Crack the Narrative
Don't inherit a political conclusion. Examine the evidence.
Political communication is often designed to produce an emotional reaction before you have time to evaluate the evidence. This framework slows that process down.
Information that produces certainty too quickly is worth examining.
Not because the conclusion is necessarily wrong — but because fast certainty is a sign that something is producing an emotional reaction rather than engaging your analysis. This framework gives you six questions to apply before accepting or sharing any political claim.
It applies equally to claims you find agreeable and claims you find outrageous. That consistency is the point.
Crack the Narrative
Don't inherit a political conclusion. Examine the evidence.
Political communication can deploy any of the following — often simultaneously:
- Selective outrage
- Selective examples
- Emotionally loaded language
- Omission of context
- Misleading comparisons
- Viral clips without context
- Anonymous claims
- Unverified statistics
- Guilt by association
- False binaries
Analysis Framework — Apply to any claim you encounter
What exactly is being claimed?
Restate it in your own words. Strip the emotional language.
Who made the claim?
Are they a primary witness, a political actor, a journalist, or anonymous?
What primary evidence exists?
Court records, parliamentary records, official documents, credible journalism, verifiable data.
What information is missing?
Historical background, base rates, competing explanations, omitted data.
Is there credible evidence pointing another way?
Seek out the strongest opposing view before reaching a conclusion.
What can reasonably be concluded?
Be comfortable with "insufficient evidence" as a valid conclusion.
Recognising Propaganda Patterns
Expressing outrage about an incident when done by one political side but ignoring or excusing the same behaviour when done by the other side.
Using words that produce emotional reactions (traitor, terrorist, fascist, anti-national) without providing the evidence needed to justify those terms.
A statement may be technically accurate but produce a false impression because key context — base rates, prior events, counter-evidence — is omitted.
Comparing two situations that appear similar but differ in crucial ways — different legal context, different scale, different evidence standard.
Implying that a person is discredited, extremist or wrong because they share a characteristic with someone who is discredited, extremist or wrong.
Precise-sounding numbers (73% agree, 10 crore jobs) presented without a source, methodology or comparison baseline that would allow them to be evaluated.
Presenting a complex situation as having only two possible positions: you are with us or against us, you support this policy or you support our enemies.
Information attributed to unnamed sources, leaked documents without chain of custody, or screenshots without verifiable origin.