Fake news in old-time Phoenix


Although the term "fake news" is fairly recent, the concept of it isn't. Before the internet, it was usually called "the spin", and it was a way of delivering, ahem, less than straight-forward information to people either to sell them something, or convince them of something, usually political.

In my lifetime, which spans over sixty years now, reputable newspapers and television stations have always separated out, very clearly, the news from paid advertising. It wasn't always that way, and the blur caused so much confusion that by the 1950s there were new laws to control it.


Newspapers in Phoenix, like the Arizona Republican (they dropped the "N" in the thirties) were created for two reasons: to promote a particular political agenda, and to sell advertising. By the way, in case you're wondering what newspaper was the voice for the Democratic party, it was called the Gazette. And whether you considered the news presented in each newspaper to be fearless, or fake, of course depended on you.

When I studied advertising and marketing in the 1980s at ASU, false advertising had already become something to look down on. I've always had a fascination with history, so I would often find old ads, and even old newspaper articles that were obviously flat-out lies, and it puzzled me. And then I found out that it was expected, there were no laws, and the thought was "let the buyer beware!"

If you time-travel back to Phoenix before the days of any consumer protection laws, you'd be dismayed. There were no expiration dates on food, and if you read an article in the paper about whether a particular food was healthy or not, of course it was because the article was written by that company. If that sounds familiar, it's because nowadays all of that is back, and the falseness of it can't be held back with laws, the way that it could before the invention of Podcasts, and web pages.

Speaking for myself, I like the separation of content from advertising, and I stand by that. I don't have any sponsors for this blog, and I have no intention of weaving advertising into what I write. But there's nothing stopping me from doing that, as I sit here at my computer, listening to the rain. It's simply a matter of integrity, and in spite of it all, integrity still exists.

Image at the top of this post: A 1920 Phoenix article about the new Cadillac. This was perfectly acceptable at the time.

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