Based on the Oxford Dictionary satire it is called the use of humor, irony, exaggeration and mockery to present and criticize vices or attitudes mainly related to politics and issues of importance. Studies the latter highlight the difficulties that individuals encounter in distinguishing satire, which makes them think of the news as truth. This is a major concern for democratic societies as it leads to misinformation and leads people to false channels of information.
However, it is very important to distinguish between fake news and satirical articles. Fake news aims to misinform individuals, while writings with satirical content have the function of highlighting behaviors that are harmful and have a negative impact on society, through the ways mentioned above. Satire is considered a radical form of expression.
The reasons why people tend not to distinguish satirical news is due to many factors. Initially, satirical sites have succeeded quite well in copying the format and design of the web, making them look completely like real news. Second, individuals who are not familiar with the rhetoric of many politicians have difficulty recognizing satirical columns, taking them for granted.
A recent study led by Ohio State University in the US, shows that up to 28% of readers have considered a satirical news as true.
This problem is also widely encountered in Albania, even though there is no study that presents exact figures. Satirical news in the Albanian media is often presented in a different context, which makes it more difficult for the reader to make the difference. If in the USA there are portals dedicated to satirical news such as "The Onion" or "The Babiyon Bee", while in our country online media, among the usual articles, serve the public writings with notes of irony and satire.
Here we can mention sections like: "Albania account” of Res Publica, “Antena" of TemA newspaper, "Beyond" of the Unexposed, "The magic eye” which is a subcategory of 360 degrees and “Antenna outside the family” which belongs to the Albanian Free Press, where for the most part the notes that should clarify that the articles are aimed at satire and not real reporting are missing.
The Unexposed share with followers the column mentioned above, “Beyond", which mainly focuses on political situations and issues that affect our society and are current. The writings are published and distributed on social networks in the same form as other articles, without clarifying that we are dealing with satire. With a quick reading of the numerous comments, one can notice the high tendency of readers to take the presented news as completely true and consequently to be distributed in mass, further influencing misinformation.
"Unheard/ Edi Rama declares himself ambassador of the USA and 28 EU countries, in Tirana" is one of the news distributed in this section. The vast majority of commenters believed the news post, which received 50 shares and 134 comments.
"This happened too! Isolation of the popular class against the only party in the election, this was the final threat to all those who are pro-democracy, pro-EU and pro-USA, I think this statement was the result of the prisons not facing those who are pro-EUROPE", says one of the commentators on the website, who obviously failed to classify the news as untrue.
Under the guise of satirical materials, TemA newspaper in the space called "Antena” constantly shares ironic, mocking and exaggerated writings with the readers. Some of the headlines taken from this column are:Jari was amazed by Luli's ability to extract the lek from the stone"; "Jari confronts Rama for blackmailing Luli with sleep". The approach of the article, influenced by the non-formal language used but also the same subjects that are constantly part of these articles, makes it easier for the reader to classify it as fake news. However, it is not always that easy.
What can we do to make it easier for readers to separate and classify news as satirical/true?
Also mentioned above, the main reason that leads to not identifying the article and absorbing it as factual information is due to the fact that the material is not actually defined as satire and this leaves plenty of room for the reader to get confused. According to our findings, only the column "Antenna outside the family” determines at the beginning of the writing what kind of category the writing belongs to, making it easier for the reader.
*Citizens Channel/Antenela Ndrevataj
