so much of media seems to think its primary job is to turn a spotlight on the hypocrisy of the audience's own pieties when its actual job is to hit a guy who made one million dollars turning puppies into mulch with a hammer five hundred times
You can tell this is true, because when anyone on X or BlueSky suggests maybe NOTing pay the NYT $240 a year to be told about the hypocrisy of our pieties, some journalist shows up to argue we're hypocrites for not "supporting journalism," and reminding us that's supposed to be one of our pieties.
The position of ivory-tower “view from nowhere” journalists is that democracy owes everything to journalism while journalism owes nothing to democracy, and they are unable to see why their readers find that demand neither convincing nor compelling.
how about the economic model of journalism? the old model of readers/advertisers provide income to news media is dead; what new economic model is possible in a democracy transiting towards oligarchy?
in any case, the example of bezos/wash post shows that model is dead too
Yeap. They demand the right to criticize, audit and denounce everyone but think they themselves should be above criticism. They all think they're Walter Cronkite but don't want to earn it.
Wait who's gonna pay for that lol? The poor and disenfranchised?
Sorry I'm not being mean or doomer. Ok maybe a lil bit doomer. US regular peasants are not well equipped to be in this information warfare era. Some don't even know it's been going on
from the reports of most of the journalists, not really. newspapers used to be primarily funded by ads and online they still run them. only taking subscriptions is a tight line to walk so then you need outside funding and unfortunately the rich and powerful control a lot of that
I’d like to see a publication take on the ultimate American political taboo: Talk about how rural America sucks. It’s just as crime ridden, drug infested, uneducated, and welfare dependent as so-called “inner cities” — but without producing anything interesting culturally.
Rural America, the much-hyped heartland, is a horror show.
I grew up in it.
Little towns are terrifying if you are in any way 'different' from accepted norms. They are a hotbed of gaslighting, abuse, fraud, outright theft, crippling poverty, ill health, and rampant depression.
Decaying infrastructure. Poor employment opportunities.. Poor connectivity and fewer shipping options, so good luck with an internet business. Dwindling health resources, often dangerously far away. No public transit, so you need a vehicle.
If you don't have bulk food prep & storage options at home, your food options can come down to dollar stores, fast food, & gas stations. That's not healthy.
No, you probably won't be able to grow most of your own food. Farming is skilled labor, hard work, & resource intensive.
My experience too. I grew up in a tiny midwestern town for 18 years. During that time my family’s home was burglarized, and my parents’ business was robbed three times. I’ve now lived in New York City for over 17 years and have never been the victim of any type of crime.
Hahaha, me too. I caught hell from the principal of an elementary school. Later learned that before I was born, his kids tried to rob my Dad's machine shop. My fam caught them, held them at gunpoint until the sheriff arrived. The kids spent jail time because they'd been doing it to lots of folks.
This turned into a gripe session below, but the point is the media treats the same socioeconomic issues differently in rural white areas and urban minority neighborhoods. In both cases, the root cause is economic—but minorities get blamed for supposed character flaws while whites are idealized.
And “inner cities” have repeatedly made cultural breakthroughs for decades, including probably America’s current biggest cultural export: Hip hop culture and everything related. No one gives a shit about people living in the middle of nowhere or suburban dads wearing socks with sandals.
I'll take my chances going back to my hotel on the NYC subway at midnight over driving with Massachusetts plates through a small town run like a fiefdom by a local sheriff any day of the week.
something to ponder on is how Frederick Douglass' newspaper would be considered bad journalism by mainstream media today for being too biased and polemic.
People want a point of view. They are busy. They need someone to tell them what to think. They may accept it or reject it, but they don’t want anything less than a complete world view.
I was on a jury and they were striking people by asking if we’d ever been in a dispute with a contractor. One man said he had but as “a scientist I can be unbiased”. Everyone in the room laughed. That was far far worse than if he’d said “Yes, a bitter one, but I will try to be fair”.
Reminds me of Molly Ivins writing how when her former newspaper ran an expose on crooked nursing homes they were accused of 'crusading' for not showing the nursing home owners POV.
2. As Molly pointed anyone who leaves sick old folks lying in their own filth for hours or days at a time is not an 'alternate viewpoint,' they're scum! And the paper rightly portrayed them as such.
3. There's a school of thought wherein if one person says Ted Bundy is a monstrous serial killer then another person must be quoted saying Bundy is a stand up guy. Because Objectivity!
Real Objectivity of course would be figuring out the truth and reporting it. But that's work.
… or worse still, turn a spotlight on the hypocrisy of what they *believe* are the pieties of who they *believe* their audience to be, based on their insular, incestuous, insider’s perspective on American life.
Someone put it well this week when they said "they don't care about being hypocrites and contradicting themselves in the same sentence, they know they're wrong, they're grinning the whole time watching you get worked up about it".
So yes. Evil men need to be treated as what they are: evil.
When the snot-nosed little shit kid at school throws another student's lunch in a mud puddle and then lies through their teeth about their innocence to the teacher, the teacher is complicit if they accept the lie. Demand action, not smug, toothless criticism.
“much of media seems to think its primary job is to turn a spotlight on the hypocrisy of the audience's own pieties” — How and why did they come to think this?
Because actual journalism mostly died out about 30 years ago and was replaced by reality tv bullshit and reporters decided they were the sole arbiters of truth. When they got pushback they chose to blame their audiences instead of taking stock of their own shortcomings.
tbh the main piece I see linked from them is the evil computer powered rent cabal thing… which like, it's true, there really is one, it's just it's ineffective and their evil idea doesn't work
Nah, that’s the whole sadistic part of Fox News, it’s the lying. Take away the lying and you have nothing. Propublica isn’t Fox News but telling the truth, it’s one of the only news outlets that is immune to the Fox News disease that caused almost every other outlet to only do both sidesism.
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It’s also the perfect pitch for a politician to get my vote.
in any case, the example of bezos/wash post shows that model is dead too
They openly favored Donny for the sake of ratings. Now their ratings are in the toilet and they shocked at how mad people are at them.
Sorry I'm not being mean or doomer. Ok maybe a lil bit doomer. US regular peasants are not well equipped to be in this information warfare era. Some don't even know it's been going on
BTW, Luigi Mangione was a right winger and worshipped Elon
Lester Holt, NBC News
I grew up in it.
Little towns are terrifying if you are in any way 'different' from accepted norms. They are a hotbed of gaslighting, abuse, fraud, outright theft, crippling poverty, ill health, and rampant depression.
Decaying infrastructure. Poor employment opportunities.. Poor connectivity and fewer shipping options, so good luck with an internet business. Dwindling health resources, often dangerously far away. No public transit, so you need a vehicle.
Food deserts, too...
No, you probably won't be able to grow most of your own food. Farming is skilled labor, hard work, & resource intensive.
Are you disabled?
https://www.propublica.org/article/lord-of-the-roths-how-tech-mogul-peter-thiel-turned-a-retirement-account-for-the-middle-class-into-a-5-billion-dollar-tax-free-piggy-bank
Real Objectivity of course would be figuring out the truth and reporting it. But that's work.
So yes. Evil men need to be treated as what they are: evil.
I read it as a failure of left media to engage in critical journalism vs chasing the siren song of gimmicks and conspiracy theories.