421–430 of 964 posts
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CNN and MSNBC are not the opposite of Fox News. The opposite would be something like The Nation or Democracy Now! .
While this seems like a great claim, it could be more compelling if I could read the supporting argument behind it.
CNN/MSNBC the Democrats.
Democracy Now is essentially the American grassroots left. Not generally fans of either party.
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The Economist strikes me as very liberal, and not particularly conservative. And by that I mean the traditional definition of liberal, not Democratic-Party-of-the-US liberal.
Conservatism is a relative term. You can be a conservative right-winger, a conservative socialist, a conservative liberal or any other kind of conservative as long as your social situation fits it. Many articles by the Economist are conservative in that they intend to defend and conserve the status-quo, especially when dealing with foreign policy.
Conservativism is a relative position, but you can't be a conservative liberal.
Economist literally had a massive article what is conservativism. And - SPOILER - UK Torries used to be conservative, while GOP has been reactionary/populist for a while now.
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How are you supposed to argue against something if you don't even understand why someone supports what they support? All you will end up doing is strawmaning their views which won't convince anybody to change their views.
Do I need to understand why someone supports flat earth theory to be able to argue that it's scientifically invalid? Why is it up to me to figure out how they got deluded?
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Yeah, dude, that’s what it means to have a defacto state religion: it becomes the default thing. A classic characteristic of state religions is that even those who do not believe will institutionally practise. So, for instance, even Buddhists in Jordan must not eat in public during Ramadan. Considering everything I was told about America, I was surprised to see that it is a Christian nation (I expected it to not be b…
> the state has official holidays for Christian events. If that alarms you, definitely do not go to Europe! That America has some unimportant vestiges of Christianity doesn't make it "a Christian nation" for any useful purposes. Yes, Trump did a bit of pandering to Christians which fooled precisely no one, but in any matter of substance America is resolvedly secular. If you want an accurate and useful model, think of…
If Christianity wasn't a major force in America there would be no controversy over Roe vs Wade (which everyone expects to be overridden soon, thanks to Christian activism) nor over gay marriage.
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> it has long since become just a western culture tradition with no particular religious significance for a lot of people I think that people have a tendency to underestimate the degree of Christian influence on their way of life, and the vast majority of people who practice xmas are Christian, even if they are not weekly church attendees. I was raised in an atheist household, we definitely viewed Christmas as a reli…
Christmas is a very secular holiday. There is still mass, but in American culture the religious aspect of Christmas is minuscule in comparison to the secular and consumerism aspects. "Most of the songs are very religious" is just not true for most mainstream Americans. For most Americans Christmas is about family, Santa (Coke's version), Reindeers, Elves, Trees, and Gifts. And then local or family traditions which ma…
Maybe we're looking at different stats. I'm looking at the ones you linked from Pew, which show that 61% of Americans who celebrate Xmas consider it to be Christian, down from 64% in 2014.
That's supposed to convince me that it is a secular holiday?
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Attacking the center is always the craziest narrative to me. It's saying: not only is it not okay to disagree with me and be on the other side, it's also not okay to not passionately agree with my exact side. The only right way to view these complex issues is to sign your name to join my party and then hold the party line, and everything else is unethical. I can't imagine a more obnoxious political viewpoint than tha…
There are two centrisms that can't be confused. The first kind of centrist examines each issue on its merits and arrives at a principled conclusion, regardless of how other people think about an issue. This kind of centrism is reasonable. This person can't really even be called a centrist. He's just non-partisan. The second kind of centrist looks at the existing parties to an argument and averages their viewpoints: "…
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> The problem of course is that not every issue needs a "both sides" treatment. Exactly. Imagine saying that it's important to be able to make an impassioned argument for slavery? To make it contemporary: Should I be trying to get into the mind of a Q Conspiracy theorist? An Antivaxer? How many conspiracies do I need delve into and understand such that I can make a passionate argument for them?
> To make it contemporary: Should I be trying to get into the mind of a Q Conspiracy theorist? An Antivaxer? How many conspiracies do I need delve into and understand such that I can make a passionate argument for them? Yes and it's disturbing that you (and many others) have no interest in understanding other people.
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Those links show that out of all Americans who vote in presidential elections, well above 90% vote for either a Democrat or a Republican. However, that does not mean that well above 90% of Americans are either Democrats or Republicans.
People lie. I'm not sure why you expect the media to sell to people's lies instead of selling to people's actions. PS Americans also overwhelmingly vote either Democrat or Republican in non-presidential elections, even down to the city council level.
Americans overwhelmingly abstain rather than voting for any of the offered candidates, Democrat, Republican, or independent or minor party, in non-Presidential elections. 2018 had the highest midterm turnout since the before the Reagan era, and it reached the whole way up to 49%.
I tried this experiment: read nytimes, wapo, fox, national review and politico. I wanted to get different perspectives. However, I encountered a bunch of issues: They dont talk about or even cover the same things, which makes it hard to compare liberal vs conservative perspectives. This is the most common form of bias I've come across. In the rare case they do cover the same thing, many articles either simply do not…
In my experience, the biggest contributor to the echo chambers is a lack of memory.
I do not think people's memories are bad, but rather they willfully ignore the other party's position, never learned it in the first place, or are justifying it because their party is in power. This is what centrists frequently get mocked at "both sides" about. They aren't saying "oh both sides are trying to stage an insurrection" they are saying "both sides are not going to let immigrants across the border" (but it'll be generalized to everything being both sided).
I think the way to cure this is also the way to make parties better. Criticism. We should always critique our parties to make them better. Unless you believe they are perfect already and getting direct commands from god, it is deserving of criticism. But we've encouraged a culture where criticism isn't (effectively) allowed. It is allowed by certain people who speak in a certain way, but not for the average person. (e.g. if you are speaking to someone you don't know that well and politics are brought up and you criticize something x party recently did it will be presumed you are of the opposing side). I believe part of this is because we are comparing politicians and parties rather than judging them independently (this is also why I'm a big supporter of Cardinal voting as opposed to the common Ordinal propositions).
This is essentially the root of whataboutism. The classic example is one I had my parents many times over the last decade. I suggest Trump should be investigated for his connections to Epstein given his frequent contact. And my dad would be like "but what about Clinton!" and my response has always been "yeah, him too." Because it isn't about parties, it is about the crime that was potentially committed. If something is bad, then it is bad if the other party does it or if your party does it. Tribes don't matter. The whataboutism is just a distraction technique.
TLDR: Don't forget the past. Criticize everyone. Stop saying "what about...".
I tried this experiment: read nytimes, wapo, fox, national review and politico. I wanted to get different perspectives. However, I encountered a bunch of issues: They dont talk about or even cover the same things, which makes it hard to compare liberal vs conservative perspectives. This is the most common form of bias I've come across. In the rare case they do cover the same thing, many articles either simply do not…
It has highlighted to me some biases from some of the sources I follow on a day by day basis (NYT, Washington Post).
Bonus points for the Economist, because you also get coverage and analysis of events across the world many of which get almost 0 coverage in US press.