Skepticism; The Most Desirable Trait on the Internet!

Today's Lesson on credibility on the internet. Be skeptical. The photo attached is a post by a writer. It has the raised the ire of a lot of NLers, particularly but not only, NL writers. It was, in fact, posted by a NL author. It's also, a complete misrepresentation of the facts. How do I know? I researched. The reason I researched? I found it too unbelievable to be true.

 The very first line is the biggest flaw. The writer of this loses credibility the moment he typed, "The Federal Government has decided," because that implies this is something new. and underhanded just decided by the government. This is not something the "Federal government has decided, " at all but rather a methodology for conducting a survey that was employed a LONG time ago that was informed by suggestions by writers. How do I know? Well because the very letter that he used to "prove" his point has the author of the letter(Chair of the Writers Union of Canada, Marjorie Doyle) stating that she became aware of this a number of years ago.

I also read the website of the PLU who he claims is discriminating against NL writers and guess what, only 7 English speaking and 7 French-speaking library systems were ever included in this survey in a given year. This is not so much discrimination, it is methodology. 

Now, you know, it may well be time to revisit this and it might be time to have a discussion on how this standard was decided upon but it is disingenuous to state this as a "NL vs Canada" issue and a "discrimination" issue, when it is not and in fact, many other small library systems are left out of the sampling. Without knowing exactly why this is done this way I'm not willing to accept that it should continue and that it isn't unfair to NL writers, however, I'm not going to be angry about a matter until I have the facts, and when I do have them, I'm certainly going to aim my anger, if it comes, squarely at the right people. 


Read, research and always be skeptical. And no, the Federal government has not decided to discriminate against NL writers because there are too many of us. It sounds silly because it is silly, and a complete fabrication. Now I have no affiliation or particular fondness for the PLU and I have absolutely no issue with the union but I have huge problems with fact distortion and fabrication. Enjoy your day and keep it honest people and always, always be skeptical. Cheers.