Social media can be a wonderful thing — who hasn’t caught up with a long-lost friend or family member through such websites? Sites such as Facebook, or apps like Instagram, allow people to keep up with one another, regardless of time and distance.

But those sites and apps do have their dangers. One is the spread of misinformation. Video clips, links and more can “go viral” in a heartbeat, meaning that the rate at which they are shared with others magnifies exponentially in a short period of time. When misinformation goes viral, it means that many more people are spreading falsehoods. Many of those repeating, or sharing online, those falsehoods never do find out that piece of information was false to begin with, and that bit of untruth is repeated into perpetuity.

Take the case of Steven Pinker, a Harvard professor. Pinker is featured in a video clip in which he appears to making the case that “highly literate, highly intelligent” people tend to be attracted to the alt-right, a loosely connected group of self-identifying white supremacist groups. The reaction to the video from the alt-right was celebration that Pinker seemed to be validating its beliefs; the reaction from the left was condemnation of the professor.

Few bothered to look beyond the clip. They watched and reacted without doing some very basic sleuthing. Pinker was not celebrating the alt-right, instead he was a making a much larger point, one that was lost in the cherry-picking of the video clip. Pinker is a liberal, Jewish psychology professor; it’s unlikely he would express any kind of appreciation for white supremacy.

Neither side was correct in their reaction to, and sharing of, the video clip: the alt-right should not have thought themselves validated and the left should not have condemned the man. Both should have looked a little harder and found out the truth of the matter before hitting the “share” button.

It’s good advice, in general. Look a little harder. Find out the truth. In this internet age, the tool is there to find out as much information as needed to make an informed decision about whether a thing represents the truth or a falsehood. Anything can be taken out of context, but it can’t always be taken out of mind.