Was it better when we were manufacturing consent?

~Unburdened from the stifling editorial constraints and labyrinthine bureaucracy that define mainstream media, one might have imagined, back in the 1980s, that alternative media would ride into the information landscape like a gallant knight. Free from the stodgy dictates of corporate overlords, unencumbered by the subtle nudges of government regulators, rogue commentators could finally deliver that rarest of commodities: the unvarnished truth.

~But no, alternative media is mostly a hell-hole.

~Accuracy doesn’t go viral. Nuance doesn’t trend. A sober, balanced analysis of the latest economic crisis isn’t going to outperform an inflammatory, conspiratorial takedown of the lizard people who are running the Federal Reserve. The game isn’t about truth; it’s about engagement—the only real filter left. And engagement is a capricious and shallow deity, demanding spectacle over substance and outrage over understanding.

I tried listening to the audio book in 2018. I listened to over thirteen hours while doing chores and the like. Even in that form, it was extremely dense and I just didn’t have the will to finish. The findings were extremely important, however.

> Quoting directly from the book “The dominant media firms are quite large businesses; they are controlled by very wealthy people or by managers who are subject to sharp constraints by owners and other market-profit-oriented forces; and they are closely interlocked, and have important common interests, with other major corporations, banks, and government. This is the first powerful filter that will affect news choice”.

The book was published in 1988. We didn’t have anywhere near the landscape of information bombardment that we have today. A lot of people primarily get their news via social media, even if they still go to primary mainstream sources to read or watch. The media has nowhere near the control over what gets seen and what doesn’t as (more than) three decades ago. It’s not a comparable environment.

Look only as far as coverage of the situation in Gaza for proof. As much as major outlets want to paint a particular narrative, millions around the world have become aware of the reality of the situation in the last 13 months in a way that can’t be entirely ignored and a lot of people are pretty upset about it. This would have died away due to lack of coverage pre-internet.

I’m not saying we aren’t still being lied to. And there’s still a billionaire shaping the output of the machine to his liking right in front of everybody (one of multiple, actually). I’m just that there’s no putting the genie back in the bottle, hence it’s a fruitless thought experiment.