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Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

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Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#231

Post by raxxorraxor »

avalys wrote: post #4

The single biggest problem with America today is the presentation and consumption of national news, political commentary and public policy as entertainment. The media has figured out that America is the ultimate reality TV show and they present it as such. Cable TV and the internet are to blame for this. I don't know what could be done about it. But we'd be way better off if "the news" was something you could watch f…

True that the US seems to have its own "quality" of news, but most western countries don't fare better. On the contrary, the less sensationell style often makes you believe the news to be more reliable, but in essence it never truly is.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#232

Post by throw0101b »

goodbyesf wrote: post #204
grantc wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely a demand issue. Sure, there are secondary supply-side effects, but the simple truth is what we see today is what captures available demand. There is no other domain where you find that Americans are willing, en masse, to eat their vegetables before dessert. So the pro-wrestling flavor of televised news is going to crush anything more thoughtful slash less entertaining with relentless invariance. To me, the…

> Definitely a demand issue. This is simply not true. There is no demand. That's why the news industry forced google, youtube, facebook, etc to push their product all over their platforms. The news industry literally got government to force tech companies to peddle their noxious product. > To me, the only plausible shift to more fact-based and balanced coverage happens via subsidies -- the government has to insert it…

> This is simply not true. There is no demand. That's why the news industry forced google, youtube, facebook, etc to push their product all over their platforms.

The product was already being produced pre-Internet, pre-television, pre-radio:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabloid_journalism

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_journalism

A new distribution medium didn't cause it to be created.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#233

Post by taylodl »

Do I avoid the news? No, of course not. What I avoid is commentary masquerading as news. If I'm going to get an opinion from someone, it's going to be someone who's demonstrated critical thinking skills. You're not going to find that on the TV news channels or on social media. They're all simply a waste of time.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#234

Post by synecdoche »

selectodude wrote: post #124
tootie wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is more and better quality news available now than ever in history and people flock to the crappiest options because they can't get enough. It's demand.

“When you’re young, you look at television and think, There’s a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down. But when you get a little older, you realize that’s not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That’s a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give peo…

Mainstream media is not blameless in the least. Pushing psychological buttons to create addiction to what is very little else than entertainment and biased opinion. Rarely if ever are there references to sources. Instead there are interpretations and nth hand accounts that you are expected to accept as is. It's there plain for everyone to see, yet rarely is it taken seriously for what it is, propaganda.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#235

Post by Auracle »

jcfrei wrote: post #19

The problem is that people don't just ignore the mainstream news media. A lot of them also turn to fringe channels that peddle an alternative view of the world that's more affirmative of their own worldview - without being more truthful. It's going to be a huge challenge to every democracy because people will fundamentally disagree about basic facts.

The problem is that it’s no longer contained to Fox News and MSNBC. NPR now incredibly biased, CNN was but is trying to backtrack (?), and the various top newspapers have all gradually slid more and more to biased viewpoints.

There isn’t a major news source out there for me. I don’t want my own political beliefs confirmed and be told how bad the other side is so I can feel superior. I want facts, and not just those I agree with. That largely doesn’t exist anymore.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#236

Post by gdubs »

I tried to explain to my kids lately the trouble with news. You want to be an informed citizen, so that you have some perspective on what's happening in the world and why. But that's rarely what 'news' is. Instead, it's a constant informational warfare environment. Rarely is a piece of news simply reporting on events – it's almost always trying to shape your opinion. The New York Times Daily podcast ends with "Here's what else you need to know today."

So I've started to teach my kids instead how to read news critically. To spot logical fallacies and the signs of manipulation. To understand when someone is sharing an opinion rather than a fact, and to be aware that a lot of the information buzzing around the world is usually directed towards convincing you of something more than it is about educating you.

There's still solid journalism out there, and I think a lot of people enter into the field with a desire to serve a public good. But sadly I think the majority of news has become like food from a vending machine. The signage might say Food™ but its got the nutritional value of a plastic toy. It's junk, filler, an extension of some corporate PR department.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#238

Post by digging »

bcoates wrote: post #89
digging wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it remarkable how healthy and wise our society was before 24-hour news. Nowadays we have newfangled problems like "populism", "anger", "Nazis" - say, where does that name even come from?

No, we have a problem with the news selling those fictional things as real. Turn off CNN or OAN wherever you get your firehose of algorithmically generated nonsense from and they magically go away.

This is a truly unhinged take. Maybe you need to be reading more news.

Re: Do you avoid the news? You’re in growing company

#239

Post by sylens »

wildrhythms wrote: post #225
sylens wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recognize there was 24/7 news media then, but it was still better than now. And before there was 24/7 news media was even better than the early 2000s

Kindly define 'better'. News in the early 2000s, the 1990s, the 1980s, ... was all just as commercialized, propagandized, and partisan as it is today. I think the difference that in the early 2000s the breadth of 'news' didn't include all of the micro niches and pointless internet celebrity drama that seems to infect everything everywhere today. Also in the early 2000s there wasn't the hyper addictive social networks…

Better meaning that in the 90s or early 2000s, your news sources were mostly: newspaper, television, radio, and some Web 1.0 websites. You most likely consumed this at various distinct times of the day, then went about your business to school, work, etc. You did not receive push notifications to a device in your pocket about the latest event, or have people blasting their opinions out all over a social feed.

And before the 90s, you most likely sat down and watched the evening news at one time a day, then read the newspaper in the morning for further information. So this was an even more segmented version of the 90s and early 2000s.

Was the content of the news commercialized and partisan? Yeah, probably was. But you consumed much less of it because it wasn't shoved in your face, demanding your attention at every waking hour.

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