The Disinformation Deluge Requires Experts to Step Up as ‘Truth Vigilantes'

Yahoo

29-05-2025

As they've licked their wounds since the 2024 election, Democrats have debated how to knife through an information system thick with conservative influencers 'just asking questions' and other fact-free noise, wondering if they need 'their Joe Rogan' to compete. Whatever the tactics, the unsettling reality is experts and true authorities appear ill-equipped to burst well-fortified media bubbles, in what even their allies see as an asymmetrical war.
The challenge, according to Angelo Carusone, who leads the liberal watchdog group Media Matters for America, is not just the advantage that purveyors of disinformation enjoy, but whether once-trusted institutions and the people who lead them possess the tools to effectively fight back. He sees ways, but they might require new messengers as well as fresh strategies about how and where to deploy them.
'The expert community has to think about how they're going to evangelize and buttress the credibility of their fields,' Carusone told TheWrap. 'They're going to need warriors. They're going to need truth vigilantes.'
Recent studies have painted a gloomy picture of the state of play. A Pew Research Center poll titled 'What Is News?' found that 55% of Americans say it's 'at least somewhat important for their news sources to have political views similar to their own,' further noting that the audience, not journalists, determine what constitutes 'news.'
In a related study, Media Matters explored how the most popular and influential online shows — including those that self-identify as nonpolitical — are 'overwhelmingly right-leaning' by almost three to one, despite being described in categories like comedy, entertainment and sports.
Some consciously straddle those lines, such as OutKick, whose founder, Clay Travis, parlayed his sports profile into a media platform that incorporates sports, politics and culture with a conservative bent. Fox acquired the site in 2021, and OutKick has grown significantly since then.
Others have clearly taken note of such successful examples, with the Media Matters study citing various programs that have 'repeatedly pushed pro-Trump messaging' and right-wing narratives and disinformation that seeps into 'supposedly nonpolitical spaces.'
In some respects, this dynamic is nothing new, in the same way Rush Limbaugh carved out a lucrative platform in AM radio, which then became overwhelmingly conservative, countering the 'lamestream media' and attracting an army of loyal 'ditto-heads.'
The reason the current battle is so one-sided, Carusone maintains, is the political left lacks the infrastructure to mobilize in a way that can counter voices coming from the right, which has made 'strategic investments in incubating storytellers and talent.'
Those storytellers are especially good at reaching what often get referred to as 'low-information voters,' helping them process and understand — or rather, feel as if they understand — complex hot-button issues. The talking points echo across multiple shows and personalities, bolstering conservative and pro-Trump narratives.
'They have reached such a center of gravity that they've created a feedback loop that is pulling more and more programming to the right,' Carusone said, while undermining confidence in institutions. 'Broadly speaking, credentialism just doesn't matter anymore.'
That dynamic has certainly been true in medicine and science, where figures like Dr. Anthony Fauci have been demonized as part of efforts to discredit them, a void frequently filled by purveyors of quack science and miracle cures.
Some experts in fields like science, medicine, economics and history — people who have invested lifetimes studying them, only to see dabblers swoop in with their hot takes — have taken it upon themselves to try combating disinformation, beyond the customary TV hits within like-minded silos on cable news. Dr. Neil Stone, for example, a London-based infectious diseases specialist, persistently uses his X account to attack anti-vaccine rhetoric and medical misinformation emanating from online posters while regularly calling out Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
'Social media has a really tedious habit of people dragging up junk theories which have been thoroughly debunked maybe 20-30 years ago, and now we have to do it all over again,' Stone said in one tweet, adding in another, 'RFK Jr. sounds learned and knowledgeable to the uninformed. He sounds like a fraudulent quack to experts.'
Others have sought to address disinformation head on by venturing into the belly of the beast, so to speak, confronting the 'just asking questions' crowd on their turf. Historian Douglas Murray caused a stir by engaging in a viral exchange with Rogan and comic Dave Smith, challenging Rogan for booking guests who have 'appointed themselves experts, who are not experts.'
'If you throw a lot of s–t out there, there's some point at which 'I'm just raising questions' is not a valid thing,' Murray argued, while taking Smith to task for weighing in on issues without committing the time to research them. 'You're not raising questions … You're telling people something.'
Although such moments occasionally break through via social media, the problem remains that people have limited time, and Trump and his acolytes suck up a great deal of media oxygen.
In addition, some attempts to counter the right have also prompted derision for how inorganic and tone-deaf they sound, from Democrats in Congress posting goofy videos to a recent New York Times report about a Democratic plan to 'study the syntax, language and content' necessary to engage and gain attention from young men.
Addressing that larger challenge serves as the underlying premise of MSNBC host Chris Hayes' new book, 'The Siren's Call: How Attention Became the World's Most Endangered Resource,' which argues that attention has become a major commodity, and observes that seeking to conduct serious conversations amid the current media din is 'like trying to meditate in a strip club.'
'Can't help but feel we're living through an increasingly existential war between spectacle and substance with spectacle winning battle after battle after battle,' Hayes recently posted on Bluesky, summing up the handicap that expert voices face.
Former 'Meet the Press' host Chuck Todd complemented those sentiments during a podcast with Mediaite, saying that while Trump hasn't really changed — he suggested people go read his 1990 Playboy interview as proof — the media has shifted in a manner that benefits him in 'this era of grievance-driven, outrage-driven clicks.'
Wading into that vitriol-laced swamp isn't for the faint of heart, which explains Carusone's contention that Democrats need certain kinds of 'warriors' to carry the banner. Moreover, Trump's willingness to use the levers of government against political opponents comes with certain risks.
While Trump has blustered about investigating celebrities like Bruce Springsteen and Oprah Winfrey who have spoken out against him (and endorsed Kamala Harris during the campaign), there have been more immediate and tangible manifestations of possible fallout, including reports the Federal Trade Commission is investigating Media Matters for possible collusion with advertisers against X — an action Carusone has characterized as overtly political and an effort to intimidate his group and others.
Nevertheless, Media Matters has vowed to continue fighting, with Carusone expressing the belief that despite the right's messaging edge, it's still possible to begin turning the tide.
'It is terribly depressing, but there is still a spark there that's not completely gone,' he said. 'The cancer's operable.'
The post The Disinformation Deluge Requires Experts to Step Up as 'Truth Vigilantes' appeared first on TheWrap.