ABC News is a brand of Disney Advertising. It is lead by a conservative billionaire, and is not a left-biased organization.

Fact-checking is an essential tool in fighting the waves of fake news polluting the public discourse. But if that fact-checking is partisan, then it only acerbates the problem of people divided on the basics of a shared reality. Dave Van Zandt has admitted to a US-centric bias in MBFC’s ratings. It’s fairly easy to notice an American conservative lean in MBFC’s bias ratings, as well as their credibility ratings.

A consortium of fact-checking institutions have joined together to form the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN), and laid out a code of principles. You can find a list of signatories as well as vetted organizations on their website. MBFC is not a signatory to the IFCN code of principles. As a partisan organization, it violates the standards that journalists have recognized as essential to restoring trust in the veracity of the news. Partisan fact-checking sites are worse than no fact-checking at all. Just like how the proliferation of fake news undermines the authority of journalism, the growing popularity of a fact-checking site by a political hack like Dave M. Van Zandt undermines the authority of non-partisan fact-checking institutions in the public consciousness.

Please choose “Kill” – to stop giving free advertising to MBFC on Lemmy.

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