Trying to understand the media and its role in society is a bit like trying to capture fog in a box. The project is covering the actual topic of media literacy in today's "post-truth" era.
The era of disinformation, uncertainty in the sources of information, era of hoaxes. Era in which the loudest voice of shocking information without source, voice of emotion using our deepest fears often matters more than the quiet, calm voice of facts, statistics, fact checked quotes and logic.
Are you “media literate”? What does it even mean? Can We believe everything in the news? They wouldn’t lie in the news, right? What is Hoax? Don’t know? Maybe you shared one. And what about propaganda? There is no such thing anymore, right?
Are you interested in the questions above? Do you want to find out more? Or do you want to share your opinion?
Czech the Facts Out is a platform and a safe space for sharing the knowledge about media literacy between Brno for You - an NGO behing Erasmus+ project Czech the Facts, and the public. In this platform you will download the booklet for youth workers in media literacy, inspiration for similiar mobilities of youth workes and lear about our methods in education of youth.
The angry voice of disinformation and hoaxes, not only on social networks, is often louder than a quiet, calm voice of facts, statistics, and verified information. Why is media literacy, media orientation, understanding manipulation techniques in the media, hoax mechanism, disinformation and factchecking essential?
The unbelievable daily pressure of information dazzles us. We're stopping to be able to filter information. We are confused and do not think about what we share in the most powerful station that bears our name and broadcasts dozens, hundreds to thousands watching: on the social network. During one activity in the training course, we presented a number to the participants and they were supposed to vote on the number. The simplest role in the world, seems to be. However, the painted number was from one side 6 and the other 9, so our participants sitting in a circle obviously did not find the solution.
Maybe we never really thought about why someone would actually share the false information and what that person would achieve by this. And, as participants came to this understanding during a previously mentioned activity where it was impossible to agree on one issue, the answer is clear: to divide the company. Against this, it makes sense to fight with all the forces we have.
We have therefore decided to go to the fight this year again, which has led to the continuation of the Erasmus + mobility of youth workers, Czech the Facts Out 2, which took place from 5 to 15 June 2017 near Brno. We taught each other, we looked for solutions and created tools together with 27 enthusiasts, youth workers and future journalists from Portugal, Italy, Lithuania, Latvia, Macedonia, Turkey, Hungary, Croatia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
The lectures were led by two coaches, Liga and Žigis Kreslins from Latvia, who became guides on the way meanwhile we learned from experience and experience. They linked the informal learning - simulation, games, discussions - with the expert blocks. We had the honor to welcome Demagog.cz, which verifies and factchets the statements of politicians. Since last year, we knew that Demagog.cz was a guarantee of a quality workshop, and participants could only agree while we practiced factchecking on texts from Lord of the Rings and later on real politicians statements. Vojtěch Boháč (formerly writing for Respekt, Právo or Referendum) and Aneta Václavíková are currently publishing investigative reports for A2larm and along with them, we went on the path of independent journalism to the field. And since we are very much admiring the work of NGO Be international, they have taken care of a session on the theme of the hoax and its connection to an explanation of hatred in society. The expert blocks have been concluded with Zvol si Info, a project of students at Masaryk University, which takes care of disseminating the importance of media literacy on a local level.
Freelance journalist for a magazine Reporter, journal Právo, Respect magazine and journal Referendum. He started with journalism in the newsroom of The Moscow Times and Ukrainian journal Segodnya. This was followed by reports from the Russian occupation of Crimea, where he was studying when Russian tanks arrived.
He worked over a year as a freelance journalist from the war in the Ukrainian Donbas, after this he was engaged in problematics of refugee crisis in the Balkans, Germany and Turkey, where he spent month during the autumn of 2015 between Istanbul and the Syrian border. And 2017? Lebanon prison, Georgia and Armenia. He is studying political science at Masaryk University and works as a lecturer of topics related to media and political engagement. Organizes summer training Academy “Hejbej”.
Demagog.CZ was created in February 2012 as a voluntary and independent initiative by students of Masaryk University in Brno. The project is indirectly inspired by American "factcheck" portals Politifact.com and Factcheck.org - the first one mentioned was awarded with the Pulitzer Prize for its work. Own approach of factchecking in Demagog.cz is however unique and outside the Czech Republic and Slovakia is incomparable elsewhere in the world.
Factchecking means verifying the truthfulness of factual statements of politicians. Demagogue works only with verifiable statements of politicians, namely those based on facts, in various forms; whether they are numerical information, the person's past actions (voting on laws or expressions), or historical events. In five years of analyzing, whether politicians speak the truth or manipulate the public, they have verified about seven and a half thousand statements.
The project "Choose the Info" aims to raise awareness of the importance of media literacy among young people, mainly in the Czech Republic, as there is not enough attention paid to this topic in The authors of the project compare the world of the internet to the supermarket where it is possible to find healthy, but also unhealthy or spoiled food that will not be good for us. "Choose the Info" then serves as your must-have media nutrition adviser.
In the huge amount of resources, media and articles, even experienced internet surfer could easily drown himself. That is exactly why there is a media handout "The Surfers Guide to the Internet", the guide will not tell anyone what to read. Everyone has their own brain. With this media guide, as a reader, you will be able to judge whether the article is good and worth it, or whether it is trying to manipulate you.
Dorota and Lucas are two trainers of Be International, which is an NGO focus on leading young people towards active citizenship. Dorota has previous experience of working for the UN in Cambodia and for the last year, she has been involved in the project that was focused on media literacy and critical thinking of young people. She is also involved in a project connecting Syrians and Czechs living in Brno. Lucas worked as a counsellor for vulnerable youth in difficult life situations and in the career development. He has spent the last year in working with young refugee children in a small town in Sweden. They are both eager to share their experience in the field of media literacy and teach you some useful tools, how to distinguish truth from hoax.
Zigimants is active in nonformal education since 1996, organized a number of own Erasmus+ trainings in Latvia with his NGO Liepajas Jaunie Vanagi, and travels around the world for hosting in different organizations and he is always learning from local wisdom. He is a free lance writer and external trainer for Latvian National Agency. Name any field and profession, and Zigimants most probably worked there for at least couple of months - street worker, policeman, actor, medical. But in the end, he dedicates his time in doing what he loves the most: educating young people and sharing his experience with them. Regarding training, he would love to have nice, friendly and motivated team ready to share and learn from each other.
My name is Liga and I created my own NGO Liepajas Jaunie Vanagi in 1993 and since then, I am working in the non formal education field. I started to work in international level in 1995 by organizing and leading different European projects and working as NFE trainer in Europe and abroad. Passing my experience and knowledge to others is my “heart work” and I believe that is visible if a person does something from the heart. Hopefully you will have the chance to see it during our common experience and sharing time - I am not coming to teach anyone but I am coming for sharing and learning.
Training course “Czech the Facts Out” took place in Drahonín u Tišnova / Czech Republic during 1.6.–10.6.2016. Participants were coming from the Czech Republic, Latvia, Spain, Romania, Turkey, Cyprus, Italy, Macedonia, Moldavia, Ukraine and Slovenia.
Trying to understand the media and its role in society is a bit like trying to capture fog in a box. The media are everywhere and are completely intertwined with our society, our politics, and our lives. Separating out the media from our own belief systems, attitudes, and perceptions is very difficult. One enduring truth about media, though, is that the greatest power of media is its ability to be anywhere in the world and beyond. As we all have become part of truly global society, we rely on the media to provide us the most vital form of currency in the world today: information. Are you “media literate”? What does it even mean? Can We believe everything in the news? They wouldn’t lie in the news, right? What is Hoax? Don’t know? Maybe you shared one. And what about propaganda? There is no such thing anymore, right? We present you project “Czech the Facts Out” targeting today’s media world. The name of the project refers to urge on checking the facts and information, that we are exposed to everyday. Program of the project was designed to help us understand, that we all live in media reality, which is affecting our opinion, our decision making. By realizing this, our journey began, together we acquired practical skills how to prevent ourselves from media manipulation. This was done trough both interactive activities, but also thanks to practical workshops with experts from the field, that helped us to orientate in complex media world, full of hoaxes, manipulation, disinformation and propaganda.
What you can find on this website? You can find what we did! During ten days we were discussing a lot and found out the idea how to spread the knowledge which we gained during the training course. So first of all we have created the promo video of the project, we did the booklet about media literacy for beginners and we also wrote kind of letters for you. We really highly recommend you to read it. We have gained all of these knowledge from the experts on media literacy. Who were the experts? Check it out in the text bellow.
There are multiple Czech and Slovak servers that contribute to systematic share of hoaxes, lies, disinformation or systematic political propaganda. Slovak teacher, activist with 25 years experience and member of regional parliament Juraj Smatana compiled a list of 42 Czech and Slovak websites that spread hoaxes, conspiracy theories or Russian propaganda and others; the list went instantly viral and has spread all over the internet. He has been featured in all important Slovak journals, such as Denník N, SME or Týždeň. Juraj Smatana is not just an active citizen engaged in the field of uncovering the media propaganda, leading discussions all around Slovakia and the Czech Republic or known all over independent media; he also worked as an external consultant of environment for previous Slovak parliament.
Demagog.CZ was created in February 2012 as a voluntary and independent initiative by students of Masaryk University in Brno. The project is indirectly inspired by American "factcheck" portals Politifact.com and Factcheck.org - the first one mentioned was awarded with the Pulitzer Prize for its work. Own approach of Demagog.cz is however unique and outside the Czech Republic and Slovakia is incomparable elsewhere in the world. Factchecking means verifying the truthfulness of factual statements of politicians. Demagogue works only with verifiable assertions of politicians, namely those based on facts, in various forms; whether they are numerical information, the person's past actions (voting on laws or expressions), or historical events.
Kremlin Watch is a strategic program of think-tank European values, which aims to uncover and combat individual instruments of Russian Federations hybrid war directed against the liberal-democratic system. The Kremlin Watch program is the only non-governmental center in the Czech Republic, which systematically engages in pro-Kremlin disinformation campaigns. Kremlin Watch Monitor is used by Czech security forces and prominent Czech journalists. Kremlin Watch regularly prepares studies on the disinformation campaign in the Czech language, but they are preparing weekly Kremlin Watch Monitor in English as well. Organization also cooperates with Central European Policy Institute, Political Capital Institute and create reports together. Kremlin Watch is involved in the audit of national security, too.
Freelance journalist for a magazine Reporter, journal Právo, Respect magazine and journal Referendum. He started with journalism in the newsroom of The Moscow Times and Ukrainian journal Segodnya. This was followed by reports from the Russian occupation of Crimea, where he was studying when Russian tanks arrived. He worked over a year as a freelance journalist from the war in the Ukrainian Donbas, after this he was engaged in problematics of refugee crisis in the Balkans, Germany and Turkey, where he spent month during the last autumn between Istanbul and the Syrian border. He currently writes mostly from Poland. He is studying political science at Masaryk University and works as a lecturer of topics related to media and political engagement. Organizes summer training Academy “Hejbej”.
Zigimants is in nonformal education since 1996, organized a number of own Erasmus+ trainings in Latvia with his NGO Liepajas Jaunie Vanagi, or travels around the world for hosting in different organizations and learns from local wisdom. He is a free lance writer and external trainer for Latvian National Agency. Name any field and profession, and Zigimants most probably worked there for at least couple months - street worker, policeman, actor, medical. But in the end, he dedicates his time in doing what he loves the most: educating young people and sharing his experience with them. Regarding training, he would love to have nice, friendly and motivated team ready to share and learn from each other.
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact us in the e-mail address below in the table.
| Name | Phone number | |
|---|---|---|
| Lukáš Šulc | lukas@brnoforyou.cz | +420 775 354 233 |
| Marie Přibylová | marie@brnoforyou.cz | +420 724 413 559 |
Křik dezinformací a hoaxů nejen na sociálních sítích bývá často hlasitější než tichý, klidný hlas faktů, statistik a ověřených informací. Proč jsou zásadní mediální gramotnost, orientace v mediálním prostoru, pochopení manipulačních technik v médiích, mechanismu hoaxů, dezinformací a také factchecking, tedy ověřování faktů? Neuvěřitelný každodenní tlak informací nás otupuje. Přestáváme filtrovat informace. Jsme zmatení a nepřemýšlíme o tom, co sdílíme na nejmocnější stanici, která nese naše jméno a vysílá desítkám, stovkám až tisícům sledujících: na sociální síti.
Během jedné aktivity jsme před účastníky namalovali číslo a oni měli hlasovat, které to je. Asi nejjednodušší úkol na světě. Ale namalované číslo představovalo z jedné strany šestku – a z druhé devítku. Naši účastníci, sedící v kruhu, se proto pochopitelně neshodli. Možná jsme se nikdy nezamysleli nad tím, proč by někdo nepravdivou informaci sdílel a čeho by tím dosáhl. Účastníci naší aktivity, kteří se nemohli dohodnout na jednom čísle, nakonec dospěli k jasné odpovědi: rozdělit společnost. A proti tomu má smysl ze všech sil bojovat.
My jsme se proto rozhodli letos znovu vykročit do boje, a tak vzniklo pokračování úspěšného tréninkového kurzu pro pracovníky s mládeží, podpořeného z programu Erasmus+. Akce nazvaná Czech the Facts Out 2 se konala od 5. do 15. června a učili jsme se na ní navzájem, hledali jsme řešení a vytvářeli nástroje, to všechno s 27 nadšenci, pracovníky s mládeží a budoucími novináři z Chorvatska, Itálie, Litvy, Lotyšska, Maďarska, Makedonie, Portugalska a Turecka.
Přednášky vedli dva trenéři, Liga a Žigis Kreslinovi z Lotyšska. Stali se našimi průvodci po cestě, na níž nám předávali své zkušenosti a zážitky, propojené pomocí neformálního vzdělávání jako jsou simulace, hry nebo diskuse s expertními bloky. Během nich jsem přivítali například zástupce organizace Demagog.cz, která ověřuje výroky politiků a s jejíž prací jsme se seznámili už loni. To, že Demagog.cz je záruka kvalitního workshopu, potvrdili i letošní účastníci, kteří si vyzkoušeli factchecking na úryvcích z Pána Prstenů a později i slovech skutečných politiků. S nezávislou žurnalistikou nás seznámili Vojtěch Boháč (v minulosti publikoval v týdeníku Respekt, deníku Právo nebo webovém Deník Referendum) a Anet Václavíková, kteří momentálně píší investigativní reportáže pro webový magazín A2larm. A jelikož velmi obdivujeme práci brněnské neziskové vzdělávací organizace Be international, pozvali jsme její zástupce, aby se postarali o přednášku na téma hoaxů, které propojili s vysvětlením příčin nenávisti ve společnosti. Na závěr expertních bloků jsme přivítali studenty Masarykovy univerzity s projektem Zvol si info, který se zabývá šířením mediální gramotnosti na lokální úrovni.
Na letošní akci jsme se naučili tolik věcí, že si není možné nechat pro sebe. A proto jsme pro všechny zájemce připravili materiály, které najdete na webu facts.brnoforyou.cz
If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact us in the e-mail address below in the table.
| Name | Phone number | |
|---|---|---|
| Lukáš Šulc | lukas@brnoforyou.cz | +420 775 354 233 |
| Marie Přibylová | marie@brnoforyou.cz | +420 724 413 559 |
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