Karl Kraus Quotes

Journalists say a thing that they know isn't true, in the hope that if they keep on saying it long enough it will be true.

The truth is not wonderful enough to suit the newspapers; so they enlarge upon it, and invent ridiculous embellishments.

In this crazy political business, at least in our times, a lie unanswered becomes truth within 24 hours.

Of all newspaper presses, I never heard anyone deny that the American is the worst.... [N]othing is easier than to make the people know only one side of a question; few things are easier than to keep them altogether from the knowledge of any particular affair; and, worse than all, on them [the American people] may easily be practiced the discovery that lies may work their intended effect, before the truth can overtake them. It is hard to tell which is worse; the wide diffusion of things that are not true or the suppression of things that are.

Editorialists who tell downright lies in order to advance their own agendas do more to discredit the press than all the censors in the world.

Let's talk about real fake news. If this were about a religion or if this were about a Muslim ban, then how come the largest Muslim nation on the planet...Indonesia, exactly, isn't listed?

I myself was to experience how easily one is taken in by a lying and censored press and radio in a totalitarian state... a steady diet over the years of falsifications and distortions made a certain impression on one's mind and often misled it.

The National Enquirer is complete garbage, it is total lies, it was planted by Donald Trump's henchmen, and I don't think the people of Wisconsin or the people of America have any interest in tabloid trash.

Pick the topic you like: the Middle East, international terrorism, Central America, whatever it is - the picture of the world that's presented to the public has only the remotest relation to reality. The truth of the matter is buried under edifice after edifice of lies upon lies. It's all been a marvelous success from the point of view in deterring the threat of democracy, achieved under conditions of freedom, which is extremely interesting. It's not like a totalitarian state, where it's done by force. These achievements are under conditions of freedom.

I think everyone knows the news has become ridiculous. It's entertainment driven.

I think the media spends a lot of time fooling itself.

News has become entertainment. Once that happens, a whole series of horrific events start to happen, whether it's the lack of dissemination of something that can inform you or something that actually negatively impacts society.

I know every politician spins the truth a little.

How is the world ruled and led to war? Diplomats lie to journalists and believe these lies when they see them in print.

The media lies to us all the time, and we always believe the media.

Well, I mean, the real attack on truth is tabloid journalism in the United States.

The mainstream media has its own agenda. They do not want to print the facts. They have an agenda, they have a slant, they have a bias. It is outrageous to me.

No longer is there a quest for the truth so much as there is this apparent need to present both sides of an issue even if one is nothing but lies and distortions.

Sensationalism sells: Don't let the facts get in the way of a good story.

Fair and balanced is doublespeak for bite-out-chunks-of-truth until only irrelevancy is left, byte-sized, entertaining irrelevancy

Sometimes hyperbole and lying are not easily distinguishable [in politics].

The listeners can see through our manipulation of the news too clearly. It is all laid on too thickly.

Yellow journalism is defined by prominent headlines that screamed excitement, often about comparatively unimportant news; a lavish use of pictures, many of them without significance; faked interviews and stories; a Sunday supplement and color comics; and a more or less ostentatious sympathy with the 'underdog,' with campaigns against abuses suffered by the common people.

What you say about the newspapers is very true ... They are indeed a curious compound of truth and untruth. I am so used to newspaper nonsense and attacks that I do not mind it in the least....

I operate on the principle that the mass media will never be accurate. They never have been. When did yellow journalism begin? After all, their basic principle is, simplify and exaggerate.