A newspaper column published this week argues that the Dominican Republic faces a danger that goes beyond traditional illiteracy: a flood of digital noise that leaves even people who can read unable to understand, verify or analyze what crosses their screens.
The column points out that traditional illiteracy in the Dominican Republic stands at around 6 percent of the population. It asks what use literacy is if people cannot comprehend, check or critically weigh what they read, arguing that never before has access to information been so wide, nor has it been so easy to publish a claim, dress up an opinion as news, or spread a falsehood to millions of people within minutes.
A media literacy gap
According to the column, the real issue in a hyperconnected society is not simply having access to new digital platforms, but knowing how to decode the messages they carry, telling truth from deception, and recognizing when a message is produced by a group of interests that has strayed from the common good. It argues that both traditional and non-traditional media, as well as formal education, have a role to play in giving every citizen, regardless of social class, age, race or religion, access to media literacy.
The column sets out warning signs of a broken information environment. It says there is a problem when a controversial statement receives more coverage than an in-depth investigation simply because it draws more views, and when a headline exaggerates something the article itself does not actually support.
The baseball player example
As an example, the column cites a dispute between a baseball player and his wife that occupied days of media coverage, while decisions affecting millions of people received only minutes of attention. It says fake news, deepfakes, meaning manipulated videos or audio, and quotes taken out of context have become an everyday occurrence, making it essential to train citizens to interrogate what they see.
Six questions for readers
The column proposes six questions the public should learn to ask of any piece of information: who is saying it, what is the source, is it information or interpretation, does an independent version of events exist, does it present documents or investigations rather than mere assertions, and, in the case of video, does it lean on emotions such as fear, surprise or indignation to stop people from thinking. It notes that a video can be genuinely authentic in its footage while still lying about what it claims to show.
The column argues these six questions could strengthen critical thinking about media, education and social participation in a fast-changing technological environment. Its goal, it says, is not to tell audiences what to believe but to teach them how to work out why they should believe it. The column expresses hope that these questions could be built into primary and secondary school curricula, with media literacy and reading comprehension woven across every subject rather than taught as a separate topic.
Digital natives and baby boomers
The column says both digital-native generations and baby boomers need to be taught critical thinking, learning to pause before sharing information and to question before believing it.
Misinformation, disinformation and AI
The challenge is made harder, the column says, by the speed at which artificial intelligence is developing. It argues citizens have an obligation, in an uncertain information landscape, to distinguish misinformation, false content spread by someone who may sincerely believe it is true, from disinformation, a message deliberately spread to deceive. It also calls for distinguishing propaganda, straightforward information and advertising from one another, and for awareness of when a source uses statistics to steer people toward misleading conclusions.
The point, the column stresses, is not to tell people which outlets to trust and which to dismiss, but to build a habit of investigating, questioning and thinking critically.
It closes by arguing that the citizen most easily manipulated today is no longer the person who cannot read or write, but the person who reads everything, shares everything and questions nothing, adding that people need to be certain of what is reality, fiction and manipulation.
