Selective Emphasis: Truth or Manipulation?

November 24 2025
By: Traci D. Long

I recently reposted a Facebook memory from 9 years ago stating that I was done with the misleading and false headlines from Yahoo and deleted my email with them. I don’t recall now what I read, but I knew it to be false since I had been there myself and saw what happened, and it was far from the first time they made a ‘clickbait’ headline. How many people don’t bother to read the context (which was also misleading) and simply accept the headline as fact?

In early August, Shawn complained that many of his recent flights had been hours delayed, and requested that we keep an eye on schedules and alternates until things settled back into what is normal. With their hub in Houston, United (previously Continental) has always been the preferred airline for us. Less than a week after our conversation, I received a United newsletter with the headline exclaiming, "NYC's most on-time airline this summer."

I seriously laughed out loud. With such a claim reaching a large amount of their frequent traveling audience, why would they emphasize that detail while other locations were experiencing such heavy delays? Because occasional travelers (nearly 50%) wouldn't have a clue, and could easily be impressed by this headline. As they should be – that is quite impressive, but relatively unimportant unless you travel from there.

Cherry-picking information or data is understandable to highlight, but doesn't give you an overall understanding of performance. NYC's on-time stats mean nothing when all other locations were failing to meet standards. Luckily, this kind of spinning is much easier to verify now than it was 9 years ago.

Every time we communicate a leader's message, it either adds to or diminishes the brand experience. What messages are you sending to your organization? Does it create trust or skepticism?

"Half the truth is often a great lie." — Benjamin Franklin