What's Wrong with the Media
slowboring.com
slowboring.com
"So we’re left with a giant that’s incapable of self-scrutiny, because that might lead to implosion, paired with a set of institutions that increasingly all reflect the same worldview and do so in very strange ways."
My question about this narrative which is a popular one is, when was this not the case? Yes, the writers at the NYT skew young, skew educated, skew urban. 'New Yorkish' as the article puts it, but is this news? The paper of record is dominated by urban, elitist, young, liberal writers. Just like it always has been. Just like it is in every other country on earth. I don't know of any major newspaper that is stuffed by 60 year old farmers and mechanics.
Big Media like Big anything recruits out of elite institutions, and that's what it looks like and what it talks about.
It's understandable that someone working in media frames the issue as if it originates in media and as if there has been a huge change in media, but I don't see it. To me noteworthy is the political shift in the US. Whereas the liberal elite formerly had presence in both parties, now there is a huge political rift, similar to the dynamic around universities, and that is what has created the attack on establishment newspapers or other civic institutions.
It's the polarisation of the political landscape that has created space for an attack on universities or media, or the arts. Demographically or in terms of attitude or quality very little has changed within those institutions.
Also, the non-left wing media landscape do exist and is massive, fox news would be prime example. Or youtube version of talk radio.
> I'm actually happy to hear that more people are latching onto the religious and moral aspects related to their industries. Everything we do is religious even if we want to pretend otherwise. Let's end the artificial separation of work and morality and god once and for all. It only benefits the sinner class.
Pretending that employment isn't itself a political issue is just naive.
Plus, I have difficulty in understanding whether an elderly's 'experience' would have a significant addition to quality of coverage in a field so unstable and ever-changing as politics apart from what standard critical writing already achieves. Aren't politics and related dynamics drastically different today, in the internet age, than those the senior, experienced editors are used to living in?
The long and short of it is that no, politics are not drastically different. It's a thing of basically every generation to think the world is significantly different than what the last generation will understand. Suffice to say this is usually not true in the broad strokes, which is really what matters.
If I can already have this moderating insight, imagine what someone twice (or maybe even three times) my age would be able to see. They'll have an overview of history that you (and I) in your naivety simply do not have.