Dr. Roderick Flynn:

I have been writing about this for years for the Media Pluralism Monitor. Media literacy is not built into the primary or secondary school curriculums. It is done in both situations but it is largely - especially at secondary level - done because of the interests of a particular teacher. It is part of English but it is an option. They might do some media literacy. It is bizarre to me that it is not a core subject. I have had conversations with people who are involved in curriculum design. Their argument is "Well, what would you take out?". I do not know the answer to that question. As Mr. Greene says, it is at the point of consumption where disinformation or misinformation has its impact. Incidentally, we need to be teaching people to be able to make a distinction between misinformation and disinformation in all media; not just in social media but also in legacy media. Newspapers sometimes make mistakes. Radio sometimes misleads, consciously or otherwise. It can happen. In bringing a consciousness of that, we need to be not sceptical but careful and alert to how meaning is made. That has to be taught from four years of age.