CNN Responds to My Application for its Fake News Position

I'm not out of the running yet, but they said there seems to be a 'misunderstanding' with my application.

By Rachel Alexander Published on January 25, 2017

The following is the CNN human resources department’s reply to Rachel’s application for their new position of fake news editor. You can find her application here.

Dear (not to imply a level of intimacy that would make you uncomfortable) Ms., Miss, Mrs. Alexander (not to imply a marriage status or non-fluid gender identity, not that there’s anything wrong with that, if that’s who you feel yourself to be, and not to exclude Mr.),

We have reviewed your request to join our team (not that it’s a competitive type of team, everyone is equal here) as a reporter on fake news.

You must have misunderstood what we are looking for. We don’t run fake news here. We consider ourselves a ministry of truth, as the most trusted cable news network. We are looking to expand the work that our fake news expert Brian Stelter is doing.

We are looking for someone with a Media Matters, Snopes or Politifact approach to fake news. This means calling out biased, fake news sources like Fox News, The Washington Times and the Drudge Report. Or The Stream, a right-wing Christian site based in Dallas.

For example, Politifact has a great article entitled, “Fake News Purveyors Cheer On, Echo Trump Team’s Lies About Inauguration Crowd Size.” Not only does the article call out several offensive sites, but it goes further and notes that the sites all make revenue from Google advertising, so they are violating the company’s terms of service by providing misleading content. Politifact went the extra mile and is trying to shut these sites down.

To be honest, Ms./Miss/Mrs./Mr. Alexander, we don’t think you could do this. We think you’d be too biased.

Further, we want our new reporter to reach even higher levels of accuracy and zealousness. A really good reporter would go beyond what the Politifact article did and break down the Trump team’s inauguration numbers, explaining why they were fake. Or better still, keep repeating that the numbers were fake with smug authority and furrowed brow until it becomes accepted common wisdom.

We don’t think you understand that readers can only trust reputable sources like CNN, the New York Times and Huffington Post. You can generally distinguish a reputable site from the riff-raff because we use the AP Stylebook (the Times has its own stylebook, but it’s very similar). This guarantees our objectivity. For example, AP style requires the neutral term “anti-abortion” instead of the biased term “pro-life.”

The fake news sites use prejudicial terms like “Islamic terrorism” and “illegal immigrant,” so they should be easy to spot. We were alarmed to notice when reviewing the writing you submitted that you used these terms. We do not hire bigots who think that Muslim freedom fighters are “terrorists” and that undocumented visitors to this country are “illegal immigrants.”

We’re afraid we also doubt your ability to recognize fake news. How good are you at parsing every word in order to find one that looks off? President Trump’s Twitter feed should be a gold mine for this position, but we suspect you do not agree.

Take this tweet, for example, where Trump brags about meeting with “automobile industry leaders.” That looks objective, right? But that’s the genius of rightwing fake news. Who are these men really? What would the objective journalist call them? They’re greedy, wealthy white men and polluters largely responsible for the massive increase in manmade global warming.

This position requires the ability to create effective sound bites, in order to make sure the fake news exposés go viral. The stronger phrase “fake fake news” should be reserved to describe the worst offenses, like any story about someone connected to the Clintons who died under mysterious circumstances. “Trump fake news machine” should be used anytime the president says anything incorrect, which seems to be every other tweet.

Although it looks like your skills and the needs of CNN do not mesh, feel free to reapply and submit some samples of your work exposing the “real fake news.” Getting published in Media Matters will improve your chances with us. We hired Stelter in part because he came from one of the world’s most honest publications, The New York Times.

In keeping with our tolerance and diversity policies, we write you in peace and solidarity with all the oppressed peoples of the earth, the whales and all endangered creatures, and especially with the Palestinians oppressed by Israel.

Right on, sister (or brother if you wish)!

Your comrades at CNN

Follow Rachel on Twitter at Rach_IC

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