I remember the days when journalists would tell you what happened and you had to figure out for yourself what to actually think. We currently live in days when the journalists will tell you what to think and you have to figure out for yourself what actually happened. I much prefer the former to the latter.
One can be a professional activist or a professional journalist, but one cannot be both. We have more than enough explicitly partisan media sources already, what we need are genuinely nonpartisan media sources.
I LOVE the way you framed this. It's a great summation of the way reading mainstream media feels these days. Also kudos to Yascha, as always, for pulling this all apart in such a thoughtful way. For me, this whole election is a repudiation of the mainstream media as much as it is anything else.
YES! Thank you, Yascha, for putting words to what I’ve been trying to articulate (and often failing). This magical thinking among progressive journalists AND their most devoted partisan readers is understandable AND utterly self-destructive. I hope more and more of us will see this clearly in the weeks and months to come.
I work in academia, am politically non-partisan, and I have 4 sisters (one an academic) who hate Trump, and assume that all Trump supporters are morally deficient, deeply uninformed, or just stupid.
I avoid discussing politics with any of these people, not because there isn't plenty to talk about, but because from my perspective they all live in an epistemological fortress. We are not "watching the same movie". We don't share basic premises regarding certain cultural and political issues.
In the aftermath of this election, this is what I have been thinking: that everything they understand about America via media channels is what's been curated, framed, and spun for them by the NYT and NPR. And of course other similar channels and individual political writers whom they follow, as well as the tendentious news/opinion items that social media algorithms pump out to them in targeted fashion that serve to reinforce their beliefs.
I think it's very easy to live as they do, because the MSM is so vast and ubiquitous. And, if you never interact with people who hold beliefs contrary to your own, and never avail yourself of opportunities to read thoughtful critiques of your beliefs, you can miss very obvious things.
I suppose it's a great business model to capture subscribers/readers/viewers by addicting them, while reassuring them that they are noble and better-informed than others. But it's ultimately so poisonous and destructive.
“But it's ultimately so poisonous and destructive.”
Many people believe that America is simply too big and too powerful to collapse but many people also believed that about the Soviet Union. No one in 1985 would have believed that the USSR, the mighty "Evil Empire,” would be a disintegrating mess in just a few years. I told that to someone last year who said "But the Soviet Union was a collection of separate countries.” What we have here though is a collection of separate realities which is a much deadlier situation. Could it be that the reason why America is so rapidly unraveling externally is because it no longer exists as a country internally?
Sir, or ma'am (used to be a 50/50 proposition of being correct whichever you chose, but nowadays . . .),
From your comment, I think you might be on the wrong platform. The "oh yeah, but what about . . . Fox News" collection is over there, where the jingoistic simpletons/undergraduates are lining up.
I understand that it's oversubscribed, but that's no excuse.
I confess I opened this expecting to hate it and clap back to it...but you're right. I'm a features journalist with an opinion, and I don't think there's a problem with putting one's opinion into articles like mine in the form of analysis. I DO think there's a problem when one lets that opinion determine what facts to include and not to include. People have become furiously angry at me online for pointing out Biden's infirmity early and correcting the media narrative when they quote Trump out of context. I am regularly accused me of being on Trump's side or wanting to sabotage the Dems. Nothing could be further from the truth. I make my opinion of conservatives crystal clear in everything I write...and yet, some conservatives still read my work. They don't like my analysis but they recognize that I'm fair with the facts. Hard for me to think of a greater compliment than that in today's media environment
There's a way to "save democracy" without compromising one's reporting: as you point out, a truth-telling media is essential for maintaining it. When the truth is on your side, you should never have to bend it. I thought a lot during this election about how, even if Harris won, we'd lost things that could not easily be replaced...and this was one of them
Thank you for writing this, is what I'm trying to day
As a newsman (I detest calling myself a journalist) for big-city daily newspapers from 1966 to 1976, I witnessed the pre-Watergate and early-Watergate era. You are nearly 100% correct in what you've said about journalism. The aftermath of the election of Trump the first time was astounding. Printing without qualification on the news pages that something the president had said was false or a lie was entirely new territory. However, the trend away from news coverage and toward more opinionated articles came earlier out of economic necessity. When everyone began getting the hard news instantly via their smartphones, no market was left for straight-ahead news coverage later. So, every article needed a slant. From a public-benefit standpoint, the transition did not go well and led to the mess of publications tailored to specific views, but the shift began before the first Trump election.
Instant news by cell phone and similar channels (browser popups, for instance) do deliver basic news facts fairly well. News from such sources generally lacks the context and background found in longer presentations like main stream media, blogs (of which this is a good example), and presentations on YouTube, perhaps even TikTok.
It is that background and context that carry much of the bias and misdirect through selection, omission, and sometimes lying. Much of it is unconscious, based on the writer's or presenter's actual beliefs about both the material presented and the receptivity of the intended audience. It is very hard to stop fooling yourself, and that is the core of what needs to be done by the victorious Republicans, the vanquished Democrats, and the mainstream journalistic class.
One item not mentioned: NYT and WaPo write for the majority of their subscribers. Subscribers want to read something that reinforces their belief, otherwise they cancel their subscription. That may influence the type of journalists the paper hires and the filter editors put on the articles.
I believe that forecasting and prediction markets could be effective information ecosystems in the future
For example a recent study using a novel technique estimated the cost of one degree of warming to be a minimum 6x higher than the previous highest estimate. This is perfect for current news systems where it's banner news about a catastrophic grand narrative. It sells!
Ironically the more reliable information, perhaps printed for the first time in some of the news outlets covering it, was that the previous mainstream estimates are about 1% of GDP cost per degree of warming (eventually rising more steeply)
I think that if information like this tended to refer to averaged estimates by experienced forecasters with experience of having their predictions resolved in markets it would provide a much more accurate answer. Rather than story views the next day their main incentive would be driven by the long term accuracy of their guesses. The question itself would be more revealing about the assumptions at play. Regarding the new warming costs paper you might see a question like: "Incorporating new study Y, how much do you think the mainstream estimate of warming costs per degree will be one year from now?"
That’s not necessarily true. NYT has expanded into games, sports, wirecutter, recipes, etc. WP has comics, crosswords, and advice columns. The tiresome opinion pieces drown out what little real reporting the papers do. There is some actual real reporting in these papers if you can find it. But where else are you going to go?
After Trump won the election the WP had a big spread on what Trump’s policy positions were and what he was likely to do. I thought, shouldn’t they have done this before the election, and for Harris also? People could have used a clear explanation of what both candidates planned to do rather than endless horse race reporting, polls, and cheering for our team.
My husband is a Trump supporter yet a wonderful person. I now regret having been dismissive of his conspiracy theories from 2020 that turned out to not be so kooky after all. This leaves me no moral authority and I don’t know how to speak with conviction without it.
I found myself in a similar position with several family members. After discounting the Hunter Biden Laptop, school closures, Biden's mental deterioration, Trump's Russia Collusion, the issues at the border etc. I ended up being wrong as often as not, and it just solidified opinions toward Trump. The Biden situation was absolutely disastrous in terms of being taken seriously.
Yes. I finally realized that in fact no one had designated me the moral authority monitor and in fact I'm a much better person if I aim instead for keeping some humility instead. I learned this after fighting my bright red husband for years and finally opened my eyes to find that he had been correct about a lot of things. Not fun to let go of my deep beliefs but things are not as we were brought up to think.
Are you sure that a couple of conspiracies that turn out to be sorta true excuses the hundreds of conspiracy theories that aren't. And does either of those justify turning to MAGA. It's like jumping out if the frying pan and into the fire. Both are hot, but one burns a lot more than the other.
Not at all. I am saying that with mainstream media promoting things that I 100% bought into I now have no credibility. The point is I listened to the Times and the Post and proved that I am just as naive as my husband thinks I am. Therefore, I don’t have any trusted sources where we can agree on facts, and I can’t say mine are true because my journalists are investigative and revel in getting to the bottom of deceptions. Most of the conspiracy stuff is obviously nuts. Unfortunately now, so are the facts on the ground.
P.S. - There probably isn't going to be a source of facts we all can agree on. And there are a lot of people who don't want there to be. It doesn't serve their interests.
Yes, and we are in a significantly more complex information literacy environment. At this point, I want education to focus on reasoning, rhetoric, and not being manipulated in addition to the three R’s. Actually, if I had my way it would also include courses on self-knowledge beyond hygiene and reproduction. How do brains work? Where do negative feelings come from? How can you reduce the amount of time you spend feeling bad. What kinds of projects give you the chance to access flow state while you are working and how does that mindset change how you collaborate and empathize with fellow humans. Ooops…off on a different soap box. But, yeah, I agree with you.
The trouble is the need to be certain you have The Truth. That is why seeking moral authority rather than humility is so problematic. As you point out we are in a significantly more complex info environment. I too thought years ago that if I just gathered all the 'facts', read widely enough, did my homework, I could arrive at The Truth. The trouble is you and I and everyone else here will never have all the facts or therefore The Truth. Watch a show called The Diplomat and you will see what I mean. And the characters are far more embedded and informed than you or I would ever be and they still don't have all the facts. It's a whole show built around this concept and reflects the reality that when a multitude of different actors and entities with differing agendas contribute to a situation, getting to The Truth is impossible. The average person will only ever have the facts their information sources give them. Start reading the likes of Michael Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi, The Free Press, and you will begin learning there is a whole world of facts out there you won't get from corporate media but you still will not have The Truth. All we can do is try to expand our collection of facts as much as possible but for you and me we will never know exactly what was said in the deepest layers of the FBI as one teensy example. It's hard enough for people to be present in and agree what was said in a work meeting much less what happened in the 2020 election. And, beware of beliefs you have because you badly want them to be true. That can cause you to misjudge what is happening before your eyes. So many kudos to you for putting in the work to listen to someone whose perspective clashed with your own and thoughtfully wrestle with all this. That's a sign you're on the right track.
Agree. I like those guys for that perspective, but no one is going to sort out the truth for us. So then the question becomes one of holding those ambiguities while we communicate with folks who hold other ideas.
This situation you described pretty accurately. The consequence of Fox News leading the way in mainstream alternative journalism. Which sounds like an oxymoron but isn't. Bear with me as I explain what happened.
Just as a side note, since no one has a lock on ultimate truth, what things is your husband being naive about? If he's a real dyed-in-the-wool MAGA kind of guy, then there are probably no shortage of things he could be naive about. The number one thing being that Trump is somehow okay and has the good of the country at heart. He does not. And that will become even clearer as his second Presidency progresses. He and his cronies are dedicated to the reformation of America in their own preferred image. A second American revolution, which was publicly announced by a Christian Right ring leader about 6 months ago or so. Considering the coalition he's put together, that would be some kind of permanent Republican lock on power (not necessarily a democracy of majority rules, but one where Republicans control the reins of power no matter what the people think. They've already achieved elimination of democracy at the state level in about 6 states. North Carolina being the most well known).
You know, I have some answers to your questions, but it's hard to know whether you'll ever read them. It's been a few days since the original post and I don't know if you keep up with your Substack notifications. So I'll just sum things up and give you a couple of tips on where to find better news sources.
1) The political project is to create a one party state in fact, though officially it will still be a multi-party state. Authoritarian in nature, by design. Republican of course. It will be a religious government, a mix of conservative Catholics and conservative Protestants united in the belief that the government should be of-by-for their particular religions. It will be heavily militarized, both against foreign enemies and especially against domestic dissent. It will be an isolationist foreign policy. Fortress America first! And most especially, the Billionaire class will be the number one government constituency, they will be the first in line to be served by the government. The rest of us... not so much. The Billionaires want a return to feudalism, since that was best for them. Bad for the rest of us. So... in a mouthful of a name: A new feudalism of Christo-authoritarians headed by a bunch of kleptomaniac Billionaires. I've just got to come up with a good name and meme for them. Could just call them the Kleps.
That is what the voters voted for, or didn't vote at all (which amounted to a vote for Trump). Whether they understood that or not. Obviously, the Kleps didn't want it to be named because then it wouldn't have been popular. The Republi-kleps (still trying to find that good name) sold it a bunch of other ways, but not what it really is.
Where you can find better news sources: "Ground" is a decent place to start. It aggregates news from sources both left and right. It isn't perfect by any means, but it's a place to start. There are other aggregators like them. And from several books published over the last 30-40 years. Plus a few really old ones like "The Prince" by Machiavelli. Still spot on to this day. Plus some magazines, most of them on-line these days: Mother Jones, The New Republic, The Nation, and others. Write back and I'll list a more complete set.
Be sure of yourself. Your instincts are right. There is something very foul going on. The MAGA folks have been deceived. And where they haven't been deceived, the've ended up being pawns in a game against democracy & freedom & liberty for most people. In Trump these people found a good tool, a blunt instrument that crashed through the barriers keeping them out of power. It is fascist in nature. Fascism never ends well for anybody. But it always has its appeal. It is directed by psychopaths. We live in an age of psychopaths.
I agree with you about the authoritarian agenda. As for my husband, he is not a kook, I respect him tremendously and that’s why when I adamantly argue against what I think are conspiracy theories and learn I was wrong, I no longer have any place to point. Though what you said is true, it is tricky AF to find clear evidence which the YouTubers will find some other esoteric explanation for in mere hours. And I can’t trust my old standby sources because they have been misleading me. Ground is nice, but my husband lists numerous sources that it doesn’t include so considers it biased. Independent media like this, bulwark, pod save America, and individual substack writers provide input for my opinions but I also read right-wing rags and occasionally check out Fox so I learn the new dog signals and what their most persuasive arguments about things I think are nuts look like. Sometimes I’m wrong.
It would be interesting if you could describe a conspiracy theory you've discovered to be true, or two.
Conspiracy theories by their very nature tend not to be true: most thinking ppl have an instant scepticism reaction to conspiracy tales, but some are very susceptible to them.
There's research out there on this.
But maybe you don't mean conspiracy theories? Maybe you mean his ideas about why is how things happen as they do differ from yours?
I think this article is a bit cheap: it's main point is spot on, but the complexities involved here are far deeper than suggested; some commenters point to the deeper issues.
24/7 coverage of everything, the endless need for content on line, & the financial failure of the old media model mean that the price is truth is higher than most outlets can justify or afford.
Fox has shown that blatant lies & entertainment or outrage news is popular & profitable. Musk has weaponised X, with it's huge reach. The right wing bs machine is way ahead of the truth.
And, Covid+ post covid trauma - including inflation - had created a global political backlash: Harris actually did better than most in stemming that tide, with congressional results hardly changed.
Choosing Trump though, given his character, history & baggage, including project 2025, over the relatively benign Harris, really takes some explaining.
My take on it is that the misinformation ecosystem, plus the general political disengagement of the majority of ppl, & covid trauma & the two wars, created chaos & uncertainty fear & hence the strongman desire.
No one familiar with what Trump actually did last time could vote for him: only ppl that did not know, or heard mainly the Fox blather could; similarly his immigration bs was so counter factual that only ppl believing Ts tone (if not his detailed lies) could accept it.
Disinformation was the winner here, & to blame journalists is a distraction. Even those telling the truth, in fact specifically them, were attacked & smeared by the right wing machine.
Musk & Carlson described Maddow as a crazed fascist, said that if she held power many would die.
That's the extent of the problem here, the alternative reality Trump has created.
Another data point is that excuse oils suggest but ppl thought H a threat to democracy than T. How is that possible?
The idea that leftist logic is a greater threat to truth & the future than the lieing, rapist, fraudulent grifter unsurectionist can only hold sway if truth does not exist, which is of course the primary goal of the disinformationists.
The financial anxiety of the post covid situation makes ppl more receptive to all that bs; it justifies their gut feeling to punish the govt they blame for it.
One of Trump's greatest achievements has been to recruit a whole bunch of decent people to his side. Providing a smoke screen for his indecent behavior.
If European research that questioned the effectiveness of pediatric gender medicine and highlighted how little is known about its safety over the long run caused the husband to have sympathy for the sex realist/gender critical position or embrace it outright, he would have had to keep it to himself around Democrats.
Dems will not countenance any criticism of gender identity ideology. Dissidents are immediately labeled transphobes without prior notice or an opportunity to present their case in an impartial forum. It's verdict first, trial never.
That wasn't enough to turn me, a centrist, gay and sex-realist Democrat into a Trump voter, but I have come across several people with my profile who did vote for Trump.
It was pretty clear that journalists were in the tank for the Democrats since at least the Bush administration. The media fawning over Obama and ignoring of some very serious events during his presidency was remarkable. This phenomenon of media as activist predated Trump and was in fact part of the reason why he was elected in 2016.
I agree. I was so happy when Obama got elected. But when he actually accepted that nobel prize having done nothing I immediately started worrying. Next thing you know foreign policy was a mess, he initiated a new wave of populist racial politics and he made it cool to heap scorn and contempt on half of the country. And the press worshipped at his feet the entire time. You are absolutely 100% right that this phenomenon both predated and caused Trumps first victory. In 2016 I told all my fellow liberals that Trumps success was basically our fault on account of the way we (and our liberal journalists) abused conservatives. I can’t remember one single time when my argument landed. Now eight years later I’m having some incremental success with this point of view. Apparently it took eight years for mainstream liberals to admit that Trumps victory was not merely a racist backlash against a black president as so many journalists and commentators asserted at the time. It amazed me that such a childish and pathetic take got do much traction—and it really opened my eyes at the time.
I think I can confidently identify at least one Trump voter ("of color," at that): that South Asian convenience-store clerk in Ferguson who got slugged by Mike Brown!
That's also the point in the Obama era when things started to turn. Many who'd voted for Obama's "No Black America, No White America" witnessed the pivot to "Black Lives," and recognized it as a bait-and-switch.
Considering the number of breaks Trump got from the press, an argument could be made that there's a Rightwing bias to news reporting. The biggest bias being the false equivalency made between Republicans and Democrats. They aren't anywhere close to being equivalent.
I think its a somewhat of a mistake to characterize the press as right wing even though it certainly seemed to be the case decades ago when corporate consolidation of news outlets was essentially completed. I think its more explanatory and less philosophical or academic to view the press as being excessively beholden to capital and corporate interests (ie advertisers like big tech and big pharma) as opposed to one or the other political ideology.
One explanation for the breaks Trump received from the mainstream media is they feared Trump would accuse them of bias if they didn't. What's not settled is whether that is speculation or rooted in facts.
Beneficent paternalism is still just lying even if it is for someone's own good. And the problem with being lied to is it is then impossible to make a decision based on the truth. You lose your freedom when you are lied to. The liar turns the lied to into a tool. I hope the NYT and WaPo go out of business for what they have done. They elected Trump.
Honestly, I haven't really trusted the media since back in the early '90s; a friend of mine was part of the Hurricane Andrew relief efforts, and was interviewed by a TV news reporter. He told the reporter, on camera, that he was part of a team from a Midwestern church. The congregation had taken up a collection and filled the youth group bus with bottled water and diapers. They had driven straight through the night and spent the morning handing out supplies in 100 degree heat, so they all looked sweaty, disheveled and exhausted. When he turned on the news that evening, he saw himself on TV, but the audio part of the recording had been replaced by a voiceover identifying him and his team as "hurricane victims who had lost everything and were waiting in line for water." Maybe it was just some sort of honest mistake or misunderstanding in the editing room; but it made me realize that what we see on TV or read in the newspaper isn't necessarily what actually happened. The dishonesty and concealing of facts in the past four years was particularly egregious; it was clear to anyone with eyes that Joe Biden had been cognitively impaired for quite some time, but the media kept insisting he was sharp as a tack until the debate made is so clear that the charade could not continue. Similarly, Kamala had been characterized as "unpopular" and "unelectable" all the way up until the day before Biden announced she would be the new candidate. Suddenly she was "joy" and "vibes" and extremely competent and accomplished. I kept thinking "did I wander into an alternate reality?" It also was very strange that absolutely NO ONE seemed to have any interest at all in finding out who has actually been running the country for the past four years; and no one even was interested in asking Kamala "so, when did you notice that Biden was not quite all there? And why did you not invoke your Vice Presidential duty to step in when the President is incapacitated, as the 25th Amendment authorizes you to do?"
The lockstep media conformity and groupthink has been absolutely horrifying. Democracy does indeed die in the darkness, and when the press decides "nope, we don't want to shine any lights on that, we only do investigative reporting on people we don't like," we are surely screwed. As distasteful as Trump may be, I am at least assured that the mainstream media will keep his every move scrutinized under a microscope, instead of covering things up as "misinformation" (and then later admitting "well, yes, that actually did happen after all - AND HERE'S WHY IT'S ACTUALLY THE BEST THING EVER.")
It does beg the question of why the media volunteered to be the American version of Pravda. Usually, it takes some sort of threat of deportation to the gulags or something like that to get people on board with becoming government mouthpieces. Very strange indeed.
Where newsrooms once had reporters, editors, etc. in separate roles, now journalists must do it all, including that they are expected to post their articles with little editing and post on social media. It encourages them to share their opinions and put a bit if a thumb on the scale. I think that has changed public perception of how journalists do their job -- and certainly how they actually do their work.
If you think bias in journalism started with Trump you must be much younger than me.
JFK was portrayed in the media as an athlete (touch football) but in fact he had a very bad back and was in constant pain. And his sexual shenanigans with various female aids were never mentioned. OTOH, Gerald Ford stumbled once on the stairs exiting an airplane was endlessly portrayed as a klutz. In fact he was an athlete, an All American football player.
Ronald Regan was portrayed as an ignorant boob while Biden was treated respectfully, until his disastrous debate reveal his senility for all to see. And the media have still not admitted that the whole Biden family is as corrupt as can be (Burisma, Hunter’s laptop, etc.)
Just a few examples off the top of- of my head. I’m sure there’s many more.
Agree, and I think it can also be said that the disinformation of the government health care establishment as amplified by the NYT, NPR, et al laid the groundwork for the widespread acceptance of the most disastrous lie since Vietnam, that of the stolen 2020 election. I for one will not soon forget the open letter signed by hundreds of health care professionals warning of the dangers of spreading covid in large public gatherings...unless it is a BLM protest.
I completely agree with almost everything you write here, and thank you for stating these important points so clearly. However, I do have a quibble: I'm neither a journalist nor a historian, but you seem to claim that the flagrant journalistic partisanship we see today is a new phenomenon, and things used to be better. Indeed, the left-skewed bias of mainstream media today seems more noticeable than any time in my past experience, but I believe this varies over time and place. My understanding is that for example in early-mid 19th century America, the level of partisan distortion edging into dishonesty was far more severe than today.
I remember the days when journalists would tell you what happened and you had to figure out for yourself what to actually think. We currently live in days when the journalists will tell you what to think and you have to figure out for yourself what actually happened. I much prefer the former to the latter.
One can be a professional activist or a professional journalist, but one cannot be both. We have more than enough explicitly partisan media sources already, what we need are genuinely nonpartisan media sources.
I LOVE the way you framed this. It's a great summation of the way reading mainstream media feels these days. Also kudos to Yascha, as always, for pulling this all apart in such a thoughtful way. For me, this whole election is a repudiation of the mainstream media as much as it is anything else.
brilliant!
Well said.
YES! Thank you, Yascha, for putting words to what I’ve been trying to articulate (and often failing). This magical thinking among progressive journalists AND their most devoted partisan readers is understandable AND utterly self-destructive. I hope more and more of us will see this clearly in the weeks and months to come.
I work in academia, am politically non-partisan, and I have 4 sisters (one an academic) who hate Trump, and assume that all Trump supporters are morally deficient, deeply uninformed, or just stupid.
I avoid discussing politics with any of these people, not because there isn't plenty to talk about, but because from my perspective they all live in an epistemological fortress. We are not "watching the same movie". We don't share basic premises regarding certain cultural and political issues.
In the aftermath of this election, this is what I have been thinking: that everything they understand about America via media channels is what's been curated, framed, and spun for them by the NYT and NPR. And of course other similar channels and individual political writers whom they follow, as well as the tendentious news/opinion items that social media algorithms pump out to them in targeted fashion that serve to reinforce their beliefs.
I think it's very easy to live as they do, because the MSM is so vast and ubiquitous. And, if you never interact with people who hold beliefs contrary to your own, and never avail yourself of opportunities to read thoughtful critiques of your beliefs, you can miss very obvious things.
I suppose it's a great business model to capture subscribers/readers/viewers by addicting them, while reassuring them that they are noble and better-informed than others. But it's ultimately so poisonous and destructive.
“But it's ultimately so poisonous and destructive.”
Many people believe that America is simply too big and too powerful to collapse but many people also believed that about the Soviet Union. No one in 1985 would have believed that the USSR, the mighty "Evil Empire,” would be a disintegrating mess in just a few years. I told that to someone last year who said "But the Soviet Union was a collection of separate countries.” What we have here though is a collection of separate realities which is a much deadlier situation. Could it be that the reason why America is so rapidly unraveling externally is because it no longer exists as a country internally?
Until the end I thought you were referring to Fox News.
Anyone can avoid Fox. I know my sisters do. But no one can avoid non-Fox.
Sir, or ma'am (used to be a 50/50 proposition of being correct whichever you chose, but nowadays . . .),
From your comment, I think you might be on the wrong platform. The "oh yeah, but what about . . . Fox News" collection is over there, where the jingoistic simpletons/undergraduates are lining up.
I understand that it's oversubscribed, but that's no excuse.
You're welcome,
Sal
I confess I opened this expecting to hate it and clap back to it...but you're right. I'm a features journalist with an opinion, and I don't think there's a problem with putting one's opinion into articles like mine in the form of analysis. I DO think there's a problem when one lets that opinion determine what facts to include and not to include. People have become furiously angry at me online for pointing out Biden's infirmity early and correcting the media narrative when they quote Trump out of context. I am regularly accused me of being on Trump's side or wanting to sabotage the Dems. Nothing could be further from the truth. I make my opinion of conservatives crystal clear in everything I write...and yet, some conservatives still read my work. They don't like my analysis but they recognize that I'm fair with the facts. Hard for me to think of a greater compliment than that in today's media environment
There's a way to "save democracy" without compromising one's reporting: as you point out, a truth-telling media is essential for maintaining it. When the truth is on your side, you should never have to bend it. I thought a lot during this election about how, even if Harris won, we'd lost things that could not easily be replaced...and this was one of them
Thank you for writing this, is what I'm trying to day
As a newsman (I detest calling myself a journalist) for big-city daily newspapers from 1966 to 1976, I witnessed the pre-Watergate and early-Watergate era. You are nearly 100% correct in what you've said about journalism. The aftermath of the election of Trump the first time was astounding. Printing without qualification on the news pages that something the president had said was false or a lie was entirely new territory. However, the trend away from news coverage and toward more opinionated articles came earlier out of economic necessity. When everyone began getting the hard news instantly via their smartphones, no market was left for straight-ahead news coverage later. So, every article needed a slant. From a public-benefit standpoint, the transition did not go well and led to the mess of publications tailored to specific views, but the shift began before the first Trump election.
Instant news by cell phone and similar channels (browser popups, for instance) do deliver basic news facts fairly well. News from such sources generally lacks the context and background found in longer presentations like main stream media, blogs (of which this is a good example), and presentations on YouTube, perhaps even TikTok.
It is that background and context that carry much of the bias and misdirect through selection, omission, and sometimes lying. Much of it is unconscious, based on the writer's or presenter's actual beliefs about both the material presented and the receptivity of the intended audience. It is very hard to stop fooling yourself, and that is the core of what needs to be done by the victorious Republicans, the vanquished Democrats, and the mainstream journalistic class.
That's what I meant about the transition not going so well. It could be done better, but I'm not sure better options would be profitable.
This is a great point!
One item not mentioned: NYT and WaPo write for the majority of their subscribers. Subscribers want to read something that reinforces their belief, otherwise they cancel their subscription. That may influence the type of journalists the paper hires and the filter editors put on the articles.
This is one of the ultimate problems in modern journalism.
The economic incentives are not aligned with the public good.
I believe that forecasting and prediction markets could be effective information ecosystems in the future
For example a recent study using a novel technique estimated the cost of one degree of warming to be a minimum 6x higher than the previous highest estimate. This is perfect for current news systems where it's banner news about a catastrophic grand narrative. It sells!
Ironically the more reliable information, perhaps printed for the first time in some of the news outlets covering it, was that the previous mainstream estimates are about 1% of GDP cost per degree of warming (eventually rising more steeply)
I think that if information like this tended to refer to averaged estimates by experienced forecasters with experience of having their predictions resolved in markets it would provide a much more accurate answer. Rather than story views the next day their main incentive would be driven by the long term accuracy of their guesses. The question itself would be more revealing about the assumptions at play. Regarding the new warming costs paper you might see a question like: "Incorporating new study Y, how much do you think the mainstream estimate of warming costs per degree will be one year from now?"
That’s not necessarily true. NYT has expanded into games, sports, wirecutter, recipes, etc. WP has comics, crosswords, and advice columns. The tiresome opinion pieces drown out what little real reporting the papers do. There is some actual real reporting in these papers if you can find it. But where else are you going to go?
After Trump won the election the WP had a big spread on what Trump’s policy positions were and what he was likely to do. I thought, shouldn’t they have done this before the election, and for Harris also? People could have used a clear explanation of what both candidates planned to do rather than endless horse race reporting, polls, and cheering for our team.
My husband is a Trump supporter yet a wonderful person. I now regret having been dismissive of his conspiracy theories from 2020 that turned out to not be so kooky after all. This leaves me no moral authority and I don’t know how to speak with conviction without it.
I found myself in a similar position with several family members. After discounting the Hunter Biden Laptop, school closures, Biden's mental deterioration, Trump's Russia Collusion, the issues at the border etc. I ended up being wrong as often as not, and it just solidified opinions toward Trump. The Biden situation was absolutely disastrous in terms of being taken seriously.
Yes. I finally realized that in fact no one had designated me the moral authority monitor and in fact I'm a much better person if I aim instead for keeping some humility instead. I learned this after fighting my bright red husband for years and finally opened my eyes to find that he had been correct about a lot of things. Not fun to let go of my deep beliefs but things are not as we were brought up to think.
Are you sure that a couple of conspiracies that turn out to be sorta true excuses the hundreds of conspiracy theories that aren't. And does either of those justify turning to MAGA. It's like jumping out if the frying pan and into the fire. Both are hot, but one burns a lot more than the other.
Not at all. I am saying that with mainstream media promoting things that I 100% bought into I now have no credibility. The point is I listened to the Times and the Post and proved that I am just as naive as my husband thinks I am. Therefore, I don’t have any trusted sources where we can agree on facts, and I can’t say mine are true because my journalists are investigative and revel in getting to the bottom of deceptions. Most of the conspiracy stuff is obviously nuts. Unfortunately now, so are the facts on the ground.
P.S. - There probably isn't going to be a source of facts we all can agree on. And there are a lot of people who don't want there to be. It doesn't serve their interests.
We are in Big Trouble.
The Bad Guys like it that way.
Yes, and we are in a significantly more complex information literacy environment. At this point, I want education to focus on reasoning, rhetoric, and not being manipulated in addition to the three R’s. Actually, if I had my way it would also include courses on self-knowledge beyond hygiene and reproduction. How do brains work? Where do negative feelings come from? How can you reduce the amount of time you spend feeling bad. What kinds of projects give you the chance to access flow state while you are working and how does that mindset change how you collaborate and empathize with fellow humans. Ooops…off on a different soap box. But, yeah, I agree with you.
The trouble is the need to be certain you have The Truth. That is why seeking moral authority rather than humility is so problematic. As you point out we are in a significantly more complex info environment. I too thought years ago that if I just gathered all the 'facts', read widely enough, did my homework, I could arrive at The Truth. The trouble is you and I and everyone else here will never have all the facts or therefore The Truth. Watch a show called The Diplomat and you will see what I mean. And the characters are far more embedded and informed than you or I would ever be and they still don't have all the facts. It's a whole show built around this concept and reflects the reality that when a multitude of different actors and entities with differing agendas contribute to a situation, getting to The Truth is impossible. The average person will only ever have the facts their information sources give them. Start reading the likes of Michael Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi, The Free Press, and you will begin learning there is a whole world of facts out there you won't get from corporate media but you still will not have The Truth. All we can do is try to expand our collection of facts as much as possible but for you and me we will never know exactly what was said in the deepest layers of the FBI as one teensy example. It's hard enough for people to be present in and agree what was said in a work meeting much less what happened in the 2020 election. And, beware of beliefs you have because you badly want them to be true. That can cause you to misjudge what is happening before your eyes. So many kudos to you for putting in the work to listen to someone whose perspective clashed with your own and thoughtfully wrestle with all this. That's a sign you're on the right track.
Agree. I like those guys for that perspective, but no one is going to sort out the truth for us. So then the question becomes one of holding those ambiguities while we communicate with folks who hold other ideas.
This situation you described pretty accurately. The consequence of Fox News leading the way in mainstream alternative journalism. Which sounds like an oxymoron but isn't. Bear with me as I explain what happened.
Just as a side note, since no one has a lock on ultimate truth, what things is your husband being naive about? If he's a real dyed-in-the-wool MAGA kind of guy, then there are probably no shortage of things he could be naive about. The number one thing being that Trump is somehow okay and has the good of the country at heart. He does not. And that will become even clearer as his second Presidency progresses. He and his cronies are dedicated to the reformation of America in their own preferred image. A second American revolution, which was publicly announced by a Christian Right ring leader about 6 months ago or so. Considering the coalition he's put together, that would be some kind of permanent Republican lock on power (not necessarily a democracy of majority rules, but one where Republicans control the reins of power no matter what the people think. They've already achieved elimination of democracy at the state level in about 6 states. North Carolina being the most well known).
You know, I have some answers to your questions, but it's hard to know whether you'll ever read them. It's been a few days since the original post and I don't know if you keep up with your Substack notifications. So I'll just sum things up and give you a couple of tips on where to find better news sources.
1) The political project is to create a one party state in fact, though officially it will still be a multi-party state. Authoritarian in nature, by design. Republican of course. It will be a religious government, a mix of conservative Catholics and conservative Protestants united in the belief that the government should be of-by-for their particular religions. It will be heavily militarized, both against foreign enemies and especially against domestic dissent. It will be an isolationist foreign policy. Fortress America first! And most especially, the Billionaire class will be the number one government constituency, they will be the first in line to be served by the government. The rest of us... not so much. The Billionaires want a return to feudalism, since that was best for them. Bad for the rest of us. So... in a mouthful of a name: A new feudalism of Christo-authoritarians headed by a bunch of kleptomaniac Billionaires. I've just got to come up with a good name and meme for them. Could just call them the Kleps.
That is what the voters voted for, or didn't vote at all (which amounted to a vote for Trump). Whether they understood that or not. Obviously, the Kleps didn't want it to be named because then it wouldn't have been popular. The Republi-kleps (still trying to find that good name) sold it a bunch of other ways, but not what it really is.
Where you can find better news sources: "Ground" is a decent place to start. It aggregates news from sources both left and right. It isn't perfect by any means, but it's a place to start. There are other aggregators like them. And from several books published over the last 30-40 years. Plus a few really old ones like "The Prince" by Machiavelli. Still spot on to this day. Plus some magazines, most of them on-line these days: Mother Jones, The New Republic, The Nation, and others. Write back and I'll list a more complete set.
Be sure of yourself. Your instincts are right. There is something very foul going on. The MAGA folks have been deceived. And where they haven't been deceived, the've ended up being pawns in a game against democracy & freedom & liberty for most people. In Trump these people found a good tool, a blunt instrument that crashed through the barriers keeping them out of power. It is fascist in nature. Fascism never ends well for anybody. But it always has its appeal. It is directed by psychopaths. We live in an age of psychopaths.
Be brave. Be smart. Good luck. Take care.
I agree with you about the authoritarian agenda. As for my husband, he is not a kook, I respect him tremendously and that’s why when I adamantly argue against what I think are conspiracy theories and learn I was wrong, I no longer have any place to point. Though what you said is true, it is tricky AF to find clear evidence which the YouTubers will find some other esoteric explanation for in mere hours. And I can’t trust my old standby sources because they have been misleading me. Ground is nice, but my husband lists numerous sources that it doesn’t include so considers it biased. Independent media like this, bulwark, pod save America, and individual substack writers provide input for my opinions but I also read right-wing rags and occasionally check out Fox so I learn the new dog signals and what their most persuasive arguments about things I think are nuts look like. Sometimes I’m wrong.
It would be interesting if you could describe a conspiracy theory you've discovered to be true, or two.
Conspiracy theories by their very nature tend not to be true: most thinking ppl have an instant scepticism reaction to conspiracy tales, but some are very susceptible to them.
There's research out there on this.
But maybe you don't mean conspiracy theories? Maybe you mean his ideas about why is how things happen as they do differ from yours?
I think this article is a bit cheap: it's main point is spot on, but the complexities involved here are far deeper than suggested; some commenters point to the deeper issues.
24/7 coverage of everything, the endless need for content on line, & the financial failure of the old media model mean that the price is truth is higher than most outlets can justify or afford.
Fox has shown that blatant lies & entertainment or outrage news is popular & profitable. Musk has weaponised X, with it's huge reach. The right wing bs machine is way ahead of the truth.
And, Covid+ post covid trauma - including inflation - had created a global political backlash: Harris actually did better than most in stemming that tide, with congressional results hardly changed.
Choosing Trump though, given his character, history & baggage, including project 2025, over the relatively benign Harris, really takes some explaining.
My take on it is that the misinformation ecosystem, plus the general political disengagement of the majority of ppl, & covid trauma & the two wars, created chaos & uncertainty fear & hence the strongman desire.
No one familiar with what Trump actually did last time could vote for him: only ppl that did not know, or heard mainly the Fox blather could; similarly his immigration bs was so counter factual that only ppl believing Ts tone (if not his detailed lies) could accept it.
Disinformation was the winner here, & to blame journalists is a distraction. Even those telling the truth, in fact specifically them, were attacked & smeared by the right wing machine.
Musk & Carlson described Maddow as a crazed fascist, said that if she held power many would die.
That's the extent of the problem here, the alternative reality Trump has created.
Another data point is that excuse oils suggest but ppl thought H a threat to democracy than T. How is that possible?
The idea that leftist logic is a greater threat to truth & the future than the lieing, rapist, fraudulent grifter unsurectionist can only hold sway if truth does not exist, which is of course the primary goal of the disinformationists.
The financial anxiety of the post covid situation makes ppl more receptive to all that bs; it justifies their gut feeling to punish the govt they blame for it.
One of Trump's greatest achievements has been to recruit a whole bunch of decent people to his side. Providing a smoke screen for his indecent behavior.
The very definition of a tragedy. On my own substack I aim to talk about how we can communicate across cultures
Out of curiosity Marie, what were the conspiracy theories he believed in that now you think are not so kooky?
Early mask messaging also European research on gender transition in kids
Got it. Yes, on both those counts your husband was actually on the right track.
Having said that, it's still disappointing that he became a Trump supporter.
Working on a post that I'll share when it's ready that maybe you'll find helpful.
If European research that questioned the effectiveness of pediatric gender medicine and highlighted how little is known about its safety over the long run caused the husband to have sympathy for the sex realist/gender critical position or embrace it outright, he would have had to keep it to himself around Democrats.
Dems will not countenance any criticism of gender identity ideology. Dissidents are immediately labeled transphobes without prior notice or an opportunity to present their case in an impartial forum. It's verdict first, trial never.
That wasn't enough to turn me, a centrist, gay and sex-realist Democrat into a Trump voter, but I have come across several people with my profile who did vote for Trump.
It was pretty clear that journalists were in the tank for the Democrats since at least the Bush administration. The media fawning over Obama and ignoring of some very serious events during his presidency was remarkable. This phenomenon of media as activist predated Trump and was in fact part of the reason why he was elected in 2016.
I agree. I was so happy when Obama got elected. But when he actually accepted that nobel prize having done nothing I immediately started worrying. Next thing you know foreign policy was a mess, he initiated a new wave of populist racial politics and he made it cool to heap scorn and contempt on half of the country. And the press worshipped at his feet the entire time. You are absolutely 100% right that this phenomenon both predated and caused Trumps first victory. In 2016 I told all my fellow liberals that Trumps success was basically our fault on account of the way we (and our liberal journalists) abused conservatives. I can’t remember one single time when my argument landed. Now eight years later I’m having some incremental success with this point of view. Apparently it took eight years for mainstream liberals to admit that Trumps victory was not merely a racist backlash against a black president as so many journalists and commentators asserted at the time. It amazed me that such a childish and pathetic take got do much traction—and it really opened my eyes at the time.
I think I can confidently identify at least one Trump voter ("of color," at that): that South Asian convenience-store clerk in Ferguson who got slugged by Mike Brown!
That's also the point in the Obama era when things started to turn. Many who'd voted for Obama's "No Black America, No White America" witnessed the pivot to "Black Lives," and recognized it as a bait-and-switch.
Considering the number of breaks Trump got from the press, an argument could be made that there's a Rightwing bias to news reporting. The biggest bias being the false equivalency made between Republicans and Democrats. They aren't anywhere close to being equivalent.
I think its a somewhat of a mistake to characterize the press as right wing even though it certainly seemed to be the case decades ago when corporate consolidation of news outlets was essentially completed. I think its more explanatory and less philosophical or academic to view the press as being excessively beholden to capital and corporate interests (ie advertisers like big tech and big pharma) as opposed to one or the other political ideology.
One explanation for the breaks Trump received from the mainstream media is they feared Trump would accuse them of bias if they didn't. What's not settled is whether that is speculation or rooted in facts.
Where I said "Democrats" I probably should have said "status quo"
As a former business/politics reporter, your suggestion ( "cultivate a healthy distrust of everyone") rings so true.
In my job as an editor in chief of a Polish second biggest newspaper I would tell new journalist: don't trust anyone, even angels.
"it is extremely hard to predict the long-term consequences of telling supposedly noble lies."
It's actually not that hard to predict. Once the lies are found out, those telling them lose credibility.
Beneficent paternalism is still just lying even if it is for someone's own good. And the problem with being lied to is it is then impossible to make a decision based on the truth. You lose your freedom when you are lied to. The liar turns the lied to into a tool. I hope the NYT and WaPo go out of business for what they have done. They elected Trump.
Which President did the following?
-- Sent the FBI, in full swat gear, arrest people for merely praying outside of abortion clinics?
-- Classified Catholics as "terrorists" (really), infiltrated Catholic Churches and tried to get priests to break the seal of Confession?
-- Arrested the father of a murdered marine because he didn't like Biden's contention the military was safer than ever?
Of course, it was Biden. It never ceases to amaze me that people think Trump is the threat to civil rights.
And they also put Tulsi on a terrorist watchlist for criticizing Kamala.
I Was Added To A Terrorist Watchlist (Quiet Skies). (5 min)
Tulsi Gabbard. Aug 11, 2024
https://youtu.be/L1wy_kppu5U?si=u3rnP-a28SLfEURd
Honestly, I haven't really trusted the media since back in the early '90s; a friend of mine was part of the Hurricane Andrew relief efforts, and was interviewed by a TV news reporter. He told the reporter, on camera, that he was part of a team from a Midwestern church. The congregation had taken up a collection and filled the youth group bus with bottled water and diapers. They had driven straight through the night and spent the morning handing out supplies in 100 degree heat, so they all looked sweaty, disheveled and exhausted. When he turned on the news that evening, he saw himself on TV, but the audio part of the recording had been replaced by a voiceover identifying him and his team as "hurricane victims who had lost everything and were waiting in line for water." Maybe it was just some sort of honest mistake or misunderstanding in the editing room; but it made me realize that what we see on TV or read in the newspaper isn't necessarily what actually happened. The dishonesty and concealing of facts in the past four years was particularly egregious; it was clear to anyone with eyes that Joe Biden had been cognitively impaired for quite some time, but the media kept insisting he was sharp as a tack until the debate made is so clear that the charade could not continue. Similarly, Kamala had been characterized as "unpopular" and "unelectable" all the way up until the day before Biden announced she would be the new candidate. Suddenly she was "joy" and "vibes" and extremely competent and accomplished. I kept thinking "did I wander into an alternate reality?" It also was very strange that absolutely NO ONE seemed to have any interest at all in finding out who has actually been running the country for the past four years; and no one even was interested in asking Kamala "so, when did you notice that Biden was not quite all there? And why did you not invoke your Vice Presidential duty to step in when the President is incapacitated, as the 25th Amendment authorizes you to do?"
The lockstep media conformity and groupthink has been absolutely horrifying. Democracy does indeed die in the darkness, and when the press decides "nope, we don't want to shine any lights on that, we only do investigative reporting on people we don't like," we are surely screwed. As distasteful as Trump may be, I am at least assured that the mainstream media will keep his every move scrutinized under a microscope, instead of covering things up as "misinformation" (and then later admitting "well, yes, that actually did happen after all - AND HERE'S WHY IT'S ACTUALLY THE BEST THING EVER.")
It does beg the question of why the media volunteered to be the American version of Pravda. Usually, it takes some sort of threat of deportation to the gulags or something like that to get people on board with becoming government mouthpieces. Very strange indeed.
Where newsrooms once had reporters, editors, etc. in separate roles, now journalists must do it all, including that they are expected to post their articles with little editing and post on social media. It encourages them to share their opinions and put a bit if a thumb on the scale. I think that has changed public perception of how journalists do their job -- and certainly how they actually do their work.
If you think bias in journalism started with Trump you must be much younger than me.
JFK was portrayed in the media as an athlete (touch football) but in fact he had a very bad back and was in constant pain. And his sexual shenanigans with various female aids were never mentioned. OTOH, Gerald Ford stumbled once on the stairs exiting an airplane was endlessly portrayed as a klutz. In fact he was an athlete, an All American football player.
Ronald Regan was portrayed as an ignorant boob while Biden was treated respectfully, until his disastrous debate reveal his senility for all to see. And the media have still not admitted that the whole Biden family is as corrupt as can be (Burisma, Hunter’s laptop, etc.)
Just a few examples off the top of- of my head. I’m sure there’s many more.
Agree, and I think it can also be said that the disinformation of the government health care establishment as amplified by the NYT, NPR, et al laid the groundwork for the widespread acceptance of the most disastrous lie since Vietnam, that of the stolen 2020 election. I for one will not soon forget the open letter signed by hundreds of health care professionals warning of the dangers of spreading covid in large public gatherings...unless it is a BLM protest.
I completely agree with almost everything you write here, and thank you for stating these important points so clearly. However, I do have a quibble: I'm neither a journalist nor a historian, but you seem to claim that the flagrant journalistic partisanship we see today is a new phenomenon, and things used to be better. Indeed, the left-skewed bias of mainstream media today seems more noticeable than any time in my past experience, but I believe this varies over time and place. My understanding is that for example in early-mid 19th century America, the level of partisan distortion edging into dishonesty was far more severe than today.