Comment by myrmidon

> the cause wasn't climate change, like all the media worldwide boasted.

That was not the typical claim of news outlets.

The actual headlines were more like "How climate change affected the LA fires".

Media outlets linking small regional problems to big global issues is to be expected because that drives engagement.

There is no need for retractions/corrections because what those articles typically said was something like "climate change can facilitate extended droughts making such fires more likely", not that climate change was the cause for the fire.

You could argue that articles like that are trying to mislead the reader, and you would not be wrong. The main purpose of a lot of modern reporting is not to inform, but to bait for clicks/ads.

edit: You can see the exact same issue in this article: It kinda baits the reader into thinking that ChatGPT is monitoring chats and snitching on you to the police preemptively, but doesn't actually say that.