It’s a known fact that the internet can lie. However, some sites can be extremely deceitful and appear to be credible.
In class, we did an interesting exercise called “Internet Bullsh*t Detector.” We had to compare two different websites that contained information about the same topic and try to figure out which one was more credible and which was inaccurate and provided false information. An article is considered unreliable when there are extremely biased authors. However, that does not mean their argument cannot be included in the a research paper; the writer would just need to mention that the author has a certain bias.
For example, this website (pictured below) seems very credible and reliable. Firstly, the website is a “.org” and has an aesthetically pleasing layout.
At a first glance, the site gives the reader a sense that the site publishers are dedicated to research about Dr. King based off the subheadings. However, if you take a closer look at the quote on the left side of the page, you’ll see that it is not related to Dr. King’s mission. Also more shockingly, the website has a link at the bottom that says “Hosted by Stormfront.” When I clicked on this link, it shows that the website is actually hosted by the KKK (photo below).
The fact that the website looked very trustworthy is problematic because most students do not completely evaluate the credibility of websites and would cite this source thinking that it is fact.
I strongly agree with my colleague, Lindsey, that doing this exercise and looking at this website was a wake up call. I know that my former self from high school, I most likely would have extracted a quote from this website and cited a quote for my high school essay. However, I’ve learned from this experience to evaluate each source carefully.
I like the website Lindsey refers to in her blog post reflection. The website provides information on how one can investigate the credibility of certain sites. They provide tactics such as “evaluating the credibility of the author, investigating the reliability of the content, and noting the timeliness and relevance of the information.” This exercise definitely has impacted the way I will look at sources in that I will look beyond website aesthetics.