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Comment by uniqueuid | Hacker News Reader

That's one possibility. But you can always construct a scenario where the opposite holds.

I.e. your local paper may cater to a part of the community whose perspective you don't share, or they may be self-congratulatory snobs, or they may otherwise aggravate local polarization.

In other words, access to local news may help some people realize how little they connection feel towards their neighbors.

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>your local paper may cater to a part of the community whose perspective you don't share

Local papers are usually both barely profitable and locally funded. Local businesses, similarly, are usually scraping by. A local paper that alienates a significant fraction of the community doesn't usually survive. Local reporting is usually straightforward and factual, therefore.

That's the other reason local reporting is important, because it can't afford biases. It's where journalists learn to be impartial.

Said another way, it seems clear that conflict between people has been becoming more extreme as a consequence of news shifting to a belief based system due to the lower probability that any news source heard is something that can be directly experienced.

> your local paper may cater to a part of the community whose perspective you don't share, or they may be self-congratulatory snobs, or they may otherwise aggravate local polarization

It cannot possibly be worse than localized social media like Nextdoor.

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