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Comment by syshum | Hacker News Reader

for most political reforms it seems the news media purposely chooses the most polarizing examples of the problem to highlight.

Does not matter if police reform, abortion, welfare, or any other topic, the media chooses the examples that will most upset those opposing the reform.

This results in nothing getting reform, maintaining the status quo, and the media;s reoccurring revenue stream

The nation is hopelessly polarized as a direct result of media propaganda, I have encountered this everyday and when people are giving actual non-sensationalized facts it is very easy to come to compromise policy position.

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The same polarizing media conveniently blamed Facebook and Twitter (though to a lesser extent) for all the polarization that they have been fomenting for years. I guess that move wasn’t as surprising for me as seeing the number of people in SV who bought into that narrative.

Corporate media should not really be thought of as real journalistic entities.

Simple example. How in the world does CNN allow Chris Cuomo to interview his own brother. The fact that no one inside CNN publicly objected to this, walked away, protested, it tells me everything I need to know about the entire organization.

I don’t remember anyone at MSNBC making a fuss about it, nor at the Washington Post (Democracy Dies in Darkness).

Hmmm, yeah no. Whether it's Vanity Fair or other "liberal scions", they're as likely to point out the issues with this sort of self-serving coverage as your favorite hand wringer on Fox News, who themselves are almost entirely "entertainment" and have so much obvious conflict of interest in their coverage... and if the Jan 6 SMS messages are to be believed, simple out right lying.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/02/chris-cuo...

> How in the world does CNN allow Chris Cuomo to interview his own brother.

To be fair to CNN, they did ban that from 2013 until it was temporarily lifted in 2020 because "Chris speaking with his brother about the challenges of what millions of American families were struggling with was of significant human interest"[1].

It was definitely a bad judgement call but hardly damning of the whole organisation.

[1] https://eu.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2021/02/19/cn...

I've stuck to here, New Yorker, NYT, and The Atlantic, I've stayed off of social media, I don't have cable and I don't watch TV.

This site's articles and comments are often the most polarizing media that I subject myself to daily.

I think most polarization comes from media packaged with a comment section and low quality news outlets.

If the only news media on consume is New Yorker, NYT and The Atlantic (all of which are rated as Left Bias news sources) then you are likely already in an echo chamber, so when exposed to a non-echo chamber source with comments (like HN) you come way with a false attribution as to what is propaganda, and what the source of that propaganda is

I think you're in the "New Yorker, NYT, and The Atlantic are echo chambers" echo chamber.

I don't believe or agree with everything that I read. I also read a fair amount of different opinions in these sources which leads me to believe it's more varied than you would like to believe.

It's interesting because I've always considered myself center/center right politically.

I thought those 3 publications were widely known to be left of centre so I have to agree with the person you're responding to, because if you don't know they're left of centre and that they clearly share an outlook, then you must be in an echo chamber.

As a simple test, do you think someone who says "I read the Federalist, Spectator and the WSJ" would notice a change if they read the NYT?

I know they all have some contributors that go against their own ideological grain, so to speak, but still, you provided a good example of what being in an echo chamber might look like.

Just being honest.

I'm unfamiliar with those so I took a look at Federalist and it's polarizing garbage.

> Right Responds To Cancel Culture By Building Its Own Infrastructure, And The Left Goes Nuts

> 10 Christmas Songs That Must Be Cancelled By The End Of 2021

> BIDEN ADMINISTRATION ENDORSES MORE BABY KILLING BY GREEN-LIGHTING MAIL-ORDER ABORTION PILLS

NYT right now:

> Hidden pentagon records reveal patterns of failure in deadly airstrikes

> As COVID surges, experts say U.S. booster effort is far behind.

The Spectator or WSJ looks a lot better, if you told me Spectator was Atlantic or New Yorker at a glance I might believe you.

Your opinion of those titles is irrelevant to the point. In fact, your calling the Federalist "polarizing garbage", and that you compared a magazine to the news section of the NYT and don't seem to know 2 of the most famous right-leaning titles in the world, should be a sign that you're not reading widely enough and that you're not doing it without bias.

What you should be doing is reading them, agreeing with them is beside the point - that's what getting out of an echo chamber looks like.

The Wall Street Journal's op-ed page is awful garbage but their journalism is exceptionally good.

It is obvious that the Federalist is appealing to outrage with those headlines; which makes it quite hard to take seriously. But those headlines are legitimate issues. The right wing is being forced in to a position where it needs to build its own internet infrastructure, which is a big deal. The headline manages to make it sound stupid but that doesn't change the fact that it is worthy of being headline news.

And again with Baby Killing vs Boosters - one of the two papers is much better at writing headlines, but both of those go to largely the same issue which is how the state should interfere with individual medical decisions.

If you ignore the fact that the Federalist is targeting people who don't appreciate good writing, the dismissal of one and favouring of the other isn't as obvious.

>The right wing is being forced in to a position where it needs to build its own internet infrastructure

The "right" does not have to build it's own infrastructure, plenty of right wing media personalities and publications maintain a presence on Facebook/Twitter/etc... as long as they follow the rules of the platform. That headline is just clickbait nonsense.

>> rules of the platform.

Which are themselves politically bias to one world view, that of the US political left.

To be clear I am not talking about the enforcement of the rules, which is a problem in itself, but the actual rules as laid out are such they favor the identity politics of the modern "left" in the US.

Those that do not support, or agree with identity politics must do verbal, and ideological self censorship to exist on said platforms.

And if they want to be able to have social media that isn't subject to the terms of the mainstream ones... they have to build their own.

Which I'm happy about! The more competition, the better!

It baffles me why people act like Twitter is the only place on the web. It's popular, sure, but it's easily cloned and could be extended upon.

The real issue hindering competition is dollars.

In the case of Trump, Twitter was actively interfering with one of the main channels being used by a Republican president, up to and including banning him while claiming "I will not be going to the inauguration" is an incitement of violence.

That isn't an acceptable situation for a wing of politics. The right will need friendly, or at least neutral, versions of the big social media platforms and they will keep losing elections until they figure that out.

People may or may not agree about the specific case, but looking at the capabilities in a strategic sense and it isn't something that can be glossed over. The outrageous treatment Trump received on social media is a big deal; insofar as the right wing is a political entity it has to respond.

The reason the right wing needs to build their own communication infrastructure is that they need to publish dishonest propaganda and they need entire organizations that are corrupt to the core.

> those 3 publications were widely known to be left of centre

They might be "US left of centre" but coming from the UK left, they're centrist at best, slightly right at worst.

In no way is the NYT any longer able to be called centrist from a UK outlook, that's long in the past, it shares a space with the Guardian now and seems happy to be doing so.

My position on those organizations political bias is from ratings by several independent organizations such as Ground News (but not only them) which I have been using more recently.

I read 100's of news sources weekly, and if topic I want information on I drill down beyond the news organization seeking out orginal sources (for example if a news organization is reporting on a COVID Study, I read the study. If they are reporting on the 6th circuits ruling, I go read the ruling.. etc)

It is ironic that someone the proudly proclaims they only consume information from 3 sources proclaims I am in an echo chamber but they could never be... lol

As for my political leanings, I more of a Political Compass person where by economics is Left/Right, under which I am almost exactly in the enter, but social is on a Authority / Liberty scale, of which I am on the extreme end of the liberty scale

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