A number's popularity does not prove its accuracy.
Yesterday, I reported that the oft-cited, debate-driving statistic that Americans use 500 million plastic straws a day was the product of a 9-year-old's guesstimations. Despite those shaky factual foundations, the 500 million figure has quickly spread, virus-like, across the media landscape and even into our shops and schools.
Visitors to the D.C. tea house Teaism—just a short walk from Reason's D.C. office—will be confronted with the questionable fact on a small poster adorning the restaurant's single-use straw dispenser, replete with a picture of a cute sea turtle. Meanwhile, impressionable children at the Mount Vernon Community School in nearby Alexandria, Virginia, are coming home with "Straw Wars" handouts citing the same dubious figure.
It's easy to understand how the school could have been led astray, given how ubiquitous this claim is in the media. Please see below for a list of just a few of the news outlets that have cited this "fact"—or otherwise quoted people saying it without any critical pushback—in their reporting:
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5 comments:
So what if the statistic is bogus. The fact remains that humans put a dump truck load of plastic trash in the ocean every minute. By 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. So roll your eyes at the plastic straw debate all you want. If the world doesn't collectively work this problem soon, it will be too late and humanity will reap the consequences.
Shouldn't we take a straw poll first?
Dave T: That's because they don't check their sources or the credibility behind those sources, which is totally acceptable when you're in the business of creating fake news. It's also total hypocrisy when kooks like Jim Acosta go around crying that they're being hated by the president for "doing their job." Give me a break, they haven't been doing "their job" whatsoever, which is why they are despised not only by the president but also by everyone nationwide that has to tolerate this pathetic display of news reporting. And these hypocrites have the nerve to call themselves journalists. These clowns are the furthest thing from journalists, in fact they're much much more like puppets.
You're just an idiot. So it's okay to lie and deceive people when reporting that this is a fact. What other lies do you read and say hey it's okay. If you tell a lie enough it'll start to sound like the truth. I did not have sex with that woman Miss Lewinsky
Anonymous Anonymous said...
You're just an idiot. So it's okay to lie and deceive people when reporting that this is a fact. What other lies do you read and say hey it's okay. If you tell a lie enough it'll start to sound like the truth. I did not have sex with that woman Miss Lewinsky
August 9, 2018 at 6:41 PM
I agree with you and how does he know we put a dump truck load of plastic in the ocean? I guess that stat is ok too? Any stat, whether true or not for some people, is ok as long as it furthers their agenda
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