A 70-year-old Republican state senator in Indiana is resigning due to suspected medical or neurological issues, but because it is so late in the election cycle, he will remain on the ballot. This story is fascinating on many levels, but how it is being reported is what initially caught my attention. It popped up on my browser’s opening screen. This was the story I saw: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/alting-will-resign-from-state-senate-amid-shoplifting-allegations/ar-AA2fL7f3?ocid=entnewsntp&pc=EDBBAN&cvid=6ad9f192ffea409582a29f327273f1ba&ei=37.
If you search the story, you’ll find seemingly conflicting information about when he is resigning. Read the fourth paragraph of the MSN report, then jump down to his statement later in the report. The information is presented in a different order.
Then go to these reports:
WFYI notes he is resigning before reporting any other details. The Indiana Capital Chronicle suggests his resignation is conditional on being re-elected in its headline and first sentence. The Journal and Courier leads with his resignation. All reference the shoplifting allegations in the headline, first sentence, or both. (The Journal and Courier story is paywalled, but you can see the headline, the first paragraph, and part of the second paragraph without paying for access.)
Unfortunately, the MSN article was the only one I found that allows readers to comment. So, from this point forward, when I reference commenters, I’m only referring to the MSN article.
My first observation is that when you compare the story’s content with the comments, you can see how commentators simplify something very complex in different ways, depending on how they interpreted what they read or skimmed. Based on the comments, some see it as plausible that he may be suffering from a medical or neurological condition. Others question his honesty. And others see him as evidence that Republicans are bad people or that if he were a Democrat, the story would have been ignored.
None of the articles establish which interpretation is correct. According to his statement, he has not been diagnosed and has no intention of remaining a state senator. Nor do the articles offer any analysis of Democrats' or Republicans' personality traits beyond what commenters say. What they find from the medical tests and what he does in the future are irrelevant to each article because they are in the future.
How does the order in which the facts are written affect the interpretation and perception of what happened? It’s hard to say since the other articles don’t have comments and this isn’t a scientific study. It’s just an observation of something that caught my attention today. People form judgments based on limited information, and the same information can mean different things to different people if you look at these comments as evidence.
So, we want facts in order to make decisions. But facts can mean different things to different people based on their perceptions of the world. It seems perceptions matter more. But does controlling the perceptions change the facts?
Hmm.