The following is a priesthood lesson I presented on January 10, the Sunday after the seditious attack on the U.S. Capitol. Because of the events of the week, I felt strongly the need to share some insights into how I choose reliable sources of information, drawing three parallels between my job as editorial director at BYU Studies and my responsibility as a citizen to be informed on important issues. Because of the nature of the topic, this was not a discussion; it was a presentation. Afterward, some members of my elders quorum asked for a copy. I figured others might also benefit, so I've decided to post it here.
The lesson I was asked to prepare was based on a conference talk about prayer by President Ballard. It included the following statement: “On Sunday, October 20, I spoke to a large gathering near Boston, Massachusetts. As I was speaking, I was prompted to say, ‘I plead with you . . . to pray for this country, for our leaders, for our people, and for the families that live in this great nation.’” Considering what has happened since October 20, I think President Ballard was inspired in making this plea.
So, early in the week I was planning on leading a discussion on prayer. Then Wednesday came along, and I felt strongly that a lesson on prayer was not very urgent. Instead, I felt that we need to talk about some issues that lie behind the disturbing events of Wednesday. One of the main causes of the violent attack on the U.S. Capitol this past week is the spread of disinformation. We might ask ourselves why so many people, in the face of overwhelming evidence, including testimony from those who know best, insist on believing unfounded claims. I think it has a great deal to do with where people choose to get their information, and this is a problem we can and must address.
The Church is aware of this problem among Latter-day Saints. As [elders quorum president] Justin’s email yesterday indicated, the Church recently made some significant additions to the Handbook. One of them reads as follows: “In today’s world, information is easy to access and share. This can be a great blessing for those seeking to be educated and informed. However, many sources of information are unreliable and do not edify. Some sources seek to promote anger, contention, fear, or baseless conspiracy theories. Therefore, it is important that Church members be wise as they seek truth. Members of the Church should seek out and share only credible, reliable, and factual sources of information. They should avoid sources that are speculative or founded on rumor.”
There is a distinction we need to make, between misinformation and disinformation. Misinformation is simply inaccurate information. It can be harmless, or it can be harmful, but it is usually unintentional. Disinformation, on the other hand, is false information that is spread with the intent to deceive. Generally, its purpose is to inflame rather than inform, and those who spread it usually have ulterior motives. We have seen a marked increase in both kinds of false information the past few years.
Finding and identifying reliable
sources of information is something I know a bit about.
For the past fourteen and a half years, I have been the editorial director at BYU Studies. Most of you don’t know what BYU Studies is, but it is an office at BYU that publishes the oldest Mormon studies journal, now called BYU Studies Quarterly. It has been published since 1959. It is a scholarly journal, so most of the content is written by professors, but it is not written to a scholarly readership. It is written for a general, college-educated audience. Because we represent the university and the Church, we have to be careful about what we publish, so we rely on double-blind peer review. Double-blind means that the author of an article doesn’t know who the reviewers are, and the reviewers don’t know who the author is. We are also one of the few remaining scholarly journals that source check everything. We hire student interns and train them well, and they check all the sources and quotes and facts in every article. BYU Studies is also multidisciplinary, so, although it is a Mormon studies journal, we publish material from a variety of disciplines, everything from physics and engineering to music and literature. We also publish a lot of LDS history. I’d say that almost half of what we publish is Church history. In my position as editorial director, I’m a sort of gatekeeper. I have to make sure that what we publish is reliable and also that it does not embarrass or harm the university or the Church. So, as part of my job, I feel it is necessary to stay informed and keep up to date on Mormon studies, a field that is expanding rapidly. That means I read a lot. I read Dialogue and the Journal of Mormon History and Mormon Historical Studies. I look at the Religious Educator. I check in daily to see what’s new in the “bloggernacle” (the LDS blogs). And I read a lot of books. I counted the other day, and in the past 15 years, I’ve read 75 books in Mormon studies. These aren’t “Church books.” These are books about Mormonism, written by scholars and published mostly by reputable university presses like Oxford University Press or the University of Illinois.
So, let me draw some parallels between how I deal with Church history and how we ought to deal with current events, especially politics. I’ll make three points.
1. LDS history is very messy. This is because life is complex, and real people are flawed, even prophets. Over the years, the Church has produced a lot of sugar-coated, sanitized history. It’s not very helpful, and indeed, it can cause problems for members when they encounter complexity and real-life messiness. Fortunately, the Church is doing better today, especially through projects such as the Joseph Smith Papers and Saints. But let me share something that has helped me in my effort to grapple with the difficult aspects of Mormon history. It’s a very simple idea, but I find it profound: “Events do not tell their own stories.” People tell stories, and people are biased. They have agendas. They are selective in which information they include and what they leave out. This means that all history is interpretation. This also means that in our search for truth we somehow need to find ways to recognize the biases and agendas of historians and to see behind the curtain, as it were, so that we can filter out as many impurities as we can. And the only way I know to accomplish this is to simply read a lot of history. When you see events through the eyes of many interpreters, you start to get a more complete picture; you become aware of which sources historians are using, how reliable those sources are, and how the historians are employing them. You also come to recognize the spin historians put on their accounts, or the choices they made in deciding what to emphasize and what to leave out, and this helps you sort out what rings true from what doesn’t. If you do this long enough, you develop a sort of sixth sense that allows you to recognize questionable conclusions or flimsy arguments. You sense that something isn’t quite right, so you dig into sources to figure out what’s off and why.
2. I’m not a fan of apologetics. Apologetics is the undeviating defense of a person or institution, come hell or high water. The problem with apologists is that they arrive at a conclusion first, and then look for evidence to support it. This is backward from the way good scholarship works. But it means that apologists inevitably cherry-pick information. They use what they like and discard anything that might disprove their preformed conclusions. Let me be blunt about this. I reached a point many years ago where I realized that it is not my responsibility to defend everything Joseph Smith said or did, nor is it my responsibility to defend everything the Church says or does. It is my responsibility to defend truth, whatever form it may take. Patrick Mason, director of the Mormon Studies program at Utah State University, said this about apologetics: “For too many years we refused to yield to dissenters and critics even an inch of territory—including some pretty rocky, barren outposts that should never have fallen within our borders and definitely weren’t worth defending.”
3. The world of scholarly publications has guardrails. One of the most important is peer review. We ask experts in various fields to review articles that come in. Quite often they point out flaws in the author’s argument that we editors, being nonspecialists, would not be aware of. Sometimes peer reviewers are wrong. Sometimes they disagree with each other. After all, they are human and are biased too. But usually they are right or at least have valuable insights, and they keep us from publishing material that is irresponsible or just plain wrong.
These points about scholarship in general and history in particular have parallels to current events. If you think about it, current events are also history, just very recent.
1. Remember, “Events do not tell their own stories,” even current events. Someone needs to interpret them to show us what they mean. So, how do we know which interpretations to trust? My answer is the same as for history. We have to put in a lot of work and tap many sources. Some sources, however, we should ignore from the outset. If a source is known to play fast and loose with facts, ignore it. If a source seeks to inflame rather than inform, be very suspicious. I use the same approach with current events that I do with LDS history. I’m sort of a news junkie. I look at the Deseret News online every morning; I subscribe to the Salt Lake Tribune, New York Times, Washington Post, and, for more in-depth reporting, New Yorker magazine; I listen to NPR in the shower every morning and sometimes while I drive; I watch NBC News most evenings and check in on CNN. I also read books about current events and important issues. Let me say something about mainstream media. It may tilt one way or the other, but reputable news sources follow a code of journalistic ethics. They also have editors and producers who act as gatekeepers. Websites and extremist media outlets do not. One thing I appreciate about the Washington Post and New York Times is that they publish columnists from across the political spectrum. Even though I lean left, I regularly read at least eight conservative columnists: George Will, David Brooks, Jennifer Rubin, Bret Stephens, Michael Gerson, Max Boot, Ross Douthat, Kathleen Parker. I don’t always agree with them, but I find them insightful and informative. The mainstream media has recently been called the enemy of the people, but please understand that the free press has always been indispensable in maintaining our freedoms and holding government accountable. That’s why freedom of the press is enshrined in the First Amendment. And it’s why I worry about the trend of newspapers being replaced by untethered online media.
2. On apologetics: If you read or watch or listen to sources that defend only one person or one side, you can be sure that they are cherry-picking information and feeding you a preformed conclusion that may tell only half of the story. Be wary of extremist views that seek to inflame rather than inform. Be aware that everyone has biases. So, read and watch and listen with that in mind. And please be cautious of the all-or-nothing mentality that treats politics as a team sport. If you find yourself defending the indefensible, ask yourself why.
3. Look for guardrails. Pay attention to which media outlets have credible fact checkers. This is a valuable service. The other day Mitt Romney published a fine editorial in the Deseret News. I have never voted for Romney and probably never will. He and I disagree about most policy questions. But we inhabit the same reality most of the time and could have a rational discussion about most issues. This is not true, however, of people who inhabit a universe built on disinformation and conspiracy theories. Let me quote Senator Romney: “I believe that we should watch and read, not just sources we tend to agree with but also sources we disagree with. If Fox is your regular diet, watch NBC, CNN or ABC now and then. Conversely, if MSNBC is your regular, don’t make it exclusive. We need to broaden our reading as well. I note that news organizations like The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times make an effort to get the facts and when they make a mistake, they acknowledge it. Social media has no fact-checkers, no editors and often doesn’t even disclose who actually wrote a post.” I endorse Romney’s wisdom wholeheartedly.
I’ll close by quoting again the
Church’s Handbook: “Many sources of information are unreliable and do not
edify. Some sources seek to promote anger, contention, fear, or baseless
conspiracy theories. Therefore, it is important that Church members be wise as
they seek truth. Members of the Church should seek out and share only credible,
reliable, and factual sources of information. They should avoid sources that
are speculative or founded on rumor.”
