I don't disagree; but propaganda is in the eye of the beholder. Eric Weinstein's podcast [0][1] has recently been discussing similar phenomena in left-leaning m

I don't disagree; but propaganda is in the eye of the beholder. Eric Weinstein's podcast [0][1] has recently been discussing similar phenomena in left-leaning media and academia, under the label "Distributed Idea-Suppression Complex" (including alleged media blackouts of Bernie + Yang). At first order of approximation, a lot can be explained by simple incentives, and who pays the bills (ie, advertisers, which at that scale necessarily include megacorporations who are hyper-sensitive to any PR impacts across their hundreds of subsidiary brands). But there's something bigger than that: a sort of credibility table-stakes, demanding alignment with a particular narrative ecosystem to be let into the party. What's insidious about this sort of self-selecting self-censorship is that it requires little-to-no to centralized orchestration; just swarms of conforming individuals who know where they're bread is buttered. As soon as one is rewarded by punishing a heretic, thus setting an example to others to not stray too far afield, a particular complex can ossify quickly. While it's false equivalence to claim that MSNBC/etc actively propagandizes to the same extent as Fox (especially aggregated over the last twenty years), the phenomenon seems to occur independently of political preferences or ideology; even rationalist, free-speech-absolutist communities can develop sacred cows, talking points, and taboos. In essence, I think there's an argument that the media has always had a propagandistic element (as discussed vociferously by Chomsky), allowing some range of open debate, while simultaneously marking some views as a priori off limits. What's changed is that the media landscape has fractionated: left-vs-right in traditional broadcast, and a long tail of communities and media bubbles and cults of personality online. What's more, I'd suggest that within each media sub-landscape, the range of acceptable debate has significantly narrowed; debate is now something that happens between tribes, rather than something that is permissible internally. What's your reasoning as to the (non-Fox) media "actively trying to cover up Trump crimes"? It seems to me that circa 2017, they were on top of Trump's shenanigans (the demand was there, and it was good for ratings and profits); I still see no shortage of anti-Trump content, but I think everyone's burned out by the horrific normalcy of it all. Do you see something being actively orchestrated, beyond just advertisers/ratings/etc, and if so, why and by whom? [0] https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/18-slipping-the-disc-state-of-the-portal-chapter-2020/id1469999563?i=1000462651162 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/18-slipping-the-disc-s... [1] https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/19-bret-weinstein-the-prediction-and-the-disc/id1469999563?i=1000462975502 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/19-bret-weinstein-the-...