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This column is an opinion piece.

Nevertheless, I am often accused in comments that my “report” is not “objective”.

No, opinion texts are not objective and should not be.

However, there is a gray area between opinion on the one hand and objective reporting on the other: analysis and reporting, for example.

And then there are reports that are inaccurate, incomplete, or one-sided.

Not to mention fake news.

Media criticism is necessary.

But more important is media literacy: the ability to differentiate between types of text, to separate opinion from facts;

distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources.

It used to be easier.

If it was in the "Brockhaus", it was probably true.

There were “leading media” that the majority trusted.

In the west, of course.

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With the Internet, all of human knowledge is just a click away.

But also a swamp of rumors and lies, hatred and fear, spread by paid trolls, activists and useful idiots.

To differentiate between serious and dubious sources and to separate opinion from facts requires a competence that has to be learned.

An evaluation of the Pisa study from 2018 shows that 15-year-olds in Germany did not learn this skill.

Less than half are able to distinguish facts from opinions when it comes to digital texts.

The Internet has long been the primary source of information for this generation.

Is it up to the teachers?

When it comes to digital competence, too, social origin plays an extremely important role.

Interestingly, anyone who reads analogue books at home is also better equipped for the Internet.

But these are mostly girls from an educated middle class.

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Boys from poorer backgrounds do worst.

That means: Those who are socially left behind run the risk of falling for populists and demagogues.

Here the school has to step in to compensate.

However, a good half of the students stated that they did not learn in class to recognize biased texts on the Internet.

This may also be due to the reading behavior of the teachers.

Almost 42 percent of teachers in schools are 50 years or older.

It is not a malicious assumption to ask how their network competence is doing.

In any case, giving all learners a tablet can be downright detrimental to democracy if the school does not teach them to use it responsibly.