When Reality Is Up for Debate – and AI Is Writing the Script

​Tantalizing clickbait content. Implausible deepfake videos. Bewildering AI-generated narratives for entertainment purposes only. A modern president who incessantly dismisses reports as “fake” news. Burgeoning binary media outlets. Conspiracy theorists fleecing their respective flocks. For a career journalist like me, this is deeply concerning – almost apocalyptic, and I’m not being hyperbolic when I say that. 
 
Nearly half of Americans are more concerned than excited about artificial intelligence creeping into daily life. AI-generated content is everywhere and highly deceptive, making it harder to know what to trust and fueling fear of the technology itself. There’s now software to detect whether or not content and images are AI-generated, which I can imagine will be employed by schools as much as newsrooms in the future.
 
We’ve reached a tipping point where it’s hard to decipher reality from fiction when we process information. And so, it’s not surprising most Americans don’t trust mainstream media and buy into conspiracy theories – or both.
 
The irony, of course, is that this comes at a time when legacy media influence has significantly waned while social-media influencers, bloggers and podcasters have raised their respective profiles. The inmates are finally running the prison!
 
We used to trust the likes of Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite, staples of CBS Television News, the so-called Tiffany Network gold standard of balanced information delivery. Then came the 1987 repeal of the Fairness Doctrine, ushering in the current age of media polarization wherein magnates like Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch learned that it was easier to monetize content by catering to fragmented audiences rather than airing what was actually in the public’s best interest.
 
Now everyone digests the day’s events in their own echo chamber of safety. Young people receive their news from abbreviated TikTok or YouTube video clips featuring influencers rather than actual subject matter experts. Critical thinking is in short supply, which only serves to widen deep divisions in an already divided nation.
 
It’s not surprising that so many of us are turning to technology for comfort – or to self-medicate through a larger existential crisis involving fractured families and split societies. Nearly one-third of Americans say they’ve had an intimate or romantic relationship with an AI chatbot, while one in three teens say they use AI companions for relations or social interaction.
 
The groundbreaking movie “Her” from 2013 is playing out daily in countless lives – a scenario that at the time seemed confined to science fiction. American society is littered with legions of lost souls. But there’s also a sinister side to some of these interactions, with “trusted” bots encouraging and even instructing depressed or emotionally fragile companions to commit suicide.
 
Trying to make sense of all these troubling developments is disheartening and depressing, especially for someone like me who made a lifelong commitment to always seeking out the truth. I have no agenda other than that simple goal, nor am I beholden to any ideology or political party. I wish more of my fellow journalists were wired this way, but gripping passionate beliefs too tightly tends to cloud the quest for objectivity while most of us feel enormous pressure to pick a side or take a stance.
 
Truth has always required effort, but now it requires vigilance: questioning sources, resisting easy narratives and valuing accuracy over affirmation. Journalism, at its best, is not about feeding outrage or chasing clicks, but about illuminating reality with discipline and humility. If we are to navigate this distorted landscape without losing our collective grip on what is real, both journalists and the public must recommit to that standard. Otherwise, the line between truth and fiction won’t just blur – it will disappear altogether.