"If you look at the Philippines, you look at Taiwan, or India...all kinds of stuff is published in the media. You don't know what's true, what's false, what's reliable, what's not." PM Lee Hsien Loong, CNN Talkasia, Jan 9, 2007Well, we don't need to look too far considering misinformation has always been an intrinsic part of the Singapore Media.
The article in question, "Middle class wage stagnation could lead to social instability." dated, went through 2 extraordinary modifications by the CNA:
Version 1:While this in itself isn't surprising, the underlying message behind such alterations begs several questions:
123,000 jobs were created last year and economists estimate some 70 percent of these jobs went to foreigners.
Version 2:
124,000 jobs were created last year and economists estimate some 45 percent of these jobs went to foreigners.
Version 3:
Manpower Ministry data shows that 124,000 jobs were created last year and 45 percent of these jobs went to foreigners
- The article publishes the findings of a conference being conducted by the The Institute of Policy Studies(IPS), which claims to have included independent research. Thus, it is surprising that in Version 3 the article refers to the "Manpower Ministry" (Ministry of Manpower?), which obviously is the government's statistics. Why doesn't the CNA discuss the findings of the IPS instead?
- Why aren't there specific names of sources providing these information?
- The modified articles do not have endnotes describing reasons for the changes. Why not?
- Which is the correct statistic? (IPS website still carrying the original report stating "70 percent")