Trump eyes starting own media company to rival Fox
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There are many merits to more news outlets hitting the public dialog.
I think we need more investment not just in news but in search and social platforms.
I would go so far as to argue that bifurcation is more beneficial than a unification.
Because unification seems to lead to monopoly, and that’s not good for anyone except the monopolist.
The Trump that spews 50 lies per day isn't going to open an company that's restricted to or even focused on factually correct stories, so I think it's wrong to call that a news outlet, even if Trump himself does so.
See https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/13/president... for example.
If you want to argue that opening a fifty-lies-per-day streaming site is a good idea and fine for the world, by all means do so. But please don't call it news.
Trump did not appear out of thin air. The out-of-touch media and politicians created this phenom.
Their call for Arizona did seem premature, but it wasn’t wrong. “Correct but a bit early, and didn’t change anything” doesn’t seem like a strong avenue for attack.
It should be clear to anyone but those blinded by their own ideology that having a less politically biased media would be a good thing. Since the majority of the media leans left and is unlikely to move to the right this currently means there is a need for right-wing main stream media to even out the field. The big question is whether Trump is the one who can successfully fill that void, given the polarising nature of his personality.
This is the opposite of your proposed ideal.
> It should be clear to anyone but those blinded by their own ideology that having a less politically biased media would be a good thing.
You should be promoting apolitical news, not increasingly polarized news to "even it out". Moving more right or left doesn't bring anyone closer together.
No, it is the result of the current media not willing to move away from their standpoint and as such in need of something on "the other side" to create the balance. In an ideal situation the media would be spread over the spectrum but that is obviously not where we - this phenomenon is not limited to the USA - are now.
> You should be promoting apolitical news, not increasingly polarized news to "even it out". Moving more right or left doesn't bring anyone closer together.
That would not work, neutral views do not balance out left- or right-wing views unless those neutral views are in a large majority. A simple (and greatly simplified) model and calculation can easily show that. Take the GAL-TAN scale which puts political ideology in a 2-dimensional grid with left-right on the x axis and libertarian-authoritarian on the y axis. Ignoring the y axis for now the majority of the media lie somewhere to the left of the middle. If the objective is for the political scale to even out there is an actual need for an even amount of media to the right of the middle, adding media on the middle will still make the scale tip to the left. Moving the left-leaning media to the middle would help but that is not happening any time soon.
Extremist views on one side do not "balance" extremist views on the other side. "Left" media is already more Centrist than Liberal/Socialist. Centrist views are already the majority held beliefs. 42% of registered voters are Independent. More Independent/nonpartisan news organizations would definitely improve the political/media landscape better than more extremist organizations.
As long as you do not want to make it impossible for me to say these things I'm fine with that.
> Extremist views on one side do not "balance" extremist views on the other side.
They don't, but having views from both sides of the spectrum available to the public makes it clear to them that what is written on the one side is not gospel. Having only one side represented in the media means that people will not be confronted with opposing views.
> "Left" media is already more Centrist than Liberal/Socialist.
That is besides the point, this being that there needs to be a balance in the way the news is reported. That is also why I stated that there needed to be media on "the right of the middle", not "on the extreme right". There is a difference here, not everything to the right of the middle is "extreme", just like you stated for the left.
> Centrist views are already the majority held beliefs. 42% of registered voters are Independent.
They are but they are not the ones driving opinions in the media. If they were the problems I mentioned would not exist. The New York Times would not have pushed the 1619 project to give an example. They would have reported on it but not pushed it as an alternative history. The media views centrism as 'boring', probably because media consumers are more attracted to the simplified world view professed by more opinionated writers. Good versus bad is a large driving factor here through times, from the "good free west" to the "evil dictatorial east" of the 50's to the current "good ethnic minorities" to the "evil white patriarchal cis-gendered majority". The former gave us McCarthyism, the latter gives us Wokeism. These will be seen in a similar light by historians.
what are some problematic "unhinged" popular left wing places? which major politicians back them?
and why are they anywhere as near a threat to civilization & order as the divisive gun toting pissed off angry conspiratoroal rhetoric as is so widespread on the right, that even Fox News batshit crazy is no longer sufficient?
it is one side. the lefties hanging out in cities are not busy making new media outlets to invite ourselves into violent revolutionary overthrow & conflict.
Start with anything related to BLM (notice the capitals, I'm talking about the organisation, not the fact of skin tone not being a factor in whether your life matters), anything related to Antifa to make it easy. The former is supported by a vocal minority of the DNC, the existence of the latter is denied by the current president elect while his running mate called for her supporters to supply funds to bail out its members after they'd been arrested. From there you might want to go past organisations like Extinction Rebellion for another example of polarised rhetoric which is supported by a vocal minority of the DNC.
> and why are they anywhere as near a threat to civilization & order as the divisive gun toting pissed off angry conspiratoroal rhetoric as is so widespread on the right, that even Fox News batshit crazy is no longer sufficient?
Have you not followed the news - and with that I do not mean just what CNN and MSNBC say - for the last 5 months? A simple count of victims of violence would answer your question.
> it is one side. the lefties hanging out in cities are not busy making new media outlets to invite ourselves into violent revolutionary overthrow & conflict.
Either you're ideologically blinded, or you're intentionally talking falsehoods. The lefties hanging out in the cities are the ones who have been or have been complicit in looting and rioting. They are the ones who have tried to start actual "revolutions" - and failed horrendously since it turns out they had not really thought it trough.
Do you know the concept of "steel-manning"? It is the opposite of "straw-manning" in that it is a way to see the opponent's point of view from as strong a position as possible. It can help you to see the opponent as something other than an object of hate. It can also help you find weaknesses in that opponent's position. I think you should try it instead of simply throwing well-worn epithets at anyone who does not share "your" point of view.
I specifically asked about what we had been talking about, which is radical media outlets. you had contended that the problem was on both sides, that media was being byper-radical. I don't see examples on the left. and I don't see politicians on the left embracing extremist media.
you are right that there has been some looting & some confrontations. I think you overrate the violence. destroying a store front is not, to me, a threat to civilization, especially when the cause for anger is so visceral, so real, so evident, such mass gilovernmental & systematuc injustice. I personally blame the right, blame neonazi & white nationists & other fascist forces for instigating much of the violence that anti-fascist have wound up engaged in.
our assessments are very different, obviously, but I am really interested in justifications for perceiving the left media as radical & extremist. my first two questions, what are extremist left media organizations, and what politicians embrace these organizations, stands.
in my view, the left is trying very hard to maintain a good civil world for as many people as it can. against enormously bitter antagonistic forces. we used to worry about Fox News as a manufacturer of lies & antagonism & shit, but the right has ratcheted up and up and up the campaign of terror & conspiratorialism it has used to whip up support, to incite it's people, and I see no clear parallels on the left.
every time I post something like this, I get a bunch of -1 -2's on bunch of my other posts too. I'll have been stable for many hours, then one little peep, & boom, a wave a negative downvoting, -7.
this time i'll leave off my commentary, but it makes me very sad. it's very very unfortunate a pattern, and all too frequent. it's just repulsive beyond belief that people behave like that.
Bias is subjective and insidious, but misinformation is obvious and unequivocally detestable. Right-wing news orgs are freely peddling misinformation. Networks like OAN aren't even biased towards conservatism as much as they are seemingly built to serve the political interests of Donald Trump. It is simply not equivalent and should not be treated as such.
What will be interesting is how Fox News would react - what’re the chances the commentary shifts harder against Trump to combat competition, but dividing conservatives along the way versus continuing to toe the line and kowtowing to a perceived Trump stranglehold on the right?