Americans largely fault the media for increasing polarization

I think part of this paradox arises from the blind spot bias, which is a bias about how biased we are. Eg a study of 600+ people found 85% said they are less biased than average with only one person claiming to be more biased than average.

Researchers Find Everyone Has a Bias Blind Spot - News - Carnegie Mellon University

So I’m guessing the reasoning goes something like this: “Yes the media is terrible! It’s poisoning all these people’s minds. Me, on the other hand, I know how to filter quality news stories, but unfortunately most other people can’t.”

 

People need to stop watching news and social media. Go outside. Talk to neighbors. Take a walk through your neighborhood.

I haven't turned on a news channel in decades. Admittedly I scan news websites sometimes when taking poops (like now) which keeps me informed of any big news. Other than that I tune in on election months. The rest of the time political news doesn't really exist in my world.

 

Who knew corporate “news” entertainment media dividing our country for profit would be a bad thing..

Capitalism will kill Democracy without guardrails.

 

One person may blame cnn, another blame Fox … and then it’s all “the media”

 

Agreed. I watched CNN on Jan 6th and the first day of the Russia/Ukraine invasion. Outside of that I don't think I've watched TV news in 20 years.

I never understood why anyone would want their "news' by having someone also tell you how you should feel about that news. "This is happening, and you should be mad about it" isn't an intelligent way to process facts.

 

Im not sure this is the right way to look at it. If we accept your claim that the profit motive leads to divisive news, this raises at least two important questions:

1) Why does stoking tribal tensions generate profit? It would seem to me that this is because people want news that confirms the superiority of their held position. And if the people want this kind news, how is it inconsistent with democracy?

2) If not profit, what motive should we install into the media industry? Even if would could agree on an answer like fairness or “the common good” or objectivity, we would be immediately faced with a much tougher problem: According to whom? I bet Ron DeSantis would love to get his hands on the central committee in charge of installing objectivity into the media, but I doubt the result would seem an improvement to you.

 

Most media is ad driven, its a commercial delivery device. Dont you think people are more inclined to buy whatever if they are feeling something other than satisfied and stable? Contrast the tone of cable news to say, NPR which doesnt sell ads to function. Contrast the tone of subscriber funded media vs. the free ad driven stuff that is meant to go viral to bring you to a website.

 

If we accept all of your claims, perhaps it would be better to outlaw ads on shows deemed to be news (though I can’t see how this could be carried out in practice), but it still leaves us with the ratings issue. No matter how powerless the emotional programming makes people to resist the seductive ads, the show won’t sell any advertising if no one is watching. People must be choosing to tune into these shows.

 

Well right, ratings gets you better ad rates. Hard news is a tough sell anyways, the ad rates are way better for pundit and commentary shows like Tucker/Hannity/Maddow etc. I think the same concept applies to regular ad driven entertainment too. Its full of situational comedy, cop shows and procedural dramas, not documentaries and such where you learn things. Take away the political aspect of all of this, what keeps people watching is a serialized aspect to the show. Most people watch news haphazardly, but they mainline it when something major is happening, or there is an ongoing story. What keeps people coming back is a larger narrative and story ... whether its an unsolved crime or whatever the libs are doing to takeover America today. It's why HBO is more invested in serialized content than say getting the latest movies on the channel. People are more drawn to story telling than stand alone lectures or lessons.

 

I blame all of them. And the internet.

 

This explanation seems plausible to me (and in fact makes me want to revisit a subscription to HBO), but it still makes me question the conclusion. If people like serialized emotional content, why are we identifying profits as the problem? because this motivates the companies to give the people what they want? It seems that we are somewhat starting from the premise that people are incapable of making good decisions for themselves, which doesn’t seem very democratic in itself.

 

They only give us what we want and they've used psychology perfectly to figure out what we can't turn away from.

I'm not sure how you stop it. Most cable news junkies will tell you they should watch less. Take more walks. Pet a dog. But they'll return to the screen unchanged.

I also consume near zero cable news, but admit that TH has the same type of effect in me. At least here I'm exposed to multiple viewpoints.

It's really a shame Tucker wasn't forced to apologize on air at 8:05pm for telling years worth of lies. I don't think it would have substantially changed anything, but it would have been an interesting experiment to see what happened.

 

It is interesting these days that so many people seem to equate “the media” with only cable news.

 

Most people are not capable of making good decisions. Humans are easily researched and manipulated if you really want to.

 

I think they are selling people on what they are missing and exploiting human insecurities, that's the whole idea of ads - not giving people what they want, but letting them think they are missing something. Media people hire people out of the academy too, this isnt PT Barnum stuff anymore. Like other aspects of society, media is very technocratic and corporate in its approach too. Its one of the pillars of capitalism in fact!

 

People are addicted to outrage and therefore polarization, that's why the media is what it is. It definitely creates this cycle of further polarization, but I don't think it starts with the media. It starts with us changing our expectations for the media.

 

how much of the media truly focuses on outrage? how many major outlets?

 

The vast majority even the New York Times will frequently resort to clickbait to arouse emotion from the reader.

It's a business that is responding to market demand. The demand in the market needs to be better. We need to be better. When that happens, it may take time, but the media will get better.