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Please stop equating the "MSM" with the right wing propaganda machine like FOX. This hyperpolarization is happening in every country that has a sizable Murdoch

Please stop equating the "MSM" with the right wing propaganda machine like FOX. This hyperpolarization is happening in every country that has a sizable Murdoch media machine.

zepto 6y ago
It really isn’t just Fox. They don’t have a lot of shame about their partisanship or desire to hide it, but there is ideological distortion going on everywhere.
- root_axis 6y ago
  Yes, everyone is biased, this is not a deep insight, it's the common denominator we can subtract from a meaningful discussion about specific events.
  - zepto 6y ago
    It actually is a deep insight if it’s true. It doesn’t matter very much if one side is more crass, or tells more obvious lies. It matters a lot if everybody has derelicted the attempt to represent views and understandings across the spectrum, and it’s important that we be able to distinguish that situation from just blaming a particular actor. Perhaps you have something deeper to offer though?
    - root_axis 6y ago
      Dishonest reporting is not a quality inherent to arbitrary political labels, there is no "spectrum", there are only "particular actors" and people decide in real time which particular actors they prefer to focus their attention on.
      - zepto 6y ago
        > Dishonest reporting is not a quality inherent to arbitrary political label Agreed. > there is no "spectrum" Only true in a pedantic and useless sense. It certainly is possible to cluster and organize political preferences. > there are only "particular actors" and people decide in real time which particular actors they prefer to focus their attention on. Without further explanation this is just a frame which doesn’t add meaning on its own. Overall it’s not clear what you have added here.
        root_axis 6y ago
        > Only true in a pedantic and useless sense. No. It's true in the sense that you cannot impugn a particular part of the spectrum for the actions of individuals because there is no way to reliably quantify dishonesty much less attribute its distribution across a poorly defined political continuum. > Without further explanation this is just a frame which doesn’t add meaning on its own. In other words, dishonesty is everywhere and it's trivial to collate a mountain of cherry-picked evidence from a particular part of the continuum to support the conclusion that a certain part of the continuum is dishonest. > Overall it’s not clear what you have added here. Your pretentious snark is bad form and unnecessary.
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        zepto 6y ago
        “Overall it’s not clear what you have added here.“ This isn’t pretentious snark. It’s an expression of surprise, and feedback that you really don’t seem to be making a clear point. You reduced my original comment to “everyone is biased, this is not a deep insight”. I thought you might have something deeper to add, so I was surprised not to see it. “It's true in the sense that you cannot impugn a particular part of the spectrum for the actions of individuals because there is no way to reliably quantify dishonesty much less attribute its distribution across a poorly defined political continuum.” This seems like a re-statement of the original comment I made in response to the post about FOX. I guess we agree about that. It continues not to be clear what you are trying to add.
        root_axis 6y ago
        > It really isn’t just Fox. They don’t have a lot of shame about their partisanship or desire to hide it, but there is ideological distortion going on everywhere. Yes, we agree on this point, what I'm critiquing is your injection of this obvious fact into a discussion about a specific event that can be attributed to the particular type of misinformation spread by FOX, the fact that "there is ideological distortion going on everywhere" is beside the point, obviously that's true, so what? If an oil spill dumps millions of barrels into the ocean and someone exclaims "wow, these oil spills are really destroying the environment" your response is akin to "yes, but pollution is a global problem that includes more than just oil spills", yes, nobody is arguing otherwise, so what's your point?
  - didibus 6y ago
    Bias isn't that big of a problem, corruption and dishonesty is. If all we had to deal with is bias in decision making which resulted in suboptimal outcome, things would still be okay, as long as people making decisions and in position of authority (which includes voters) are still honestly thinking that one strategy will yield the best outcome for all of society. But as soon as people start being dishonest for self-interest reasons, they've subsumed the goal for their own, that's the real problem. I'd rather have someone in charge whose not the best at coming up with strategies and approaches that meet the goal, possibly due to their bias or other reasons, but is at least trying their best, then someone whose trying to manipulate support and slowly put goons they control in various positions so that they can just focus on their own self-interest and promotion while pretending to everyone that this is in our interest.
andrewstuart2 6y ago
I don't know that I'd associate it with the right wing, though. All parties are currently guilty of what you might call overfitting, where medium-term profits are directly measured against the content generating those profits, which understandably eventually segments the population and fits content to what keeps them engaged.
core-questions 6y ago
Unfortunately, you've fallen into the trap, friend. FOX may be to the right of MSNBC, but on a larger scale historically-informed left-right spectrum, the two are not actually that far apart ideologically. Most "conservative principles" these days are just the modern liberal status quo delayed by ~20 years; for example, anti-homosexual rhetoric is dead and dying on that side in a way that lines up well with what I remember from the Democrats in the late 90s. The hyperpolarization is not to do with the right vs left dichotomy so much as it is a deliberate, encouraged-by-both-sides establishment of a false dichotomy designed to pen people into a small range of discourse. Some call this the Overton window; the deliberate establishment of contrasting narratives in a 2-pronged strategy was perfected in America by Arthur Finkelstein in the mid-20th century and is becoming an art form today. If you can see FOX as a "right wing propaganda machine" but can't see the other MSM networks as being equally polarizing machines aimed at a different half of the audience, you're missing the shot. The solution is to see the false dichotomy for what it is, look at who is pushing it, and look at what direction both "sides" actually push for. If you're on the right, they want you to have your attention and energy soaked up in this useless Stop the Steal push for Trump, who actually didn't accomplish any of the things his populist base asked for (immigration control, really bringing back American jobs, giving a shit about the working class). If you're on the Left, they want to soak you up with Biden instead of the more progressive policies that someone like Bernie or Tulsi Gabbard espoused. Either way, you're being played if you allow your energy to go toward supporting one of these useless figureheads instead of critiquing the system itself.
- akiselev 6y ago
  You've fallen for the trap of the 2d political spectrum. It isn't about bias, it is about intent. MSNBC, CNN, etc are capitalist enterprises biased towards revenue and clicks - it's in their DNA. FOX was created explicitly by Ailes and Murdoch to prevent a second Nixon style teardown of the GOP. It's the reason Disney wanted absolutely nothing to do with the news arm when it acquired the rest of the Fox media empire - it's a capitalist enterprise only in the sense that it's profitable as a side effect of their main goal.
  - core-questions 6y ago

Please stop equating the "MSM" with the right wing propaganda machine like FOX. This hyperpolarization is happening in every country that has a sizable Murdoch media machine.

zepto 6y ago

It really isn’t just Fox. They don’t have a lot of shame about their partisanship or desire to hide it, but there is ideological distortion going on everywhere.

root_axis 6y ago
Yes, everyone is biased, this is not a deep insight, it's the common denominator we can subtract from a meaningful discussion about specific events.
- zepto 6y ago
  It actually is a deep insight if it’s true. It doesn’t matter very much if one side is more crass, or tells more obvious lies. It matters a lot if everybody has derelicted the attempt to represent views and understandings across the spectrum, and it’s important that we be able to distinguish that situation from just blaming a particular actor. Perhaps you have something deeper to offer though?
  - root_axis 6y ago
    Dishonest reporting is not a quality inherent to arbitrary political labels, there is no "spectrum", there are only "particular actors" and people decide in real time which particular actors they prefer to focus their attention on.
    - zepto 6y ago
      > Dishonest reporting is not a quality inherent to arbitrary political label Agreed. > there is no "spectrum" Only true in a pedantic and useless sense. It certainly is possible to cluster and organize political preferences. > there are only "particular actors" and people decide in real time which particular actors they prefer to focus their attention on. Without further explanation this is just a frame which doesn’t add meaning on its own. Overall it’s not clear what you have added here.
      - root_axis 6y ago
        > Only true in a pedantic and useless sense. No. It's true in the sense that you cannot impugn a particular part of the spectrum for the actions of individuals because there is no way to reliably quantify dishonesty much less attribute its distribution across a poorly defined political continuum. > Without further explanation this is just a frame which doesn’t add meaning on its own. In other words, dishonesty is everywhere and it's trivial to collate a mountain of cherry-picked evidence from a particular part of the continuum to support the conclusion that a certain part of the continuum is dishonest. > Overall it’s not clear what you have added here. Your pretentious snark is bad form and unnecessary.
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        zepto 6y ago
        “Overall it’s not clear what you have added here.“ This isn’t pretentious snark. It’s an expression of surprise, and feedback that you really don’t seem to be making a clear point. You reduced my original comment to “everyone is biased, this is not a deep insight”. I thought you might have something deeper to add, so I was surprised not to see it. “It's true in the sense that you cannot impugn a particular part of the spectrum for the actions of individuals because there is no way to reliably quantify dishonesty much less attribute its distribution across a poorly defined political continuum.” This seems like a re-statement of the original comment I made in response to the post about FOX. I guess we agree about that. It continues not to be clear what you are trying to add.
        root_axis 6y ago
        > It really isn’t just Fox. They don’t have a lot of shame about their partisanship or desire to hide it, but there is ideological distortion going on everywhere. Yes, we agree on this point, what I'm critiquing is your injection of this obvious fact into a discussion about a specific event that can be attributed to the particular type of misinformation spread by FOX, the fact that "there is ideological distortion going on everywhere" is beside the point, obviously that's true, so what? If an oil spill dumps millions of barrels into the ocean and someone exclaims "wow, these oil spills are really destroying the environment" your response is akin to "yes, but pollution is a global problem that includes more than just oil spills", yes, nobody is arguing otherwise, so what's your point?
- didibus 6y ago
  Bias isn't that big of a problem, corruption and dishonesty is. If all we had to deal with is bias in decision making which resulted in suboptimal outcome, things would still be okay, as long as people making decisions and in position of authority (which includes voters) are still honestly thinking that one strategy will yield the best outcome for all of society. But as soon as people start being dishonest for self-interest reasons, they've subsumed the goal for their own, that's the real problem. I'd rather have someone in charge whose not the best at coming up with strategies and approaches that meet the goal, possibly due to their bias or other reasons, but is at least trying their best, then someone whose trying to manipulate support and slowly put goons they control in various positions so that they can just focus on their own self-interest and promotion while pretending to everyone that this is in our interest.

andrewstuart2 6y ago

I don't know that I'd associate it with the right wing, though. All parties are currently guilty of what you might call overfitting, where medium-term profits are directly measured against the content generating those profits, which understandably eventually segments the population and fits content to what keeps them engaged.

core-questions 6y ago

Unfortunately, you've fallen into the trap, friend. FOX may be to the right of MSNBC, but on a larger scale historically-informed left-right spectrum, the two are not actually that far apart ideologically. Most "conservative principles" these days are just the modern liberal status quo delayed by ~20 years; for example, anti-homosexual rhetoric is dead and dying on that side in a way that lines up well with what I remember from the Democrats in the late 90s. The hyperpolarization is not to do with the right vs left dichotomy so much as it is a deliberate, encouraged-by-both-sides establishment of a false dichotomy designed to pen people into a small range of discourse. Some call this the Overton window; the deliberate establishment of contrasting narratives in a 2-pronged strategy was perfected in America by Arthur Finkelstein in the mid-20th century and is becoming an art form today. If you can see FOX as a "right wing propaganda machine" but can't see the other MSM networks as being equally polarizing machines aimed at a different half of the audience, you're missing the shot. The solution is to see the false dichotomy for what it is, look at who is pushing it, and look at what direction both "sides" actually push for. If you're on the right, they want you to have your attention and energy soaked up in this useless Stop the Steal push for Trump, who actually didn't accomplish any of the things his populist base asked for (immigration control, really bringing back American jobs, giving a shit about the working class). If you're on the Left, they want to soak you up with Biden instead of the more progressive policies that someone like Bernie or Tulsi Gabbard espoused. Either way, you're being played if you allow your energy to go toward supporting one of these useless figureheads instead of critiquing the system itself.

akiselev 6y ago
You've fallen for the trap of the 2d political spectrum. It isn't about bias, it is about intent. MSNBC, CNN, etc are capitalist enterprises biased towards revenue and clicks - it's in their DNA. FOX was created explicitly by Ailes and Murdoch to prevent a second Nixon style teardown of the GOP. It's the reason Disney wanted absolutely nothing to do with the news arm when it acquired the rest of the Fox media empire - it's a capitalist enterprise only in the sense that it's profitable as a side effect of their main goal.
- core-questions 6y ago