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Things You Notice When You Quit the News

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Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#201

Post by ssijak »

mmaunder wrote: post #93

Agreed there is a lot of garbage news. The trouble comes about if you aren't up to speed on current events that affect you. Just a simple example from today: The CIA's claims regarding Russian election hacking. I'm the CEO of a cyber security company and I'd hate to think what would happen if someone asked me about that and I wasn't aware of it. It's not just CEO's that need to stay current. If you're in PR, policy,…

There are probably relevant security related journals that could inform you better about it than CNN or FoxNews.

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#202

Post by Zahreddine »

michaelchisari wrote: post #39
cloakandswagger wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look at recent events if you need further evidence of this. The term "fake news" has exploded in just under a month in the mainstream media. If my memory serves me, tabloids like The Enquirer have been sitting on news stands for as long as I can remember. So how did this fervor over "fake news" coalesce so quickly and uniformly? Mainstream outlets move in lockstep with each other and these are the final, desperate de…

Because this is the first election where "spirit cooking" and "pizzagate" conspiracies were put on equal footing with foreign policy and economic positions.

When MSM pushes false/sponsored narratives to start wars in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Ukraine and Libya as part of "foreign policy", I can see why "pizzagate" gets equal validity.

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#203

Post by siberianbear »

colordrops wrote: post #197
eigenvector wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favourite example of this is the Economist news magazine. The Economist reports on a much larger range of country and topics than the typical magazine or newspaper. Many of its readers like it for that exact reason: it gives them information on stories they won't normally find in their local or national news sources and they want to be informed about, say, hydroelectric developments in the Congo. The problem is th…

The Economist also has a fairly evident political agenda.

Has The Economist shifted? I started reading it in about 2000, and at the time I really liked it because it seemed so intelligent and neutral. It seemed like such a pleasure to read something that went deep into interesting topics without an obvious axe to grind.

In the past ten years it seems to have drifted gradually leftward. Sometimes I can't reconsile The Economist of 2000 with the one of 2016. Did The Economist move gradually to the left or did I move to the right?

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#204

Post by Tempest1981 »

closeparen wrote: post #192
Tempest1981 wrote: post #8

The local news seems to always be about murders and violence. Why is it beneficial to learn about every instance of "humans behaving badly"? (Celebrities, ok, maybe, but random people?)

>Why is it beneficial to learn about every instance of "humans behaving badly"? Because it is your civic responsibility to care that such things are happening in your community, and to allocate your political activity, voting, and charitable giving in a way that you believe will mitigate that suffering. Because if everyone said, "sometimes humans behave badly; why should I care?" we'd be living in a hellscape.

I see your point. I guess I would prefer a summary every month/year, vs. a graphic live video report each night.

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#205

Post by whybroke »

gnarbarian wrote: post #28
cloakandswagger wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look at recent events if you need further evidence of this. The term "fake news" has exploded in just under a month in the mainstream media. If my memory serves me, tabloids like The Enquirer have been sitting on news stands for as long as I can remember. So how did this fervor over "fake news" coalesce so quickly and uniformly? Mainstream outlets move in lockstep with each other and these are the final, desperate de…

The whole FUD campaign regarding "Fake News" is comically hypocritical in my opinion. Glenn Greenwald has an excellent article calling them out for it: https://theintercept.com/2016/12/09/a-clinton-fan-manufactur... Edit: Ironically, that post was doing great until it got flagged. Edit 2: It has been unflagged Edit 3: Flagged again.

An exact opposite equally excellent article from the same publication calling out the FUD we know as 'Fake News'

And this one avoids words like 'shameful' and 'disgusting'

https://theintercept.com/2016/11/26/laura-ingraham-lifezette...

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#206

Post by rjeli »

slavik81 wrote: post #68
redsummer wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He mentions: "instead of reading the back and forth of a daily, why not read a weekly review? Instead of a weekly review, why not read a monthly magazine? Instead of a monthly magazine, why not read an annual book?" Can anyone recommend such a weekly or monthly review? One that isn't particularly ideological. It would save so much time.

It is rather ideological, but that is basically the pitch for Last Week Tonight. https://youtu.be/_BlI3BRUTHs

"Rather" is an understatement. There is zero nuance or reasoned critique on LWT - just "look at this stupid person, make ridiculous analogy, yell at imaginary person, laugh track" over and over for 20 minutes straight.

Proponents will argue that it brings scandals into the light of popular media, or that mockery is the only reasonable critique of such idiocy displayed on the show, to which I say knowing little about a subject and mocking the target is worse than knowing nothing at all - it solves no problem and only polarizes politics more. "It's only a comedy show" is no excuse when politics is rapidly becoming vitriolic, polarizing and dehumanizing.

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#207

Post by alltakendamned »

redsummer wrote: post #20
ssaunier_ wrote: post #6

Must-(re)read: http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/hatethenews - it was 10 years ago.

He mentions: "instead of reading the back and forth of a daily, why not read a weekly review? Instead of a weekly review, why not read a monthly magazine? Instead of a monthly magazine, why not read an annual book?" Can anyone recommend such a weekly or monthly review? One that isn't particularly ideological. It would save so much time.

Le Monde Diplomatique.

English version can be found at https://mondediplo.com/

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#209

Post by tw04 »

cloakandswagger wrote: post #17
pipio21 wrote: post #12

5. You are being manipulated by mainstream news. You can learn Arabic or Russian and go to Ukraine or Syria or Iraq and inform yourself talking to the people there, both sides of the story, or you can let the TV media tell you what is happening. I have done it(I don't know much Arabic and a little Russian but I have traveled there) and it is quite an astonishment that what TV shows you has nothing to do with reality.…

Look at recent events if you need further evidence of this. The term "fake news" has exploded in just under a month in the mainstream media. If my memory serves me, tabloids like The Enquirer have been sitting on news stands for as long as I can remember. So how did this fervor over "fake news" coalesce so quickly and uniformly? Mainstream outlets move in lockstep with each other and these are the final, desperate de…

It coalesced when the "MSM" managed to get the election outcome in the US so comically wrong. The only possible reason for the mistake was "fake news". It turns out "fake news" has been a driving force since roughly the time twitter arrived. I can only hope the (in theory) REAL media will eventually give up on "first is best" and instead focus on ACTUAL REPORTING. Relaying what twitter has to say about a world event is borderline useless. Put someone on the ground and tell me what's REALLY going on instead of "twitter reports say..."

Re: Things You Notice When You Quit the News

#210

Post by sooheon »

jacalata wrote: post #185
caseysoftware wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/11/us/correcting-the-record-t... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Duranty https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism The first two were both NYT journalists - one a Pulitzer Prize winner in 1932 - and the third covers the 1890s, so let's stop acting like it's new, unique, or exists exclusively on one side or the other. This is how much of the modern press started.

Do I understand correctly that you would like to take back your earlier claim: >Whether you agree or not, if you ask any suspect if they're guilty, the answer is "No!"

I'm sorry but even I don't follow your logic. AFAICT your parent is simply pointing out the pot calling the kettle black.
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