5 ms·

That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform

That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. What you're insinuating to be mind control are normal social mechanisms that have always been in place and have nothing to do with the media. They are primarily exerted upon you by your peers (close friends, family, colleagues), and not by the media. Whether these social control mechanisms are good or bad depends on the how closed these groups are and what view/policies they have. For example, if you're surrounded by religious fanatics, then that's likely going to be bad for you. What you refer to is actually an "alt right" meme that was invented to discredit free thinking (free thinking requires people to be well-informed) and push an authoritarian and communitarian agenda in which people are more controlled than in a free society. It's a fascist agenda that only works if you successfully discredit media first, since otherwise nobody will buy the "alternative facts" nonsense they're trying to sell.

pjc50 6y ago
> the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Well .. in some cases they are; Fox, Sky, News Corp Au. (many local newspapers in Australia), the UK Sun, Times, the WSJ, HarperCollins, and some talk radio stations are all owned by News Corp under Murdoch control and have at times been used to promote his personal politics, endorse parties, bully governments into accepting particular policies, and so on.
throwaway743 6y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird Media companies are businesses driven by profits and content, from advertisers and sources (at times supposed) who must be kept happy.
txmachinery 6y ago
"The media" and "social media" may not be controlled by a single actor, but it's common knowledge that large enough chunks of both can be and often are. For example, the conspiracy theory that Russia rigged the 2016 election for Trump is based on this premise. There is also a widely-accepted partisan divide between the encumbent news sources on the left, and Fox and newer so-called "fringe" or "alt" news sources on the right. These in fact aren't correctly fringe or alt - at least in the US - as clearly very close to or more than half of the US population for the past decade has indicated they have political beliefs aligned with them. It's therefore as disingenuous to attempt to delegitimize "alt right" media by referring to it thusly, just as it may br for right-leaning media to do the same by referring to the left as "fake news". With this example, both sides are behaving in uniform ways exactly typical of unified, single-actor control, respective to each. If the Russian conspiracy is true, the premise that single-actor control is possible is accepted, as it therefore happened with enough force to alter a major an election. If it isn't, then half of the US is legitimately right-leaning, making the labelling of their mainstream news sources as "fringe" or "alt" or "extreme" indeed tantamount to "fake news". Either way, it's mistaken to believe it impossible for the control of single actor to be enacted upon a large enough portion of the media to achieve widespread adoption of their agenda. In effect, your last paragraph directly contradicts your first.
- pjc50 6y ago
  > both sides are behaving in uniform ways exactly typical of unified, single-actor control, respective to each. If you're alleging single-actor control you need to have some idea of who that single actor allegedly is. A lot of this stuff is simply .. more chaotic. That goes for the question of Russian involvement. Reducing it to a single yes/no binary doesn't help; it's almost certainly not true that Putin has been personally, directly issuing orders to Trump, but there definitely have been a lot of Trump associates who also associated with Russians, in some cases took money from them, lied to Federal investigators about it, and as a result were jailed or at least indicted. https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-cases-factbox/factbox-guilty-pleas-indictments-abound-in-trump-russia-probe-idUSKCN1RT1X3 https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-cases-fac...
  - mistermann 6y ago
    > If you're alleging single-actor control you need to have some idea of who that single actor allegedly is. Why? Do you apply this same standard when debugging software, or do you discard the realization of all observed patterns for which you lack an immediate explanation? It's interesting to observe how the manner in which logic is executed changes when the topic of conversation changes in various ways.
    - pjc50 6y ago
      Are multiple phenomena the same bug or different bugs? Until you've traced the root cause this can be hard to tell.
      - mistermann 6y ago
        It is often unknown, as are many things in reality. What's interesting is that IT folks are typically rather curious about mysterious behaviors in software, but this curiosity often vanishes when it comes to the real world (but only on certain topics). Regardless, back to my question: >> If you're alleging single-actor control you need to have some idea of who that single actor allegedly is. > Why? Why is it ok to discuss theories about some portions of reality, but not others? I'm not insisting that we must, I would just like some day for people that assert or imply that we cannot, to explain (in logically consistent detail, using objectively true statements) why we cannot (or will not). But to be crystal clear, I'd never insist that the majority needs to explain or justify their behavior or unwritten rules, here or elsewhere - I realize this is simply one of the fringe benefits of being the majority.
TeMPOraL 6y ago
> That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Not from the systems perspective, it doesn't. It requires a set point, an ability to measure deviation from that set point, and an ability to influence a factor that can reduce said deviation. It's not a conspiracy theory to observe that news publishing is first and foremost a for-profit enterprise. That the primary, overriding goal of any private news agency is making money to survive and pay its owners. It's not a conspiracy theory to observe that news publishing is controlled to maximize that primary goal. It's also not a conspiracy theory to notice that people's behavior is influenced by the news - and here you have all the components you need for a feedback control loop. If you notice that ad-based revenue model makes media profits proportional to "engagement", and that fear and hatred are some of the most strong emotions out there, you arrive at the reason why news publishing is trying to turn everyone into afraid, hateful bigots. It's how they make money. There's no conspiracy theory involved, just free market at work. That there's no single actor with intentions and explicit goals - it only makes the phenomenon more robust.
- pjc50 6y ago
  We could do with different words for these. You're right that from the perspective of both electronics engineers and sociologists there are all sorts of "control systems" that affect behaviour. It's the great achievement of Weberist "modern" societies to take control away from individual chains of authority (feudalism) and into impersonal systems (bureaucracy, police, capitalism). But the individual lived experience of being controlled can still be oppressive. We swing backwards and forwards between trying to hold individuals accountable for system-caused behaviour vs trying to change "the system" which is both huge and thwarted by individual actions.
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    What categories do we want to separate using different words? About control systems, I think it would be good for general population to be more aware of just how many various control systems they're a part of, usually as a Manipulated Variable (in process control parlance). It's not just "the police" or "the government" or "the market" - it's every advertiser, every company they deal with, various branches of government, possibly even their HOA. Basically everyone that can persuade you or has power over you, that stands to benefit from particulars of your behavior. The key aspect here is that these systems are usually impersonal and amoral, they don't care about people who are being used as MVs. There's also very many of them. It's not a question of being influenced or not, but of limiting your exposure to the systems that harm you.
freeflight 6y ago
> That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. In most places the media landscape is a oligopoly [0], even social media doesn't evade that pitfall, only a handful of companies dominate that whole space. And while on social media these companies are not always supplying the content, they are very much the gatekeepers about what kind of content is allowed in the first place and what content they aggregate to whom [1]. That is a very powerful position to be in and the results can be observed for years already with filter bubbles based on extremely warped Overton windows and an increasingly centralized world wide web [2] Giving all kinds of media a blank pass, as not doing so would allegedly be fascism, just trivializes a very real problem. [0] https://youtu.be/ZggCipbiHwE https://youtu.be/ZggCipbiHwE [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-29/the-german-far-right-finds-friends-through-facebook https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-29/the-germa... [2] https://staltz.com/the-web-began-dying-in-2014-heres-how.html https://staltz.com/the-web-began-dying-in-2014-heres-how.htm...
mschuster91 6y ago
> That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Another poster has already brought media conglomerates like Murdoch, Sinclair or Axel Springer (Germany) so I won't deal with that. Social media is also heavily directed by the platform operators, their "moderation" policies - Facebook/Instagram are on a massive crusade against nudity, for example - and especially their "algorithmic feed" selection. FB got under fire for throttling traffic to "left wing" sites (https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/17/21520634/facebook-reportedly-choked-traffic-mother-jones-zuckerberg https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/17/21520634/facebook-report...), YouTube under multiple fires for stuff like Peppa Pig scare videos or for actively feeding users conspiracy propaganda, Reddit has many, many accusations of censorship regarding Uyghurs (since the Tencent ownership stake)... tl;dr: social media platforms have intentions on their own and are not shy of using them.
mistermann 6y ago
> What you refer to is actually an "alt right" meme that was invented to discredit free thinking (free thinking requires people to be well-informed) and push an authoritarian and communitarian agenda in which people are more controlled than in a free society. This itself is a meme, and an extremely popular one at that. I hear it all the time, all over the place. Did you come up with this idea on your own, via close observation and rational analysis of the highly dimensional, infinitely complex reality that we all live within, including significant interaction with "the alt right" in their natural habitat? Is that the genesis of this idea in your mind? If so, I wonder how it is that so many people have this very same idea inside their minds. Did they all come up with it on their own, via the same, skilful methodology that you used? If so, I wonder why encountering people who give off the slightest hint that they think in high dimensions with strict logic and epistemology, is so incredibly rare. I've asked easily 100++ people who believe your meme how they know it to be true, and not only have I received no high quality answers, I can't recall if I've ever received any answer that isn't simply a restatement of the original meme itself. (Come to think of it, this is a fairly common pattern that I've noticed when asking the same question about a variety of different memes. Hmmmm, that's interesting!) Similarly, did the "members" of "the alt right" also arrive at their beliefs via this same methodology? Or in their case, is it just a rumour that was adopted without question, without being subjected to the strict critical thinking process that those who accepted your meme into their minds? Another relevant question might be: what evidence (current and historic) can the respective sides collectively offer to substantiate their side of the story? And if no evidence can be provided, then from where does the confidence in the correctness of the idea derive? The confidence is there, of that there's no doubt. My question is: where did it come from, or, what is it composed of? Can the one who is in possession of it articulate it in written language? Or, are they maybe "very busy right now". Some other important questions might be: What is actually True? How might we know, for sure? How many epistemic states are there: two (True/False), or three (True/False/Unknown)? And, what might be the possible consequences if our beliefs happen to be incorrect about some of these things - do the history books provide any lessons on that sort of thing?
erikbye 6y ago
> social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Regarding influencers at least (and a lot of other social media phenomenon), the uniform actor is the ad industry. It's the sole reason influencers make a living and flaunts the latest products. There certainly is intent: make people desire useless shit, get people spending. Regarding the ad industry and social media in general, I am surprised that people think it is not about control, that the effects we are seeing are not planned. This is not conspiratorial thinking. Behavioral psychology has always been central to advertising. It is manipulation on a vast scale. The problem is it has become so widespread and ingrained in our daily lives and everything we see and hear that most of us now seem completely blind to it. Hey, it is black Friday soon; you will probably buy something you do not need, right? You are practically saving money by buying... The design of social media platforms are even worse (more malicious, with intent) than traditional ad campaigns.
artvark11 6y ago
>but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. There are 6 corporations that control the vast majority of the news media you consume. The idea that it is unfathomable that they would work together to push their narrative is utter nonsense. https://techstartups.com/2020/09/18/6-corporations-control-90-media-america-illusion-choice-objectivity-2020/ https://techstartups.com/2020/09/18/6-corporations-control-9...
- jonathanstrange 6y ago
  Two problems with your reply: 1. It only talks about "in America", meaning the US. There are 192 other countries. 2. I haven't said it's unfathomable. It's ridiculously unlikely, though. Journalists are not exactly known for their secrecy, even if they wanted to they wouldn't be able to hide a gigantic mind control collusion among the six corporations you've mentioned. There is no grand conspiracy. On a side note, editorial policies are not "mind control" either. What people say about the media and mind control is not only crazy, the very same people tend to propagate extremely bad information sources such as blogs and partisan news aggregation sites that are primary examples of what they criticize and allegedly reject. As I've said, there is an agenda behind these conspiracy claims, and it surely isn't to improve the quality of news and information sources for citizens. As a result, the vast majority of normal and well-informed people now have to endure all this insane nonsense, from Covid conspiracy theories by vegan cooks over Pizzagate to a complete denial of reality by flat earthers ("I don't believe in trigonometry"). It's an unfortunate but perhaps inevitable consequence of the fact that small, radical minorities can so easily find their own esoteric peer groups and create their own small echo chambers nowadays. The same kind of radical groups also existed in the past, of course, but it was much harder for them to meet and gain followers.
  - gurkendoktor 6y ago
    Or maybe this insane nonsense has become so powerful because the official narratives are much dumber than I seem to remember them from before. Probably a result of both increasing polarization and shrinking media budgets. For example, covid is just the flu, and only xenophobes would enact travel bans over it. No wait, corona is terrible and it's Trump's fault for not containing it. No wait, we should all go to BLM protests, did you know they actually _lower_ Covid rates? Listen to the science, don't wear masks! No wait, wear masks! ... (The most effective "alt-right"/trust erosion accounts I've seen don't do much more than put screenshots of contradictory statements from the same source next to each other.) Or Pizzagate, where it felt like the official narrative had solidly won after someone wanted to raid the pedophile dungeon and couldn't find it. Case closed! Until the Epstein story happened, Clinton's name was on flight list several times, and the media acted in actual unison by ignoring the implications. (I get it! Touching this case is suicide by proxy for journalists. But then don't blame normies for getting paranoid about pedophile elites.)
AndrewBissell 6y ago
Here's an MSNBC journalist saying she was explicitly told which candidates in the Democratic primary could and could not come on her show last year: https://twitter.com/arianapekary/status/1330571415549046787 https://twitter.com/arianapekary/status/1330571415549046787 The thing is, journalists can and do discuss the ways their coverage is shaped from above all the time -- whether through explicit directives like this one or more soft forms of influence like using promotions and firings to select for certain perspectives -- but this never makes any dent in the insistence on such bromides as "if there was a big conspiracy to control the media some journalists would talk about it." They do talk about it, people just aren't interested in hearing it.

pjc50 6y ago

> the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Well .. in some cases they are; Fox, Sky, News Corp Au. (many local newspapers in Australia), the UK Sun, Times, the WSJ, HarperCollins, and some talk radio stations are all owned by News Corp under Murdoch control and have at times been used to promote his personal politics, endorse parties, bully governments into accepting particular policies, and so on.

throwaway743 6y ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird Media companies are businesses driven by profits and content, from advertisers and sources (at times supposed) who must be kept happy.

txmachinery 6y ago

"The media" and "social media" may not be controlled by a single actor, but it's common knowledge that large enough chunks of both can be and often are. For example, the conspiracy theory that Russia rigged the 2016 election for Trump is based on this premise. There is also a widely-accepted partisan divide between the encumbent news sources on the left, and Fox and newer so-called "fringe" or "alt" news sources on the right. These in fact aren't correctly fringe or alt - at least in the US - as clearly very close to or more than half of the US population for the past decade has indicated they have political beliefs aligned with them. It's therefore as disingenuous to attempt to delegitimize "alt right" media by referring to it thusly, just as it may br for right-leaning media to do the same by referring to the left as "fake news". With this example, both sides are behaving in uniform ways exactly typical of unified, single-actor control, respective to each. If the Russian conspiracy is true, the premise that single-actor control is possible is accepted, as it therefore happened with enough force to alter a major an election. If it isn't, then half of the US is legitimately right-leaning, making the labelling of their mainstream news sources as "fringe" or "alt" or "extreme" indeed tantamount to "fake news". Either way, it's mistaken to believe it impossible for the control of single actor to be enacted upon a large enough portion of the media to achieve widespread adoption of their agenda. In effect, your last paragraph directly contradicts your first.

pjc50 6y ago
> both sides are behaving in uniform ways exactly typical of unified, single-actor control, respective to each. If you're alleging single-actor control you need to have some idea of who that single actor allegedly is. A lot of this stuff is simply .. more chaotic. That goes for the question of Russian involvement. Reducing it to a single yes/no binary doesn't help; it's almost certainly not true that Putin has been personally, directly issuing orders to Trump, but there definitely have been a lot of Trump associates who also associated with Russians, in some cases took money from them, lied to Federal investigators about it, and as a result were jailed or at least indicted. https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-cases-factbox/factbox-guilty-pleas-indictments-abound-in-trump-russia-probe-idUSKCN1RT1X3 https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-cases-fac...
- mistermann 6y ago
  > If you're alleging single-actor control you need to have some idea of who that single actor allegedly is. Why? Do you apply this same standard when debugging software, or do you discard the realization of all observed patterns for which you lack an immediate explanation? It's interesting to observe how the manner in which logic is executed changes when the topic of conversation changes in various ways.
  - pjc50 6y ago
    Are multiple phenomena the same bug or different bugs? Until you've traced the root cause this can be hard to tell.
    - mistermann 6y ago
      It is often unknown, as are many things in reality. What's interesting is that IT folks are typically rather curious about mysterious behaviors in software, but this curiosity often vanishes when it comes to the real world (but only on certain topics). Regardless, back to my question: >> If you're alleging single-actor control you need to have some idea of who that single actor allegedly is. > Why? Why is it ok to discuss theories about some portions of reality, but not others? I'm not insisting that we must, I would just like some day for people that assert or imply that we cannot, to explain (in logically consistent detail, using objectively true statements) why we cannot (or will not). But to be crystal clear, I'd never insist that the majority needs to explain or justify their behavior or unwritten rules, here or elsewhere - I realize this is simply one of the fringe benefits of being the majority.

TeMPOraL 6y ago

> That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Not from the systems perspective, it doesn't. It requires a set point, an ability to measure deviation from that set point, and an ability to influence a factor that can reduce said deviation. It's not a conspiracy theory to observe that news publishing is first and foremost a for-profit enterprise. That the primary, overriding goal of any private news agency is making money to survive and pay its owners. It's not a conspiracy theory to observe that news publishing is controlled to maximize that primary goal. It's also not a conspiracy theory to notice that people's behavior is influenced by the news - and here you have all the components you need for a feedback control loop. If you notice that ad-based revenue model makes media profits proportional to "engagement", and that fear and hatred are some of the most strong emotions out there, you arrive at the reason why news publishing is trying to turn everyone into afraid, hateful bigots. It's how they make money. There's no conspiracy theory involved, just free market at work. That there's no single actor with intentions and explicit goals - it only makes the phenomenon more robust.

pjc50 6y ago
We could do with different words for these. You're right that from the perspective of both electronics engineers and sociologists there are all sorts of "control systems" that affect behaviour. It's the great achievement of Weberist "modern" societies to take control away from individual chains of authority (feudalism) and into impersonal systems (bureaucracy, police, capitalism). But the individual lived experience of being controlled can still be oppressive. We swing backwards and forwards between trying to hold individuals accountable for system-caused behaviour vs trying to change "the system" which is both huge and thwarted by individual actions.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  What categories do we want to separate using different words? About control systems, I think it would be good for general population to be more aware of just how many various control systems they're a part of, usually as a Manipulated Variable (in process control parlance). It's not just "the police" or "the government" or "the market" - it's every advertiser, every company they deal with, various branches of government, possibly even their HOA. Basically everyone that can persuade you or has power over you, that stands to benefit from particulars of your behavior. The key aspect here is that these systems are usually impersonal and amoral, they don't care about people who are being used as MVs. There's also very many of them. It's not a question of being influenced or not, but of limiting your exposure to the systems that harm you.

freeflight 6y ago

> That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. In most places the media landscape is a oligopoly [0], even social media doesn't evade that pitfall, only a handful of companies dominate that whole space. And while on social media these companies are not always supplying the content, they are very much the gatekeepers about what kind of content is allowed in the first place and what content they aggregate to whom [1]. That is a very powerful position to be in and the results can be observed for years already with filter bubbles based on extremely warped Overton windows and an increasingly centralized world wide web [2] Giving all kinds of media a blank pass, as not doing so would allegedly be fascism, just trivializes a very real problem. [0] https://youtu.be/ZggCipbiHwE https://youtu.be/ZggCipbiHwE [1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-29/the-german-far-right-finds-friends-through-facebook https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-29/the-germa... [2] https://staltz.com/the-web-began-dying-in-2014-heres-how.html https://staltz.com/the-web-began-dying-in-2014-heres-how.htm...

mschuster91 6y ago

> That's complete and utter conspiracy nonsense because control implicates intentions, but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Another poster has already brought media conglomerates like Murdoch, Sinclair or Axel Springer (Germany) so I won't deal with that. Social media is also heavily directed by the platform operators, their "moderation" policies - Facebook/Instagram are on a massive crusade against nudity, for example - and especially their "algorithmic feed" selection. FB got under fire for throttling traffic to "left wing" sites (https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/17/21520634/facebook-reportedly-choked-traffic-mother-jones-zuckerberg https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/17/21520634/facebook-report...), YouTube under multiple fires for stuff like Peppa Pig scare videos or for actively feeding users conspiracy propaganda, Reddit has many, many accusations of censorship regarding Uyghurs (since the Tencent ownership stake)... tl;dr: social media platforms have intentions on their own and are not shy of using them.

mistermann 6y ago

> What you refer to is actually an "alt right" meme that was invented to discredit free thinking (free thinking requires people to be well-informed) and push an authoritarian and communitarian agenda in which people are more controlled than in a free society. This itself is a meme, and an extremely popular one at that. I hear it all the time, all over the place. Did you come up with this idea on your own, via close observation and rational analysis of the highly dimensional, infinitely complex reality that we all live within, including significant interaction with "the alt right" in their natural habitat? Is that the genesis of this idea in your mind? If so, I wonder how it is that so many people have this very same idea inside their minds. Did they all come up with it on their own, via the same, skilful methodology that you used? If so, I wonder why encountering people who give off the slightest hint that they think in high dimensions with strict logic and epistemology, is so incredibly rare. I've asked easily 100++ people who believe your meme how they know it to be true, and not only have I received no high quality answers, I can't recall if I've ever received any answer that isn't simply a restatement of the original meme itself. (Come to think of it, this is a fairly common pattern that I've noticed when asking the same question about a variety of different memes. Hmmmm, that's interesting!) Similarly, did the "members" of "the alt right" also arrive at their beliefs via this same methodology? Or in their case, is it just a rumour that was adopted without question, without being subjected to the strict critical thinking process that those who accepted your meme into their minds? Another relevant question might be: what evidence (current and historic) can the respective sides collectively offer to substantiate their side of the story? And if no evidence can be provided, then from where does the confidence in the correctness of the idea derive? The confidence is there, of that there's no doubt. My question is: where did it come from, or, what is it composed of? Can the one who is in possession of it articulate it in written language? Or, are they maybe "very busy right now". Some other important questions might be: What is actually True? How might we know, for sure? How many epistemic states are there: two (True/False), or three (True/False/Unknown)? And, what might be the possible consequences if our beliefs happen to be incorrect about some of these things - do the history books provide any lessons on that sort of thing?

erikbye 6y ago

> social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. Regarding influencers at least (and a lot of other social media phenomenon), the uniform actor is the ad industry. It's the sole reason influencers make a living and flaunts the latest products. There certainly is intent: make people desire useless shit, get people spending. Regarding the ad industry and social media in general, I am surprised that people think it is not about control, that the effects we are seeing are not planned. This is not conspiratorial thinking. Behavioral psychology has always been central to advertising. It is manipulation on a vast scale. The problem is it has become so widespread and ingrained in our daily lives and everything we see and hear that most of us now seem completely blind to it. Hey, it is black Friday soon; you will probably buy something you do not need, right? You are practically saving money by buying... The design of social media platforms are even worse (more malicious, with intent) than traditional ad campaigns.

artvark11 6y ago

>but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. There are 6 corporations that control the vast majority of the news media you consume. The idea that it is unfathomable that they would work together to push their narrative is utter nonsense. https://techstartups.com/2020/09/18/6-corporations-control-90-media-america-illusion-choice-objectivity-2020/ https://techstartups.com/2020/09/18/6-corporations-control-9...

jonathanstrange 6y ago
Two problems with your reply: 1. It only talks about "in America", meaning the US. There are 192 other countries. 2. I haven't said it's unfathomable. It's ridiculously unlikely, though. Journalists are not exactly known for their secrecy, even if they wanted to they wouldn't be able to hide a gigantic mind control collusion among the six corporations you've mentioned. There is no grand conspiracy. On a side note, editorial policies are not "mind control" either. What people say about the media and mind control is not only crazy, the very same people tend to propagate extremely bad information sources such as blogs and partisan news aggregation sites that are primary examples of what they criticize and allegedly reject. As I've said, there is an agenda behind these conspiracy claims, and it surely isn't to improve the quality of news and information sources for citizens. As a result, the vast majority of normal and well-informed people now have to endure all this insane nonsense, from Covid conspiracy theories by vegan cooks over Pizzagate to a complete denial of reality by flat earthers ("I don't believe in trigonometry"). It's an unfortunate but perhaps inevitable consequence of the fact that small, radical minorities can so easily find their own esoteric peer groups and create their own small echo chambers nowadays. The same kind of radical groups also existed in the past, of course, but it was much harder for them to meet and gain followers.
- gurkendoktor 6y ago
  Or maybe this insane nonsense has become so powerful because the official narratives are much dumber than I seem to remember them from before. Probably a result of both increasing polarization and shrinking media budgets. For example, covid is just the flu, and only xenophobes would enact travel bans over it. No wait, corona is terrible and it's Trump's fault for not containing it. No wait, we should all go to BLM protests, did you know they actually _lower_ Covid rates? Listen to the science, don't wear masks! No wait, wear masks! ... (The most effective "alt-right"/trust erosion accounts I've seen don't do much more than put screenshots of contradictory statements from the same source next to each other.) Or Pizzagate, where it felt like the official narrative had solidly won after someone wanted to raid the pedophile dungeon and couldn't find it. Case closed! Until the Epstein story happened, Clinton's name was on flight list several times, and the media acted in actual unison by ignoring the implications. (I get it! Touching this case is suicide by proxy for journalists. But then don't blame normies for getting paranoid about pedophile elites.)

AndrewBissell 6y ago

Here's an MSNBC journalist saying she was explicitly told which candidates in the Democratic primary could and could not come on her show last year: https://twitter.com/arianapekary/status/1330571415549046787 https://twitter.com/arianapekary/status/1330571415549046787 The thing is, journalists can and do discuss the ways their coverage is shaped from above all the time -- whether through explicit directives like this one or more soft forms of influence like using promotions and firings to select for certain perspectives -- but this never makes any dent in the insistence on such bromides as "if there was a big conspiracy to control the media some journalists would talk about it." They do talk about it, people just aren't interested in hearing it.