Americans largely fault the media for increasing polarization

Can’t speak for everywhere but local news in central Florida is almost harder to stomach than the national news.

I’m a native Floridian so I have a different frame of reference. but if listened to local weather every day I should expect to have a near death experience every summer afternoon in a thunderstorm

 

The product is poor, but you also basically get it for free or included with other stuff you already pay for. You can get better quality stuff if you want to pay, most people dont want to pay because they think it should be free, because news has always been free or at least not very expensive. To some extent the market has created this problem, not people. Is the problem that there isnt good media (because there is but its small time and not cheap), or is it a problem that there is no authoritative mass media which sort of governs how we approach politics and relate to each other? When people talk about division and the media and such, there seems to be an implication that we should all be united in some way or something, that there is some sort of centralized thing that should be a stasis point.

 

I think there is utility to quantitative descriptors. I got to "people are addicted to outrage" and lost all confidence in the rest of the argument. "Danger, Will Robinson, danger!"

"People are addicted to eating glass... blah blah blah"

I'll stop beating the dead horse.

There are people who derive pleasure from outrage, others who possess a polarized perspective of the world, and some who are addicted to both of these tendencies. Certain media outlets, regardless of whether they are in print, cable or social media, cater to these preferences for profit. Tribalism, or the creation of content that exploits polarization, is a readily available and popular way to satisfy these appetites. However, this has created a vicious cycle where outlets attempt to outdo each other by producing more and more outlandish content, which can lead to radicalization.

Despite only a small percentage of individuals become radicalized, their impact can be substantial. A chance encounter with a radicalized individual or a news story can generate concern. I'm not sure of the extent of these divisions, it is clear that they pose significant risks to our society.

 

I like both of these points: There is a variety of media products that can be purchased, and having different media outlets vary from one another isn’t necessarily a negative outcome. It is possible that the market has distorted our preferences, so that we choose crappy news more often that we ourselves would like. I wouldn’t know how to measure this, but more importantly, I wouldn’t have a good idea about how to combat this even if it was easily documented.

I have for many years worked on improving my ability to identify good information and minimizing my many flaws in reasoning, and still today when someone tells me that I am an idiot, I am not too sure they are wrong.

 

I'm curious what you consider clickbait on today's home page

The New York Times - Breaking News, US News, World News and Videos

 

CNN

 

The media can't control what you think, but they can control what you think about.

 

I think it was mostly the far-right types that started this. Maybe it’s just when I first started noticing, but seemed like at some point in the 2000’s the talking point on the “liberal mainstream media” started really taking hold, such that right wingers should not trust any story from a mainstream source. That has been dumbed down slightly from “Mainstream Media” to just “Media”, but it’s the same deal. Obviously they believe their Fox News or their farther “out there” alternative media without question.

Problem is these people apparently don’t understand nuance. It’s one thing to be skeptical of a news report, healthy skepticism is a good thing. It’s always a good idea to read multiple articles on a subject. Unfortunately as we see in recent years, this isn’t happening. A lot of folks seem to latch on to sketchy alt-right sites or even just run with whatever they view on social media and take THAT as gospel… even when it’s obviously straight up propaganda. Disappointingly, this phenomenon on social media seems to work on more than just the total morons (although morons of course might act more viscerally or be more “bought in”).

 

Fair point.But at the national level at least, we see guys like Steven Crowder getting rich - all the way up to Tucker, who was reportedly making $35 million a year. Seems like the resources/money would be there if there were unmet demand for more objective and less sensationalist journalism, reporting, and/or analysis. I'm sure local media markets are a different ballgame, and it does seem more difficult to monetize that, although I don't have a good sense of the industry.

 

I think a lot of right-wing political media is heavily subsidized by very rich people. Things like the Federalist or Project Veritas arent making money, they are money losers in fact. All the worst media is basically immune from market forces or is basically a way to do marketing for other things. I'm kind of shocked more rich liberals aren't funding this kind of stuff, the ones that get into media seem to demand ROI or actually treat it like a business. Dont see many liberal billionaires creating make-work propaganda jobs for hacky pundits, perhaps they dont think they need to unlike people who have more radical politics or views. Another interesting thing about right-wing media is that so many of the people are failed Hollywood types. Crowder was in entertainment, Shapiro tried to be a screen writer (and is now actually producing movies), etc.

 

Headlines can certainly be problematic - a limited number of words written by someone who didn't write the story who may be in a hurry to do something else.
But in those cases, I'm not sure your point. Which one is not an accurate portrayal of the story?
Taking on an icon like Disney is pretty tricky, isn't it?
According to the sources in the story, that large donor isn't sure about DeSantis' presidential run yet.
And DeSantis seems to be getting traditional scrutiny while Trump isn't.

 

Are they trying to get you to draw a conclusion before you read the article or not?

Taking on Disney: DeSantis is in over his head.
Donors and DeSantis: DeSantis's campaign lacks the necessary support to win.
DeSantis scrutiny: The Republican Party is still the Trump show.

My takeaway: The New York Times really doesn't want DeSantis to run, so they're trying to kill his campaign before it even starts. And it's not going to work, because Republican Primary voters know their game.

They want Trump to run because they think he's a beatable opponent and he provides money-making opportunities for them with his big mouth.

 

You'd be surprised.

But they can only control what you think with your permission.

 

Related:

John Oliver Embarrasses James O’Keefe in Brutal Send-Off

 

Good grief, that's not even close, and I suspect you know.
Do you, does anyone, think taking on Disney is easy? As the AFA found out, it's not. Its boycott failed. That doesn't mean he's in over his head.
"Donor" is singular. Most of the donor story is about one guy. But it does quote another donor who back DeSantis but is withholding support now.
Finally, usually, what the candidate does or said has an impact on the polls. The story points out that's what has happened with DeSantis. But it's also clear that nothing Trump says or does - no matter how stupid, false or petty - seems to affect his support. Do you really disagree with that?

 

Do you see how this is soliciting an emotion or a disposition from the audience before they even read the article despite the fact that it's true?

Top Biden official suggests there are too many jobs while defending climate agenda in tense exchange

 

I miss the old headline news channel. Every 30min had news from around the US, then sometimes the world. No opinions etc. Just straight info.

Everything now is just garbage.

 

What do you think is the purpose of a headline?

Seems to me a headline has two primary purposes. 1) to succinctly summarize an article. 2) to get the reader to actually click the article.

A headline can be too “click bait-y” (trashier sites sometimes have a total disconnect between the headline and the facts), but it isn’t like a headline has to be totally neutral either.

If there are issues with that FOX headline, it is getting close to that dishonest/trashy type clickbait headline. Why you might ask? It’s that it really doesn’t succinctly describe the situation, in fact if you read their article it was actually Josh Hawley that said “too many jobs”! He was putting words in her mouth. That is not what the interior secretary was trying to say. Reading the exchange, her position that closing one particular mine is not devastating because plentiful other jobs are available. To reframe that discussion over the mine (which may indeed be a cost-benefit analysis of environment vs jobs) as her saying “there are too many jobs” is spin, and all the Fox headline does is parrot Hawley’s dishonest political spin.

 

Clearly you don't know the meaning of the word "suggests." She did suggest that a surplus of jobs is a problem.

 

DeSantis is receiving the negative press because he has been putting himself in the spotlight. Whether you like it or not Trump is leading DeSantis by a large and more significantly increasing margin in virtually every Republican primary poll. Rationally, do you really think potential Republican primary voters are influenced by the coverage of DeSantis in the NY Times and CNN? If anything they treat attacks on Republican candidates by what consider liberal MSM outlets as positives. Maybe your narrative is accurate and the Times, CNN and MSNBC are so Machiavellian that they have adopted the strategy of bashing Trump so as to increase support for him thus giving him more ammo to claim that the liberal media is after him. Although obviously a guess negative stories about Trump in the MSM probably outnumber negative stories about Meatball Ron by at least a two to one margin.