How to Identify "Fake News"

A story that appeared to report a terrible incident in which 16 members of a Japanese whaling crew were eaten alive by orcas (killer whales) was published in the satirical website "World News Daily Report.” Although most people visiting the site and seeing this story probably could recognize it as satire, when it was retweeted and posted on various social media sites it was mistaken by many people as a true story.

World Daily News Report (2014, May 7). Japanese Whaling Crew Eaten Alive By Killer Whales, 16 dead. Retrieved June 30, 2018, from https://worldnewsdailyreport.com/japanese-whaling-crew-eaten-alive-by-killer-whales-16-dead/

Using the excellent list of criteria for how to evaluate sources, from New Mexico State University Library (http://nmsu.libguides.com/c.php?g=381561&p=2585271), we can see that the most important question for quickly assessing the truthfulness of the killer whale story comes under the heading “Scope, Coverage & Relevance”: Who is the intended audience? Fortunately, the reader can find the answer to this question easily by scrolling to the bottom of the page where it says “World News Daily Report assumes all responsibility for the satirical nature of its articles and for the fictional nature of their content.” This tells us that the content is meant to amuse and entertain. After we know the purpose of the website questions about “authority” (i.e., the credentials of the author), the timeliness of the content, and issues related to bias, accuracy and quality are all irrelevant.

What may have led some people who read the article quickly to be fooled by it was that there was plenty of factual information about Japan’s whaling operations mentioned. Just to name a few, the factory ship was identified as the Nisshin Maru (which is accurate), and it was also correctly noted that Japan had lost a ruling in the international court forcing them to stop whaling in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.

If one did a Google search for information about killer whales eating members of a Japanese whaling crew, an article would be found from the fairly respectable British newspaper, Independent, with the headline “Japanese whaling crew 'eaten alive by killer whales, 16 dead' story definitely a hoax.” This shows the importance of checking outside sources. The Independent article points out how unlikely it would be for a representative of Greenpeace to say the following: "It seems that Japan just doesn’t give a damn about international law. The waste of life is always a shame, but the whales are not to blame here, they were only doing what they are born to do: kill for food." There were also spelling and grammatical errors in the article that should have hinted that something was wrong.

Below is a reference to the article in the Independent identifying the article as a hoax:

Eleftheriou-Smith, L. (2014, July 31). Japanese whaling crew 'eaten alive by killer whales, 16 dead' story definitely a hoax. Independent.co.jp. Retrieved June 30, 2018, from https://www.independent.co.uk/news/weird-news/japanese-whaling-crew-eaten-alive-by-killer-whales-16-dead-story-definitely-a-hoax-9639959.html

Disturbingly, some of those who had believed the story after seeing it reposted on Facebook or retweeted on Twitter thought that the Japanese whalers got what they deserved and rejoiced.

Using the Corpus "COCA" For Insights about Whaling

I searched on COCA (Corpus of Contemporary American English—https://corpus.byu.edu/coca/) for the occurrences, —within 4 spots of each other—of when the word “Japanese" collocates with “whaling.” In total 41 such collocations were found. Thirty in academic contexts, five in news, and three in spoken English, while only one was found in fiction. This was a fairly low occurrence rate in a corpus comprised of more than half a billion words.

It was discovered that all of the ones from academic contexts were found in either of two articles that were published in the years 2000 and 2002. Some further research revealed that the articles came from two issues of the same academic journal, one that is based in America but focuses on Asian affairs. These are the citations of the articles:

BAILEY, J; MCKAY, B. Are Japanese Attitudes Toward Whaling America-Bashing? A Response to Tanno and Hamazaki. Asian Affairs: An American Review. 29, 3, 148, Sept. 2002. ISSN: 00927678.

TANNO, D; HAMAZAKI, T. Is American Opposition to Whaling Anti-Japanese?. Asian Affairs: An American Review. 27, 2, 81, June 2000. ISSN: 00927678.

The article by the Japanese co-authors contends that American ethnocentrism and an anti-Japanese bias led to negative  feelings by Americans toward Japanese whaling operations. They also claim that Japan was singled out for its whaling activities even though Iceland and Norway also conducted their own annual whaling expeditions. Tanno and Hamazaki charge that environmental groups such as Greenpeace tend to focus their protests on Japan instead of the Western countries that also engage in whaling, which they believe amounts to Japan bashing.

In response to the Tanno and Hamazaki article, Bailey and McKay convincingly counter that Greenpeace, Sea Shepherd and other environmental NGOs have extensively protested against the whaling of Western countries such as Greenland, Iceland, and Norway. They assert that Japan was not exclusively targeted. In fact, Sea Shepherd sunk the Norwegian whaling vessel Willassen Senior in 2007, something it never did to a Japanese whaling vessel. Not to justify their actions, but this is evidence that the pressure put on Japan’s whaling was not evidence of any sort of racism or “Japan bashing.”

The news stories that were found in COCA ranging from 2010 to 2014, concerned the threatened legal measures taken by Australia against Japan to halt Japan’s Antarctic whaling program, which Japan was claiming to be necessary for scientific purposes. When Japan did not respond to the pressure put on it by Australia, the Australian government sued Japan in the International Court of Justice in the Hague. In 2014, a decision was made against Japan in the court. It was found that “Japan’s program failed to justify the large number of minke whales it takes under its [then] current Antarctic program.”

Because the academic articles that the COCA samples came from fell on both sides of the whaling issue, they were balanced in their stances. Only a few of them showed some bias:

* Sympathetic toward the Japanese (in the face of aggression tactics by the conservation group Sea Shepherd (3)

* Expresses opinion that environmental NPOs are more likely to target Japanese whaling operations than Norwegian ones. (2)

* Siding with environmentalists or with countries opposing whaling (pointing out that the Japanese whaling industry is heavily subsidized and “scientific whaling” a guise for commercial whaling) (3)

Iceland and Norway are in the company of Japan in terms of Whaling

Four days ago, the whaling season opened for Icelandic whaling operations. Authorities in Iceland granted a quota of 161 fin whales (one species of large whales) to whalers in 2018. Since they didn’t reach their quota last year they are allowed to kill as many as 191 fin whales, which are an endangered species. They consider it economically worthwhile to hunt whales because Japan has loosened up its restrictions on imports of whale meat from Iceland. This is a strange decision on Japan’s part because Japanese consumers cannot even eat all the whale meat that is the result of Japan’s whaling industry (disguised as “scientific whaling”).

Fin whales are huge whales that are much bigger than the minke whales that make up the majority of the ones Japanese whaling ships kill in the Southern Ocean. The diagram I’m attaching to this posting shows the relative size of the various species of whales, dolphins, and other Cetaceans.



The article in the Guardian reveals that it is mostly curious tourists in Iceland who eat whale meat at restaurants and only 35.4% of Icelanders said they supported the fin whale hunt in a poll taken in October of 2017.  Just like in Japan, environmental and animal rights groups in Iceland insist that the decision to kill whales isn’t based on “real market needs” and doesn’t reflect public opinion on whaling. It seems to be done just to keep a dying industry alive and for reasons of nostalgia. To kill harmless creatures for such reasons is senseless and cruel.

Boffey, D. (2018, April 18). Iceland sets target of 191 kills as country resumes whaling. Retrieved June 14, 2018, from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/18/iceland-sets-target-of-191-kills-as-country-resumes-whaling