Without even reading it I think I can predict the unspoken intent of the article: anything that undermines our suppression of opposing viewpoints must itself be suppressed.
Off to check.. Yep that's pretty much the gist of it.
Off to check.. Yep that's pretty much the gist of it.
James Fallows of the Atlantic has a great book from a long time ago called “Breaking the News” which offers a compelling take on how we ended up in this state, and what the news is really about.
It why the guardian can exist for 20 years without a profit.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19799893
It's why WashingtonPost is bailed out by Bezos. Do you really think Bezos bought the WashingonPost to make money?
The first newspapers in the US and during colonial times were created by wealthy landowners and business elites to push their views and ideology. Fundamentally, I don't think much has changed, but I'm open to having my mind changed.
You names WaPo and NYT but those are tiny in reach and revenue compared to CNN or Fox News, which are both extremely profitable. Bezos WaPo for $250 million which is barely more than a third of CNN's profit in 2018 [1] and Fox's profitability is even bigger [2] with a giant warchest after the sale of its other media assets. The television news channels that most Americans get their news from are very profit motivated and some like Fox have found idealogical niches that are consistent across media empires like News Corp but they all just push outrage for profit.
[1] https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/cf4270
[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-03-28/fox-ne...
Establishment press was bad in the 60s already, which was why there was a flourishing counter-movement, from the early Rolling Stone to underground press.
In due time, the Rolling Stone turned to the content-less rag that it is today, and e.g. the once revolutionary Liberation turned into a centre-left more of the same, similar fate awaited most of the once alternative press.
Nowadays with the web as equalizer, alternative sources also directly compete for viewers with any established outlet (they're just another URL away). So they are far more fierce with them, presenting any opposing viewpoint as beyond the pale (even if shared by a great chunk of the population, or even the majority), and cheering for their de-platforming.
Their views are well represented in other newspapers, media and in politics. In fact in the UK it can be argued to be the majority view.
Why is it that these people always want to say that they're the real victims whilst sugarcoating their views with the phrase "opposing viewpoints". It's like there's a playbook to follow for disingenuous argument.
And a great majority of people don't particularly like giving sovereignty to participate into a nebulous "European Union" which mostly promotes German interests and Brussels bureucrats, don't welcome immigration as panacea without thinking their race is superior (just that their country doesn't need more people coming in, whether caucasian or black or whatever), have a good relationship with their spouses without turning everything into a war of the sexes and a fight against "patriarchy", and are straight/LGBT/etc, etc, and content with it, without making everything be about their sexual preferences, or approving of BS demands like trans persons competing in women's sports, or the "cotton ceiling".
And yet those people are frequently classified as racist, sexist and homophobic, because any nuance away from a constantly widening Overton window is considered beyond the pale -- even if what they say could very well have been the opinion of the mainstream of the left population in, say, 1980s (heck, in 1999 in Seattle the left fought against "globalization", and today anybody that speaks against the same is a "populist/Trump supporter/xenophobic/etc").
>Why is it that these people always want to say that they're the real victims whilst sugarcoating their views with the phrase "opposing viewpoints". It's like there's a playbook to follow for disingenuous argument.
So, just like there's a playbook to demonize the other side with thought-crimes ("anybody that says X is "racist, sexist or homophobic", and you get to define how wide X can be...).
In other words: show your work.
The article is (in the main) about our relationship to news. The ever increasing saturation of 'news' into our everyday lives with constant demands for our attention and the impact on individuals and society.
It actually advocates rising above news and connecting on a human level with each other rather than political in order to push the news cycle out of our lives.
Here are some quotes from the article:
"The belief that we’re morally obliged to stay plugged in – that this level of time commitment and emotional investment is the only way to stay informed about the state of the world – begins to look more and more like an alibi for our addiction to our devices."
"At Thanksgiving with your Trumpist uncle, the point is not to seek agreement or compromise, but to grasp that we are not fully defined by our political allegiances – and that, as Talisse puts it, “in order to treat each other as political equals, we must see each other as something more than citizens”. "
And the last paragraph:
"But it may be the only practical way for us to begin to foster a change. If the colonisation of everyday life by the news is damaging both to ourselves and to democratic politics, we ought not to collaborate unthinkingly with that process. Far from it being our moral duty to care so much about the news, it may in fact be our duty to start caring somewhat less."
Covering all _major_ viewpoints with decency, and not demonizing the ones they disagree with.
Here's a trick impartial outlets use all the time, for example:
a favorite politician is presented in nice flattering photographs,
a politician they don't like is presented in unflattering photographs, selected to make them look evil, etc.
(Now extend this to coverage of their actions inside the articles).
Let's say that a popular politician believes that vaccines cause autism. In order to be impartial, does the news outlet now have to give equal weight to people who believe in a lie?
Or what if what the majority believes is actually abhorrent? Like for example, let's say the majority believe (or choose to simply ignore) that it's a good thing to put a bunch of ethnic minorities in concentration camps. Whether it's due to propaganda or threats from the government. In this hypothetical example, let's call these people Uyghurs.
Is the impartial outlet supposed to give equal consideration to both sides? Maybe bring up a few positives of concentration camps?
The political matters news outlets cover are not confined to scientific issues (like vaccines) that can be settled by some expert consensus. They can dismiss such claims easily, and those are not the point anyway.
Nor are most political issues as clear cut as putting minorities in "concentration camps" -- that's a contrived example, making sound like anything not approved by the Guardian amounts to Hitler (or, in this case, Chinese state oppression -- though even this story might have more nuance than what we're getting).
The most important political issues cannot be classified as "a lie", they are just different ways of thinking of what's good, beneficial, important short or long term, etc. And of course, different interests, to different segments of the population, or to different countries, cultures, etc.
Examples? The arguments pro or against social democracy or liberalism. The arguments pro or against immigration. Or pro or against EU governance. Or pro or against certain fiscal policies. Or pro or against surveillance. Or pro or against privacy. Or pro or against this or that war or intervention or enemy du jour. Or pro or against this or that technology. Or pro or against this or that education reform. Or pro or against Assange. And so on...
Yet those nuanced things are still presented as one side is the "good side" and the other is either evil or deluded or a liar.
For example, EFF is obviously going to be biased against anything that takes away privacy. The Guardian is going to be more left leaning than The Daily Mail and so forth.
Can you name me a single example of a website behaving according to the rules that you've laid down?
I don't care for "some bias in one direction or another", nor I have "nigh-impossible lofty ideals".
I just don't like to be taken for a fool with blatant bias -- which many outlets have, including the Guardian.
>For example, EFF is obviously going to be biased against anything that takes away privacy. The Guardian is going to be more left leaning than The Daily Mail and so forth.
Again those things are not really relevant to what I say. You can be more left or right leaning, or be more pro-privacy than anti-privacy and still tell things like they are (including in your opinion pieces) without demonizing the other side, misrepresenting their arguments, using uncharitable interpretations, using imagery and statistics for cheap tricks, and so on.
In other words, you can still report and opinion on things in good faith, despite having a bias.
That said, again, what would be an example of a charitable news outlet that does not pull tricks you claim the Guardian is doing?
The issue comes when it feels like they're leaving out information or a perspective which would be harmful to their case. Basically if I read something in the news and after reading it I felt like the story made it look like one side was obviously correct, but then I go and look up more sources or more information and I will feel like there's a lot more nuance to it or my opinion even reverses, then I feel like there's been a huge failure in the media and I call that "not balanced".
It feels like they strawman the opinions they disagree with while pulling in the best representatives and sources for the positions they agree with.
If this is an honest question, does that mean you don't actually know?
It's not that hard. Just find out and present the facts even handedly. Make an attempt at see things from the different perspectives.
Well, it shouldn't be hard for a normal grownup, but it sure seems like it is for a lot of people.
Or perhaps the real issue is not how hard it is, but that there is no demand for that type of journalism, so the market doesn't produce it.
why did you do this.
Saying earth is flat is not an "example" equivalent to saying immigration hurts me and my family.
Outrage sells so this is a rational strategy for them, it is just surprising they have a better reputation than, say, Fox News.
How are they supresssing oposing viewpoints when alternative news sources are consistantly producing stories with a wide range of points of view? What is it exactly that they are supresssing? Through the internet I can easily access all sorts of takes on any topic.