Journalism fails miserably at explaining what is really happening to America
Journalism fails miserably at explaining what is really happening to America
Momentous week of GOP debate, Trump's arrest gets "horse race" coverage when the story's not about an election, but authoritarianism.
Will Bunch expresses what I've been thinking since Trump was elected. American democracy is under attack from within. The fascists who yearn for an authoritarian government in the media are promoting it, and the media who supposedly don't support it fail to recognize it. They are busy trying to follow the political playbook of the 20th century.
Spare me the outrage from the press, when the press is the entity that helped create this mess.
All this could have been avoided some 6 years ago if these clowns in the press did their goddamn jobs. Trump had a history of corruption going back decades. Between sexual assault cases, crooked business dealings,connections to the Russians as well as connections to the mafia, and everything in between. Rarely any of that came to light or was taken as seriously as it should have been. It was one free pass after another. They gave him endless air time because they loved those sweet, sweet ad-dollars. They considered him a joke candidate and never dove deep into his past finances or connections.
...And then it happened. He was actually elected. And that's when it became serious.
Fuck every last one of these journalists who just sat back, let him slide, and just let it happened. Now they have the gall to talk about authoritarian-this, and fascism-that.
We need to hear from more experts on authoritarian movements and fewer pollsters and political strategists. We need journalists who’ll talk a lot less about who’s up or down and a lot more about the stakes — including Trump’s plans to dismantle the democratic norms that he calls “the administrative state,” to weaponize the criminal justice system, and to surrender the war against climate change — if the 45th president becomes the 47th. We need the media to see 2024 not as a traditional election, but as an effort to mobilize a mass movement that would undo democracy and splatter America with more blood like what was shed Saturday in Jacksonville. We need to understand that if the next 15 months remain the worst-covered election in U.S. history, it might also be the last.
Incredibly captivating article, but when you reach this final paragraph, you know with absolute and agonizing certainty that none of this will come to fruition. The mainstream media isn’t going to fix itself and this election will be covered, same as all the rest, as a horserace.
The issue is there is a belief that the problems we are facing are because we can't accept each other's opinions and we all need to buckle down and compromise with one another.
Which is deliciously naive in a world where Nazism has gone from "So universally reviled that they are a punchline at best" to "Just an opinion from a guy asking questions."
Do not serve Bar Nazis
To me this is an interesting bit:
but brutal fascism or flawed democracy.
The US under Trump wasn't North Korean style fascism, although it may have been headed in that direction. It was maybe fascism with strong overtones of democracy. People still got to vote, and their vote mattered, it's just that Dear Leader had his thumb on the scale. Congress members and senators still showed up to work, and the decisions they took still mattered, even if some of the Republicans were constantly violating precedents and norms. The judicial system still kept churning and mostly following the laws and precedents, even if Trump appointed a lot of unqualified partisan judges.
My guess is that many Trump voters wanted this kind of system. They didn't want a full-on North Korea sort of situation, and they were deluded enough that they thought they could keep a Trump presidency from becoming a full-on dictatorship. What they wanted was basically a "flawed democracy" where people who looked like them still got to vote and their vote mattered, but they definitely wanted their vote to matter much more than the votes of other people.
At the same time, the alternative was definitely also a flawed democracy. To get elected requires raising a ton of money, which ties strings to almost everyone who runs. The DNC largely picks who's allowed to run as a democrat, and one of the main qualifications to run is a person's ability to raise money. As a result, even when the democrats are in charge, common sense things that are supported by a majority of the population don't pass when they're opposed by any special interest with money.
It's easy to understand why there was initially so much overlap between supporters of Bernie Sanders and supporters of Trump. People were tired of the oligarchy-controlled pseudo-democracy, and they wanted radical changes.
The advertising duopoly of Facebook and Google has weakened journalism at a time when we desperately needed good journalism. What's left is basic horse-race and scandal-focused coverage for politics, and click bait for the rest. There are still some journalists out there doing good work, like the folks at Pro Publica. But, that kind of journalism is difficult and expensive.
I'm scared that the window for journalism being able to rescue the US might have passed. If Trump wins again, you know that the freedom of the press is going to take a serious hit. On the other hand, if the democrats win big they're going to be completely tied to the people who fund their campaigns. And the corporate-owned media isn't going to be doing stories on how the corporate-owned politicians are handing even more power to corporations.
It is, and will always be- capitalism. When everything is for profit, lies become commodities. This system can work, until there is a crisis that markets can’t absorb. Climate change cannot be commodified because it affects consumers. Fascism is capital’s answer to the crisis. It can’t be voted away. We must demand for a planned economy to transform into a sustainable society. It’s our only hope. This is where we need to be.
The incentives of capitalism and the intended role of the 4th estate are not compatible. Stoking the flames of populism is simply too lucrative of a business model when compared to trying to keep the public informed. This is what allows perverse media groups to proliferate and dominate the public eye.
I don't think this is an easy problem to solve. If you're able to successfully regulate things like Fox, does that fix it, or do people just start gravitating more towards alternate media like Joe Rogan? Do you start regulating podcasts too? Twitter influencers? I feel like it'd just become a never-ending game of whack-a-mole. And given that the 4th estate's role is to check the government, how do you use the government to safeguard it without giving them too much control over it? It's a difficult balance to strike.
That said, clearly we aren't striking that balance now, so perhaps it's time to try something different.
In short the rich folk have the country over a barrel due to FPTP-voting and a lack of campaign financing subsidies. This scheme was designed by ancient wealthy romans for the benefit of ancient wealthy romans and it's not a coincidence this form of democracy is the one America seeks to deliver upon the rest of the world.
Literally it's called "the great experiment" because it's failed before and will fail again if not allowed to evolve and advance into a form with better representation and where wealth doesn't dictate everything happening.
The greatest driver of violence, crime and corruption is wealth-inequality, it's no coincidence unions and such worse are branded as communism and criminal behavior by the plutocrats running the country, unite and demand change!
Journalists today have no association with the scum of the Earth types radicalized by authoritarian movements. They are college educated and understand complex principles, but radicalized people are the opposite, which is simple and based on assumptions. It's built on racism, xenophobia, and hate towards anyone different from them that they can blame. The entire point is about power and ensuring that conservatives hold that power.
Now many young people think there is an oligarchy in the United States, which there isn't, yet. This conservative authoritarian movement intends to establish it. Currently power still resides in the voters. The wealthy keep circumventing the means of messaging but fail time after time. That is why Elon really bought Twitter and intends to destroy it, because it prevented the message the wealthy wanted the public to believe. It's why the Fediverse is so important, because the wealthy can't stop the flow of information.
That’s because “journalism” is a joke and died a long time ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McClatchy
owns most local news papers and prints nothing but propaganda no news of local city council or county council meetings everything is being decided behind closed doors without the people and noone is there to report otherwise
everything is awesome just look at this new eatery "insert gentrified town here" is being blessed with
That's becuase journalism cant affird to give it to you straight because they can't piss you off, since they need to sell articles.
I'll tell you EXACTLY what the hell the problem is, but you aren't going to like it at all, I promise.
The problem is everyone (yes you and me included) is way too entitled and desperate to be either noticed or get ahead. Some of this is economy, some is the internet making the globe feel small, some is politics, mostly though it's our incessant greed combined with the ease of life in modern times.
When people are unhappy the government reflects that.
There is no such thing as Journalism anymore. When you get paid by the click, the actual information doesn't matter.
Whats happening is decades of bubbles neatly sorted by Reagan beginning to hurst at capacity. This is what happens when you allow media to capture specific audiences and muse to them endlessly on a single bias. This is what happens when you stop forcing people to cover news on all sides. They pick a side and divide the populace. None of this is surprising, or even hard to understand. There are no adults in the room, there never were.
Permanently Deleted
"and the media who supposedly don’t support it fail to recognize it", this is such a purposefully obtuse take, of course they recognize it, what they also recognize is FOX News ratings, and the advertising revenue which are derived from it's popularity, and in the age of shrinking consumer interest in the safe middle of the road answers, have worked to gin up the controversy, because that's where the money is. this is what drives the majority of all news organizations, the desire to garner more eyeballs, more interest, more ad revenue. this is all on purpose. and who's to blame them for it, everyone wants to fill up their own ricebowl. journalists want to remain employed, there's only so many spots at msnbc. news orgs could today simply state the overwhelmingly disastrous one sided republican onslaught, which would be factual, and it would lose viewership. news organizations, not like "if it bleeds, it leads" wasn't already their foundation principle since the beginning of the written word, decided, fuck it, we're going all in.
the idea that journalism can save america if only they inform enough people is a perspective only held by journalists. america knows what's going on. they don't need to be told. and they're okay with it. only 1/3 of the electorate voted against trump in 2016, and approximately 1/3 voted against him in 2020, and it looks like about the same 1/3 will vote against him in 2024. and we've all seen what he's been doing.
it's not some secret that Trump is an authoritarian and republicans would rather cheat and win than lose a fair election. that's terrifying and horrible, but it's not news. everybody knows. and telling them isn't going to change anything.
Inquirer?
American democracy is under attack
no:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/22/american-democracy-was-never-designed-to-be-democraticAlso, anyone who expects the MSM to serve the interests of anyone but the rich - have you been living under a rock?
Oh the media knows exactly what they are doing. Trump gets them views and clicks. Democrats are willing to attack other Republicans on Trumps behalf because they fund raise off of Trump too. Everything democrats don't like is a "fascist MAGA Qanon" conspiracy.
There is no risk of fascism in the US from the right.
"Make America Great Again" is a slogan taken from Bill Clinton and not offensive to any sane humans.
I've yet to meet anyone who knows what Qanon is.
The internet is not real life and neither is the media.
I think the journalists are actually doing a pretty darn tooting good job. My favorites are CNN and Fox. They keep me pretty knowledgeable about everything but I wish they would stick more to the facts of what’s really ruining this country like lazy welfare mooches who don’t want to do their jobs properly, and the biggest danger of all, China. China owns all of our farms now and has been launching nukes over our territory of Taiwan.
Sigh...It was a solid article, but it's a both sides issue.
outdated and detestable hierarchies of white supremacy and the patriarchy.
That's where the both sides come in. Centrists like me are the enemy.
For example: I'm for equal rights and LGBT rights, but against kids participating in drag shows. Dancing for dollars is not a skill preteens should have. (Yes, I've been to a drag show when that happened, and that's when I turned in my hard liberal card). I'm for BLM, but for the love of god, stop protesting people getting shot while holding a weapon. George Floyd was tragic,
Travon MartinMichael Brown was justified.The whole world hates men like me. I'm just a middle class white dude making responsible decisions. I'm clearly the devil according to both sides of major media these days. I'm either a liberal elite or a TERF. There's no in-between. There's no subtle discussions to be had about any major issues today. You're either in the frothing mad Trump army, or you're in the frothing mad militant BLM feminist mob.
Either way I vote in the next election is bad for America. The extremists are going to win.
EDIT: Just look at the the replies to this. It's all insanity from both sides.