During those frightening, early moments of the L.A.-area wildfires last week, I was obsessively flipping from one local TV station to the next to get my fill of coverage. ABC 7, KTLA, KCAL (which also airs on CBS 2), NBC 4, Fox 11… they were all on the front lines, sharing valuable information while chronicling the shocking images of our neighborhoods under siege.
When I had to be in the car, I was locked into KNX NewsRadio and also checking out LAist 89.3 and KCRW. And when I needed some immediate information, like all of you, I downloaded the Watch Duty app. I was texting news with friends, and then checking in with our own Variety workspace on Slack to see how my colleagues were doing.
But where I didn’t bother to turn for legit information was Twitter/X, or really, any of the usual social media sites. Sure, I still briefly went to those sites to proudly share links to some of the Variety coverage that we worked so hard to write in the midst of the chaos. But a few years ago, I probably would have been posting on Twitter all day and night, while scrolling non-stop to pick up any morsel of news.
That feels like an entirely different social media age, however. As Twitter (oh sorry, I mean X) has been flooded by bad actors pushing misinformation, and spam has taken hold over the past year especially, I’ve let my feed fall into disuse. And last week, I had no interest in picking it up again. I hadn’t realized just how much of a non-factor X and others were during this disaster until a user on Bluesky reposted one of my stories about local TV and had this to say:
“The fires showed the importance of local journalism,” wrote @kristapor80.bsky.social. “Twitter used to be great for emergency coverage but for the fires, it was more concerned about debating DEI than helping provide valuable information. Bluesky is not yet up to the task for breaking local coverage. Local TV stepped up.”
And that’s it in a nutshell. I remember the early days of Twitter, when it was a truly useful resource to find out, in real time, what was happening both globally and locally. Here in L.A., we’d head straight to Twitter whenever we felt the earth shake — and could quickly figure out if it was an earthquake or just a heavy truck driving down our street.
Perhaps most notably, the Boston bombings in 2013 were a landmark moment when people started describing Twitter as “the new public square.” Immediate photos and visuals of the attacks helped people quickly learn what was happening, while authorities utilized the platform to spread safety warnings.
Cut to 2025, and now our social media leaders are getting rid of fact checking, and their creations are filled with lies, fake photos and total fabrications. I didn’t go to X for my news because I knew I wouldn’t find it there, buried between the MAGA propaganda, hate speech and accounts I don’t follow but now clog my feed. Then there’s all the A.I.-generated lies, like the heavily shared photo of the Hollywood sign on fire, which we all know didn’t happen. But I’m sure there are plenty of people around the country who saw that fake pic and thought it was true.
What a time for Mark Zuckerberg to announce he’s out of the fact checking business, allowing more lies to run free. I must admit, however, that in the days that have followed, Meta’s Instagram has been at least a place to see Los Angeles residents share how to support those who lost their homes, and where to donate. Local businesses that have stepped up are using the platform to let residents know where those most impacted can get a free meal, a bag of toiletries or even where they can spend an afternoon (like LACMA or Vidiots) on a mental health break to decompress, watch a movie or see some art.
That’s useful information from a social standpoint. But for true, journalistically sound specific news about the fires and their aftermath, this week has been a reminder, once again, of how important local media is — and what we lose when newspapers and TV stations downsize or even go out of business.
Local TV news often gets derided — sometimes justifiably — for focusing too much on the low-hanging fruit of murders, car chases and fires. It takes a lot of effort and years of source-building to cover the byzantine bureaucratic puzzles of City Hall or the school district; it’s a lot easier to shine a helicopter camera on a speeding vehicle and just let ‘er rip.
But where local TV can still shine is a disaster like the L.A. fires, where information is key — but then so is showing a little humanity through it all. As I wrote in a piece last week, this was personal for so many of these reporters as they covered evacuations and fires in their own neighborhoods. And yet, they worked 15 hour days covering the story, often getting dangerously close to the flames to give us all a view of what was going down. Some even put down the camera to help when they saw fellow Angelenos in distress.
“In times like this, we think of ourselves as emergency responders,” KABC president/GM Wendy Granato recently told me. “If we don’t go in and tell people what’s going on, who will? That is the definition of local news and local journalism, especially when lives are on the line and when information is crucial. I always feel positive about what we do, but in times like this, I hope it resolidifies to the public how hard we work, how hard we try, how much we care and how much we’re needed.
Local news outlets were there to cover important press conferences, share details on what specific neighborhoods had been impacted by the flames and keep us informed of weather patterns and what to expect with the Santa Ana winds. They were there to explain what was going on with the confusing evacuation warnings that were going off. They’re walking us through the confusing details of what comes next with insurance and rebuilding.
And perhaps even more importantly, they’ve started fact checking all the disgusting, vicious mistruths being propagated all over social media and on right-wing networks like Fox News. Let’s think about that again for a moment: Just as we need the truth more than ever, this is when Facebook and its ilk have decided to turn the keys over to the propagandists.
As we head into a new presidential administration that seems to like utilizing social media to spread distortions and fabrications, I fear for everyone who has been indoctrinated by these malicious players. More than ever, the L.A. fires remind us why we need a vibrant framework of broadcast, print and online journalism. Because that once promising social media public square has, instead, turned into a social media public hellhole.
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