Fake news in the age of post-truth [Hakikat-sonrası dönemde yalan haberler]

Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.26449/sssj.2048

The definition of ‘post-truth’, according to Oxford Dictionaries, is those objective facts are today less effective and powerful in structuring public or masses' opinions than personal emotions and beliefs. The prefix post- does not come to mean ‘after’ but ‘the end’ or ‘the death.’ In other words, the word ‘post-truth’ comes to indicate ‘the end, or the death of truth.’ To put it differently, feelings and emotions matter more than facts.’ Mass media and social media are the main promoters of post-truth or of the death of truth. This study investigates how much the public is exposed to and manipulated by these promoters and by fake news that comes out of these promoters. The study also aims to figure out how much literate the public is on reading fake news in the age of ‘post-truth.’ For this small-scale study, data was gathered from surveys both in Turkish and English. Data analysis and evaluation provided a small-scaled outcome to suggest further study.