14 ms·

US ranks last among 46 countries in trust in media

132 points by hirundo 5y ago

trynumber9 5y ago
On the plus side at least our meteorological forecasts have earned a good deal of trust. It's a lot easier to trust as you can easily verify the accuracy of reports yourself.
raxxorrax 5y ago
Since a lot of people know English as a second language, I can assure you that it isn't just Americans that distrust the US media.
ecshafer 5y ago
This will only continue to get worse. Journalism can never be truly objective. But as we move more and more along this line, where journalists seem content with moving away from the facts, and more towards yellow journalism, and see themselves more and more as activists changing the world, and less as people bringing the truth out. this will only accelerate. As the old guard retires and leaves the news room, we will have completely lost any sense of journalistic integrity.
- kingsuper20 5y ago
  Looking at newspapers from 1900, I'd say that an objective old guard, to the extent it really existed, was a temporary affair.
  - bena 5y ago
    Completely objective reporting has always been more aspirational than anything else.
- i_haz_rabies 5y ago
  I did my masters in journalism in 2015... you have no idea how right you are. It was more or less a masters in blogging about your feelings on a topic you just heard about.
- mc32 5y ago
  >” and see themselves more and more as activists changing the world...” That is the main problem. They no longer see themselves as a medium to disseminate events but rather shapers of opinions about events. Like laughtracks for situational comedies, they see themselves as having a responsibility to tell people how to think of an event. It’s like Pravda but worse. Pravda at least had the decency to not want to pit a population against itself.
  - pydry 5y ago
    I'm less bothered by opinionated news than I am seeing Julian Assange thrown in prison for exposing state sanctioned murder.
    - mc32 5y ago
      It's this opinion shaping that convinces people not to care about the imprisonment of someone acting as a mere conduit to the dissemination of information.
      - pydry 5y ago
        true enough
    - read_if_gay_ 5y ago
      You should be just as bothered, if not more, by the news not making a huge deal out of this and instead reporting on FUD rape allgations against Assange.
      - pydry 5y ago
        To me it doesn't seem as bad. I don't like the lies and the slander but it's better than raw violence.
        read_if_gay_ 5y ago
        It's not just lies and slander, but lies and slander in place of reporting this abuse. It's the media's job to make people aware of their government's wrongdoings.
- BurningFrog 5y ago
  The news rooms are dying out. The journalism jobs are disappearing. The interesting question is what will replace what we now call "journalism", and how it will work. Interesting times ahead!
  - weimerica 5y ago
    > The interesting question is what will replace what we now call "journalism", and how it will work. One might well call it for what it is, PR and propaganda, but in my experience one will want to retain the title "journalist" for all the positive emotional weight it contains. I've had drinks with a few local paper "journalists" of the current, young generations and the reality of their work is shaping of narrative rather than reporting, but on the topic of job title view themselves in the same light as an Upton Sinclair. Brings to mind the early 2010s "positively changing the world" startup software engineers building Orwellian systems.
- kyle_martin1 5y ago
  I don’t think there such a thing as objective journalism—- there is only who is honest about the lens from which they view the world. For instance, CNN is left leaning and Fox is right leaning. They should just explicitly state their viewpoint so viewers can calibrate how much credence they give to unsourced claims and see past the political posturing.
  - _gtly 5y ago
    You might want to check out allsides.com [1] which gives a rating for where media sources lie on a left-right spectrum 1. https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings
    - xadhominemx 5y ago
      That’s an absurd chart. They put politico as left and cnn as far left (equivalent to Breitbart). Come on.
      - Wolfenstein98k 5y ago
        They distinguish between news and opinion, but CNN is definitely left. I'd call them the equal opposite to Fox.
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        xadhominemx 5y ago
        You’re not American and don’t live in the US. You’re perspective is limited and your opinion is wrong.
      - ctrlp 5y ago
        Correct, these ratings make no sense. CNN should rightly have been labelled as Deep State Media.
    - 5y ago
- two2two 5y ago
  While journalism was/is the fourth estate, the watchdog of the government, the people as the watchdog of journalists is becoming the rising fifth estate. This fifth estate isn't so organized or always of much quality, but observable signal is emerging. Truly, I've noticed a more substantial signal coming from HN comments questioning the veracity of the fourth estate. It's great to see.
- papito 5y ago
  Most good journalism is moving behind paywalls, but disinformation campaigns are free.
- eplanit 5y ago
  That describes it exactly. I think it will have to completely fail, and then a new generation (tragically, probably not the present one, or even then next) will have to rebuild it from the ashes. Maybe the positive way to see the present is as being that prelude to a better day for your grandchildren.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  If you aren't objective to the best possible degree, your readers don't trust you anymore. Newspapers are in economic peril, but the trust issue is something a lot of journalists brought on themselves.
  - merpnderp 5y ago
    Interesting point, but I saw a judge took that to the extreme with a libel suit against Rachael Maddow, by saying no one would ever think she was offering news, only her opinion, thus no one would ever believe her. But people often believe things they've been told, even when it comes from people who are clearly not objective on the matter, so perhaps the judge was wrong.
    - dexterdog 5y ago
      That ruling was used later to defend Tucker Carlson for basically the same thing. A good way to tell if a source is left or right leaning is to see which of those stories they reported on and how.
  - xadhominemx 5y ago
    That’s not true. Readers don’t trust you when you don’t tell them what they want to hear. They are extremely fragile.
    - Steltek 5y ago
      Fox News circa 2000's is the best example. A huge outlier for media bias at the time but Republicans tuned in because it reinforced and validated their beliefs.
    - raxxorrax 5y ago
      I don't know if that is true. We had a press telling people what they wanted to hear and trust is now extremely low.
      - xadhominemx 5y ago
- fastball 5y ago
  I think maybe you're attributing to malice what can more easily be attributed to the fact that most journalists these days wanted/want to become creative writers, but that doesn't pay consistently so they became journos with the intent to write their novel in their spare time, but then realized they can just scratch the creative writing itch as part of their day job.
- fouric 5y ago
  I've heard this phenomenon described as "post-journalism", in an informative (albeit biased) article from City Journal: https://www.city-journal.org/journalism-advocacy-over-reporting https://www.city-journal.org/journalism-advocacy-over-report...
- BigGreenTurtle 5y ago
  I guess maybe I don't understand why one would go into journalism, but if your goal isn't to effect change why be a journalist? Were the journalists working on stories detailing the Catholic Church's pedo problem just doing it for kicks or a book deal?
refurb 5y ago
This is a good thing! I go to my home country and the media is just as bad but nobody seems to notice.
zwieback 5y ago
The silver lining: people recognize that the move from traditional to online journalism has created echo chambers that leave the public unsatisfied. Even though we're being fed what reinforces our view we realize it's not what we want, the article states that this is true for partisans as well. Hopefully at least some news organizations will figure out a better path, I'm sure we won't go back to the old days but the fact that the younger demographic has pretty much left news media behind means that that generation will have to figure out something more balanced.
- hirundo 5y ago
  I think that rather than creating the echo chamber, it has just made them more visible and more niche. In the old days, most of the country was part of the echo chamber that Walter Cronkite, David Brinkley, et. al. led. Since we were (mostly) all in it, it didn't seem like a bubble, just reality. Now internet tech is letting us inflate our own bespoke bubbles, and easily peer into the the other bubbles. Yes this causes conflict. But in the end multiple echo chambers are an improvement over one big one, plus a few small alternatives that only weirdos like me were in.
  - zwieback 5y ago
    Well, everyone being in the same echo chamber is much better than what we have today. At least that's the conventional wisdom. Agree about technology making an existing problem more visible, though. It's not like human nature has suddenly changed.
- ghaff 5y ago
  >Hopefully at least some news organizations will figure out a better path That path seems to be pretty clear: charging for a subscription. But that's probably only a path open to global brands and popular niches.
dfxm12 5y ago
75% of those who identify as being on the right thought coverage of their views is unfair. This is interesting given how many local news outlets are owned by the conservative Sinclair Broadcast Group. I guess it doesn't help when they run segments like this, sowing more distrust: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI
- handrous 5y ago
  Coverage (let's say) of left-wing bias in the media has been a major part of right-wing media since at least the early 90s. Limbaugh, for instance, talked about it a lot back then (and I doubt he ever stopped—don't know why he would have), and if he wasn't receiving payment from the advertising department of Fox News, when they started up, he sure should have been (there was a lot of, "well, except Fox News" in his, ah, coverage of left-wing bias). The "the media hates conservatives" thing got his treatment where he acted like it was just a fact that he and his listeners, of course, knew to be true, sometimes calling out what he perceived as examples, but more often just stating it on the way to some other point. From what I've seen, the rest of right-wing punditry (I suppose you'd call it) picked up on this and took a similar approach to it.
  - andyxor 5y ago
    The media leftist bias is real, I guess it’s hard to notice from inside the bubble I was never interested in politics , left or right and never listened to conservative or liberal commentary you mentioned but the coverage of BLM riots, Trump etc especially in 2020 was mostly fake news and blatant propaganda. That’s what brought me to vote for Trump in the first place, the constant lying and manipulation by the media. I don’t know how otherwise reasonable people can not notice these 24/7 lies by CNN, WaPo, NYT etc. I’m a first gen immigrant, from former communist country, we have a good nose for propaganda and can smell it from afar, I’m surprised American-born Americans are so easily fooled.
    - handrous 5y ago
      I didn't claim it's not. I just meant to point out that people on the right have been told, consistently and repeatedly, that it exists since at least the early 90s, by people whose opinions they sure seem to take seriously, so it'd be unsurprising that many wouldn't trust the media even if it weren't true. The truth of it's almost irrelevant to the poll results.
ihsw 5y ago
Perhaps those in the media will reflect on this and make an effort to be more trustworthy.
jaredwiener 5y ago
*Disclaimer: working on a news startup to combat some of these issues* I find it interesting first of all that local news -- and weather, especially -- are the most trusted in the US. It reminds me of that old half-joke that everyone hates Congress but loves their congressperson -- but more likely it's that the issues that hit close to home are less likely to be polarized across traditional political lines. We've long passed the inflection point where people seem to judge trustworthiness based on alignment to their own predetermined biases. If I tell you that what you think is wrong -- even if I have a factual basis for that; or more mildly, just frame something in a way that you might disagree with, you can label me as biased. How did we get here? I think a lot of the blame comes from social media. Local news really cannot trend -- by definition it appeals to a narrow audience, and no one is sharing city council minutes. People do share outrage -- forcing the most polarizing content to the top. And, not for nothing, newsfeeds often put propaganda and disinformation -- or just lowest-common-denominator ("7 child stars: where are they now?") -- to compete at the same level as traditional journalism. I (previously) wrote some thoughts here: https://blog.nillium.com/news-was-never-meant-for-social-platforms/ https://blog.nillium.com/news-was-never-meant-for-social-pla...
- kyle_martin1 5y ago
  Local news stations get their agenda for their parent companies. They are told what to cover, what not to cover, and how to cover things to fit the overarching narrative from executives/producers.
  - xadhominemx 5y ago
    Yes, and the largest of those parent companies are explicitly right wing / Republican aligned.
    - rscoots 5y ago
      Why mention company size and not the far more relevant total viewership #s?
mc32 5y ago
On the other hand, the media has truly earned this distrust and isn’t the result of “foreign agitation”. Both mainline ideologies constantly and pathologically deceive and withhold information to make things one sided increasing polarization. MSNBC argues that its audience knows that its news isn’t actually news...(!)
- freshpots 5y ago
  You misspelled Fox: https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-... Don't both sides a phenomenon that is far worse on the right.
  - mc32 5y ago
    No, it really looks like I did not misspell MSNBC: https://greenwald.substack.com/p/a-court-ruled-rachel-maddows-viewers https://greenwald.substack.com/p/a-court-ruled-rachel-maddow... Court-ruled: >"Cynthia Bashant, dismissed the lawsuit on the ground that even Maddow's own audience understands that her show consists of exaggeration, hyperbole, and pure opinion, and therefore would not assume that such outlandish accusations are factually true even when she uses the language of certainty and truth when presenting them (“literally is paid Russian propaganda")."
    - freshpots 5y ago
      ah, yes, comrade Glenn. He lost it a long time ago.
    - freshpots 5y ago
      https://www.reddit.com/r/neutralnews/comments/j04eqv/fox_news_won_a_court_case_by_persuasively_arguing/g6otnd5/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/neutralnews/comments/j04eqv/fox_new... Key points from the article: But Fox News argued that Carlson "cannot be understood to have been stating facts, but instead that he was delivering an opinion using hyperbole for effect," the ruling said. US District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil agreed with Fox's premise, adding that the network "persuasively argues" that "given Mr. Carlson's reputation, any reasonable viewer 'arrive[s] with an appropriate amount of skepticism' about the statements he makes.""This 'general tenor' of the show should then inform a viewer that he is not 'stating actual facts' about the topics he discusses and is instead engaging in 'exaggeration' and 'non-literal commentary,'" the ruling said This was the same defense used in the rachel maddow lawsuit. Why not use a defense that is known to work? "For her to exaggerate the facts and call OAN Russian propaganda was consistent with her tone up to that point, and the Court finds a reasonable viewer would not take the statement as factual given this context," Bashant added. https://thehill.com/homenews/media/499294-judge-dismisses-one-america-news-defamation-lawsuit-against-rachel-maddow https://thehill.com/homenews/media/499294-judge-dismisses-on...
karaterobot 5y ago
In this respect the U.S. is ahead of the rest of the world by a few years. It isn't as though media is siloed geographically. Wherever there's the internet, there's media that is locked in a ratlike struggle for survival, cannibalizing its reputation and standards to stay alive. That pressure is already evenly distributed, even if the dawning realization that it exists is not.
xadhominemx 5y ago
It’s because we have only two major political parties and one of them has increasingly right wing authoritarian and nihilistic tendencies. It’s in their interest to sow distrust of the media / reality despite the damage it is doing to the country, and they have a willing coalition of right wing traditional (Fox, Sinclair) and social media properties to tow the party line on grievance and mistrust, with this latest astroturfed meltdown over “critical race theory” a prime example. As far as I am aware, no other rich Democracy has a set up as bad.
- xtian 5y ago
  > It’s because we have only two major political parties and one of them has increasingly right wing authoritarian and nihilistic tendencies. You mean the Democrats?
  - xadhominemx 5y ago
    No, I don’t
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - dexterdog 5y ago
      I think you might want to look at the actions of your party. You may not have meant both, but you should understand why somebody who is not on your team would think you did.
      - xadhominemx 5y ago
        He didn’t actually think it, he was trolling.
        xtian 5y ago
        I'm trolling? No, I'm being completely genuine. The present-day Democratic Party is objectively more right-wing, authoritarian, and nihilistic than it was 50-60 years ago.
asjdflakjsdf 5y ago
I'm at the point where I instantly dismiss any "world" news that comes from the US. I'll simply wait for an independent source from another country to report on any such story. I also hold the opinion on US political news that it is beyond the stage of a possible recovery without some dramatic changes to the fabric of the country itself. Every argument is wedged into an imaginary Team A vs Team B battle and it seems that to remain relevant as a publisher, you have to play that game. People feel personally attacked/validated by every article now because those are the most engaging and publishers will omit certain contexts and facts in any story to facilitate that emotional trigger. Given that the journalism industry is energised by advertising and political propaganda, it has reached a point where it has become nothing more than an itchy wound that the public keep scratching. The 24 hour news cycle isn't an issue in itself, but the power games combined with a dangerous economic model and all of the mass media manipulation on sites like reddit, are the core of the issues imo. Having the 24hr cycle (online, and on cable) just amplifies it all and makes it so omnipresent to the fact that despite the great efforts of dictators who put their picture in every place they can, I can bet that Trump managed to become a part of everyones daily life, and in a much more direct fashion, than any dictator could ever dream of, in the anglosphere during his term.
- read_if_gay_ 5y ago
  > I'll simply wait for an independent source from another country to report on any such story. Which countries specifically? I know that German-speaking news outlets aren’t any less partisan, and I have little reason to think that the rest of Europe is much better.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    I think if you arithmetically add a US and a Russian article and divide it by two, you are as informed as if you had read them separately. Obvious advantage: You can read two articles in one.
  - zwieback 5y ago
    In fact, when I was growing up in Germany there was a discussion about whether the US' noble goals of achieving a balanced media was possible or even desirable. The general agreement was that recognizing news sources implicit bias made more sense than trying to balance out reporting. This was in the 70s and 80s, I've been away from Germany for so long now I have no idea which direction things have taken there.
snarfy 5y ago
Nope, nothing wrong with US news [1] [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI
brsg 5y ago
It's no coincidence that the following events seem to coincide * Distrust of traditional media * Collapse of local media * Rise in social media platforms Traditional media isn't competing with rival newspapers on a stand anymore. It's competing on platforms like facebook, twitter, and reddit. Getting clicks on these platforms is correlated with what drives engagement - usually some cultural outrage or some "out-group mocking". Newspapers are really just catching up to the psychology hacking that social media has already profited from. It's more economics than ideology that enforces this imo. Frankly, you see this shift on HN as well. Half the time I log on here, at least 2/10 of the top articles are appeals to whatever cultural outrage triggers this site's demographics (let's be honest, this article does that too), and these articles will always have 10x the comments of other on the front page.
- titzer 5y ago
  Don't forget that the President of the United States called the press "the enemy of the people" [1]. [1] https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/437610-trump-calls-press-the-enemy-of-the-people https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/437610-trump-cal...
  - Quillbert182 5y ago
    I disagree with that president about many things, but that I agree that the press is the enemy of the people.
    - zero_deg_kevin 5y ago
      If he'd said that for-profit news media is the enemy of Democracy, I'd have probably bought a hat.
    - boublepop 5y ago
      I guess your American? If so, please consider that you are not just one of the voices putting US at the lowest trust in the media, but currently also arguing that it would be better if America was literally at the bottom of the list.
andyxor 5y ago
Or God, 24% pay for WaPo brainwashing subscription
- djanogo 5y ago
  It's amazing people pay for WaPo, they literally have so much power, they get to decide what internal government info to leak or not leak and create the sentiment for ruling party.
FpUser 5y ago
Trust is very loaded term. Trust what? If the article says there is a tornado in progress at such and such place I trust it. As for the rest I think that journalism now is distorted to the point of no return. Most articles are heavily riddled with propaganda, things taken out of contest, hypocrisy etc. etc. It does not really matter to me whether it is Canadian press, US or whatever other country. All the same.
giantg2 5y ago
If you give people reasons to mistrust you, it should be no surprise when they don't trust you.
ericls 5y ago
At least people knows media are bad.
minikites 5y ago
>This study, like many others, found extremely high levels of distrust — 75% of those who identify as being on the right thought coverage of their views is unfair. When one party consistently attacks "the mainstream media" for decades for telling the truth about reality, you get this. It's not a "both sides" problem, the problem is only on one side. >Interestingly, partisans, including conservatives, at least say that they prefer a range of views (74%) and neutral treatment of issues (66%) rather than reports that just reinforce their views. People say they want that, but people also say they hate negative political attack ads, and we get something other than what we say we want because the product we actually get instead is appealing to many people.
- incrudible 5y ago
  > telling the truth about reality More like telling part of the truth about a carefully selected aspect of reality: https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/10/17/fact-check-trump-quote-very-fine-people-charlottesville/5943239002/ https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/10/17/fact...
murbard2 5y ago
US ranks first among 46 countries in distrust in media. FTFY.
d--b 5y ago
That France ranks so bad is much more newsworthy than the US. News in the US is terrible, and everybody knows this. In France, it is not so bad, yet, people equally distrust the industry. Social media conveyed news took over the country like crazy. People are so misinformed, it's beyond scary.
- ctrlp 5y ago
  Could dissatisfaction with EU membership and the a pro-EU French media class play a part? Asking for a friend.
werber 5y ago
The article mentions a higher level of trust in local news. My local news in Detroit is very matter of fact, here’s an event that happened, here’s visual proof, and with a few exemptions free of opinion. National news, in my experience, is more pundits talking about the events and extracting larger meaning from it. I personally have a very hard time consuming news outside of the local because of this.
cletus 5y ago
The US political system has weaponized religion for political power and minority rule. Gasoline has been thrown on the flames of anti-intellectualism legitimizing feelings over peer-reviewed scientific research. The US political system is under siege by what is essentially minority rule. Every public institution (notably including the judiciary and elections themselves) is simply fodder for a scorched earth policy of politicization. Ayn Rand billionaire acolytes have poured billions into reshaping policy to the benefit of the 0.01%. What I'm most sick of seeing of psuedo-intellectuals who say in a self-satisfied tone "both sides are biased" usually followed by "I only read independent news". This is the definition of false equivalence. The so-called "left media" in the US isn't without fault but it's fine. The "right media" is an active participant in the subversion of democracy that panders to and enables anti-vaxxers, conspiracy theorists, insurrectionists and white Supremacists. "Bias" is just an excuse to justify the self-reinforcing unsubstantiated echo chambers that people like to inhabit.
- ctrlp 5y ago
  You check all the boxes of having been very effectively propagandized by pseudo-State media. Don't give in. Think for yourself. It's not too late. There's the road to Damascus. Take it. Good luck.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    There is certainly no road to Damascus from the US. Chances are that the US also bombed that away. Still good advice.
theli0nheart 5y ago
One large country in Asia is notably missing from this list.
cirrus-clouds 5y ago
For comparison, a 2019 survey of 33 European countries ranked countries by their trust in the written press [1]. The UK ranked last (75% do not trust the written press, just 15% trust the press, 10% don't know). Unlike newspapers, TV and radio in the UK is regulated by a government-funded body called OFCOM (Office of Communications) where broadcasters are required to follow rules around impartial news coverage. These rules exclude opinion-based shows e.g. talk radio shows. These impartiality rules apply to all broadcasters i.e. public service broadcasters (PSBs) like the BBC and Channel 4, and commercial broadcasters like ITV and Sky News. People often criticise PSBs for their news coverage (justified in some cases), but there is no editorial standard or code of ethics for national newspapers in the UK. Most of the national newspapers in the UK lean to the right, and a few to the left. But they are all awful. The Financial Times is the only half-decent national newspaper in the UK and even they have their biases. I have long held the belief that the national press in the UK has poisoned political discourse in the UK for decades. Despite declining newspaper circulation, they continue to exert outsized influence on public discourse (and on politicians). The relationship between journalists and politicians is uncomfortably close and unhealthy. (Journalists often move to positions of influence into political parties). Interesting tidbit about UK newspaper columnists: attendence at private schools makes up just 7% of the general population. Yet, in UK national newspapers, the proportion of news columnist who were privately educated is disproportionately high: 44%. [2] [1] EBU (European Broadcasting Union) Media Intelligence Service – Trust in Media 2020 Report [2] The Sutton Trust: Elitist Britain 2019
JoshTko 5y ago
News needs to become a protected class of information that has strong controls against misinformation. It should not be in a similar class of freedom of speech which includes any and all opinions.
- andrewclunn 5y ago
  Hahaha. Yes, the solution is more centralized control. More power concentration... less competition... There is alternative media for anyone who actually looks for it. We don't need to save the media. We need it to die.
andrewclunn 5y ago
Is US media worse, or has the ability of alternative media to thrive in the US (largely because of the First Amendment) just meant that the US citizens are more clued in on how corrupt their media are? Perhaps both.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
“If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're mis-informed.” ― Mark Twain
mountainb 5y ago
I think one issue that has emerged with the 'free' internet is that more people than ever are reading news, but very few people are paying for it. This statistic is often cited by failing newspaper companies about why they are worth investing in. The issue is qualitative more than quantitative. The engagement that most people used to have with news was casual and occasional. There were a minority of cable TV news viewers but for most other people it was limited to short summary programs on network TV. The news magazines and opinion journals used to be much more cordial and high brow on both the left and the right, more focused on digesting books and important issues and less dedicated to parsing the trending issue of the picosecond. Now you have tons of casual news viewers participating in social media sharing mostly shallow 'opinions' which are just repetitions of what they have just consumed. It's kind of like what used to be the rich person seafood section with highfalutin organic varieties of wild caught fish has been replaced with 16 aisles of DISCOUNT IMITATION "CRAB" MEAT that all tastes the same and comes out of an industrial tube. When social media was new I think most tech forward people's opinion was that this was good, and that people would move on from "CRAB." Sure we have one whole aisle of synthetic flavored "CRAB," but in the future it will be better. Instead we just got 16 aisles of "CRAB" and no more good fish, just the memories of what used to be a more refined news culture. Mass participation in national issues is very distorting for the United States as it is constitutionally composed. Our laws are designed for intense local and state-level participation in politics, with representatives mediating the passions of democracy at the national level. The media optimizes for intense national/international 'engagement,' but this must lead to frustration and unhappiness because mass participation can have zero impact on national issues of import (for the most part) because of the fundamental structure of our system.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
I'm looking forward to the media Kino of the anniversary of the January 6th Insurrection. The show will be spectacular. I'm buying popcorn, inviting friends and turning on CNN. Expecting North Korea level of wailing and Jim Acosta tears. Will take shots to every "insurrection" bellowed.
pram 5y ago
The thing that has most shocked me throughout the years is how lockstep the media is on foreign policy, no matter what 'side' they are ostensibly on. Theres no war the media doesn't like! Iraq, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, etc. One particularly shameful episode I remember was Trump being described as finally 'presidential' when he fired missiles at Syria. I genuinely think if he had started some disastrous war it would have rehabilitated him with the MSM.
carapace 5y ago
"Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media" was published in 1988. > It argues that the mass communication media of the U.S. "are effective and powerful ideological institutions that carry out a system-supportive propaganda function, by reliance on market forces, internalized assumptions, and self-censorship, and without overt coercion", by means of the propaganda model of communication. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent The advent of the Internet has rocked the "mass communication media" and exposed their "system-supportive propaganda function" in a way that is pretty hard to counter. It's a case of "How Ya Gonna Keep 'em Down on the Farm (After They've Seen Paree)?" > a World War I song that rose to popularity after the war had ended. The lyrics highlight concern that American soldiers from rural environments would not want to return to farm life after experiencing the European city life and culture of Paris during World War I. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Ya_Gonna_Keep_%27em_Down_on_the_Farm_(After_They%27ve_Seen_Paree)%3F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Ya_Gonna_Keep_%27em_Down_o...
RickJWagner 5y ago
Well deserved. Media sources are so politicized you have to question anything you read. I had this graphically illustrated in the gym one day. There was a wall of televisions, with Fox on one tv and CNN on the tv next to it. Both stations were showing then-President Trump as he addressed a group of elderly veterans. Fox ran subtitles extolling the popularity of the visit, explaining the increased benefits Trump was bringing. CNN ran subtitles describing looks of 'disappointment' and calling the benefits sub-standard. Both ran the exact same video. The media richly deserves it's poor reputation.

132 points by hirundo 5y ago

On the plus side at least our meteorological forecasts have earned a good deal of trust. It's a lot easier to trust as you can easily verify the accuracy of reports yourself.

raxxorrax 5y ago

Since a lot of people know English as a second language, I can assure you that it isn't just Americans that distrust the US media.

ecshafer 5y ago

This will only continue to get worse. Journalism can never be truly objective. But as we move more and more along this line, where journalists seem content with moving away from the facts, and more towards yellow journalism, and see themselves more and more as activists changing the world, and less as people bringing the truth out. this will only accelerate. As the old guard retires and leaves the news room, we will have completely lost any sense of journalistic integrity.

kingsuper20 5y ago
Looking at newspapers from 1900, I'd say that an objective old guard, to the extent it really existed, was a temporary affair.
- bena 5y ago
  Completely objective reporting has always been more aspirational than anything else.
i_haz_rabies 5y ago
I did my masters in journalism in 2015... you have no idea how right you are. It was more or less a masters in blogging about your feelings on a topic you just heard about.
mc32 5y ago
>” and see themselves more and more as activists changing the world...” That is the main problem. They no longer see themselves as a medium to disseminate events but rather shapers of opinions about events. Like laughtracks for situational comedies, they see themselves as having a responsibility to tell people how to think of an event. It’s like Pravda but worse. Pravda at least had the decency to not want to pit a population against itself.
- pydry 5y ago
  I'm less bothered by opinionated news than I am seeing Julian Assange thrown in prison for exposing state sanctioned murder.
  - mc32 5y ago
    It's this opinion shaping that convinces people not to care about the imprisonment of someone acting as a mere conduit to the dissemination of information.
    - pydry 5y ago
      true enough
  - read_if_gay_ 5y ago
    You should be just as bothered, if not more, by the news not making a huge deal out of this and instead reporting on FUD rape allgations against Assange.
    - pydry 5y ago
      To me it doesn't seem as bad. I don't like the lies and the slander but it's better than raw violence.
      - read_if_gay_ 5y ago
        It's not just lies and slander, but lies and slander in place of reporting this abuse. It's the media's job to make people aware of their government's wrongdoings.
BurningFrog 5y ago
The news rooms are dying out. The journalism jobs are disappearing. The interesting question is what will replace what we now call "journalism", and how it will work. Interesting times ahead!
- weimerica 5y ago
  > The interesting question is what will replace what we now call "journalism", and how it will work. One might well call it for what it is, PR and propaganda, but in my experience one will want to retain the title "journalist" for all the positive emotional weight it contains. I've had drinks with a few local paper "journalists" of the current, young generations and the reality of their work is shaping of narrative rather than reporting, but on the topic of job title view themselves in the same light as an Upton Sinclair. Brings to mind the early 2010s "positively changing the world" startup software engineers building Orwellian systems.
kyle_martin1 5y ago
I don’t think there such a thing as objective journalism—- there is only who is honest about the lens from which they view the world. For instance, CNN is left leaning and Fox is right leaning. They should just explicitly state their viewpoint so viewers can calibrate how much credence they give to unsourced claims and see past the political posturing.
- _gtly 5y ago
  You might want to check out allsides.com [1] which gives a rating for where media sources lie on a left-right spectrum 1. https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings
  - xadhominemx 5y ago
    That’s an absurd chart. They put politico as left and cnn as far left (equivalent to Breitbart). Come on.
    - Wolfenstein98k 5y ago
      They distinguish between news and opinion, but CNN is definitely left. I'd call them the equal opposite to Fox.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - xadhominemx 5y ago
        You’re not American and don’t live in the US. You’re perspective is limited and your opinion is wrong.
    - ctrlp 5y ago
      Correct, these ratings make no sense. CNN should rightly have been labelled as Deep State Media.
  - 5y ago
two2two 5y ago
While journalism was/is the fourth estate, the watchdog of the government, the people as the watchdog of journalists is becoming the rising fifth estate. This fifth estate isn't so organized or always of much quality, but observable signal is emerging. Truly, I've noticed a more substantial signal coming from HN comments questioning the veracity of the fourth estate. It's great to see.
papito 5y ago
Most good journalism is moving behind paywalls, but disinformation campaigns are free.
eplanit 5y ago
That describes it exactly. I think it will have to completely fail, and then a new generation (tragically, probably not the present one, or even then next) will have to rebuild it from the ashes. Maybe the positive way to see the present is as being that prelude to a better day for your grandchildren.
raxxorrax 5y ago
If you aren't objective to the best possible degree, your readers don't trust you anymore. Newspapers are in economic peril, but the trust issue is something a lot of journalists brought on themselves.
- merpnderp 5y ago
  Interesting point, but I saw a judge took that to the extreme with a libel suit against Rachael Maddow, by saying no one would ever think she was offering news, only her opinion, thus no one would ever believe her. But people often believe things they've been told, even when it comes from people who are clearly not objective on the matter, so perhaps the judge was wrong.
  - dexterdog 5y ago
    That ruling was used later to defend Tucker Carlson for basically the same thing. A good way to tell if a source is left or right leaning is to see which of those stories they reported on and how.
- xadhominemx 5y ago
  That’s not true. Readers don’t trust you when you don’t tell them what they want to hear. They are extremely fragile.
  - Steltek 5y ago
    Fox News circa 2000's is the best example. A huge outlier for media bias at the time but Republicans tuned in because it reinforced and validated their beliefs.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    I don't know if that is true. We had a press telling people what they wanted to hear and trust is now extremely low.
    - xadhominemx 5y ago
fastball 5y ago
I think maybe you're attributing to malice what can more easily be attributed to the fact that most journalists these days wanted/want to become creative writers, but that doesn't pay consistently so they became journos with the intent to write their novel in their spare time, but then realized they can just scratch the creative writing itch as part of their day job.
fouric 5y ago
I've heard this phenomenon described as "post-journalism", in an informative (albeit biased) article from City Journal: https://www.city-journal.org/journalism-advocacy-over-reporting https://www.city-journal.org/journalism-advocacy-over-report...
BigGreenTurtle 5y ago
I guess maybe I don't understand why one would go into journalism, but if your goal isn't to effect change why be a journalist? Were the journalists working on stories detailing the Catholic Church's pedo problem just doing it for kicks or a book deal?

refurb 5y ago

This is a good thing! I go to my home country and the media is just as bad but nobody seems to notice.

zwieback 5y ago

The silver lining: people recognize that the move from traditional to online journalism has created echo chambers that leave the public unsatisfied. Even though we're being fed what reinforces our view we realize it's not what we want, the article states that this is true for partisans as well. Hopefully at least some news organizations will figure out a better path, I'm sure we won't go back to the old days but the fact that the younger demographic has pretty much left news media behind means that that generation will have to figure out something more balanced.

hirundo 5y ago
I think that rather than creating the echo chamber, it has just made them more visible and more niche. In the old days, most of the country was part of the echo chamber that Walter Cronkite, David Brinkley, et. al. led. Since we were (mostly) all in it, it didn't seem like a bubble, just reality. Now internet tech is letting us inflate our own bespoke bubbles, and easily peer into the the other bubbles. Yes this causes conflict. But in the end multiple echo chambers are an improvement over one big one, plus a few small alternatives that only weirdos like me were in.
- zwieback 5y ago
  Well, everyone being in the same echo chamber is much better than what we have today. At least that's the conventional wisdom. Agree about technology making an existing problem more visible, though. It's not like human nature has suddenly changed.
ghaff 5y ago
>Hopefully at least some news organizations will figure out a better path That path seems to be pretty clear: charging for a subscription. But that's probably only a path open to global brands and popular niches.

dfxm12 5y ago

75% of those who identify as being on the right thought coverage of their views is unfair. This is interesting given how many local news outlets are owned by the conservative Sinclair Broadcast Group. I guess it doesn't help when they run segments like this, sowing more distrust: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI

handrous 5y ago
Coverage (let's say) of left-wing bias in the media has been a major part of right-wing media since at least the early 90s. Limbaugh, for instance, talked about it a lot back then (and I doubt he ever stopped—don't know why he would have), and if he wasn't receiving payment from the advertising department of Fox News, when they started up, he sure should have been (there was a lot of, "well, except Fox News" in his, ah, coverage of left-wing bias). The "the media hates conservatives" thing got his treatment where he acted like it was just a fact that he and his listeners, of course, knew to be true, sometimes calling out what he perceived as examples, but more often just stating it on the way to some other point. From what I've seen, the rest of right-wing punditry (I suppose you'd call it) picked up on this and took a similar approach to it.
- andyxor 5y ago
  The media leftist bias is real, I guess it’s hard to notice from inside the bubble I was never interested in politics , left or right and never listened to conservative or liberal commentary you mentioned but the coverage of BLM riots, Trump etc especially in 2020 was mostly fake news and blatant propaganda. That’s what brought me to vote for Trump in the first place, the constant lying and manipulation by the media. I don’t know how otherwise reasonable people can not notice these 24/7 lies by CNN, WaPo, NYT etc. I’m a first gen immigrant, from former communist country, we have a good nose for propaganda and can smell it from afar, I’m surprised American-born Americans are so easily fooled.
  - handrous 5y ago
    I didn't claim it's not. I just meant to point out that people on the right have been told, consistently and repeatedly, that it exists since at least the early 90s, by people whose opinions they sure seem to take seriously, so it'd be unsurprising that many wouldn't trust the media even if it weren't true. The truth of it's almost irrelevant to the poll results.

ihsw 5y ago

Perhaps those in the media will reflect on this and make an effort to be more trustworthy.

jaredwiener 5y ago

*Disclaimer: working on a news startup to combat some of these issues* I find it interesting first of all that local news -- and weather, especially -- are the most trusted in the US. It reminds me of that old half-joke that everyone hates Congress but loves their congressperson -- but more likely it's that the issues that hit close to home are less likely to be polarized across traditional political lines. We've long passed the inflection point where people seem to judge trustworthiness based on alignment to their own predetermined biases. If I tell you that what you think is wrong -- even if I have a factual basis for that; or more mildly, just frame something in a way that you might disagree with, you can label me as biased. How did we get here? I think a lot of the blame comes from social media. Local news really cannot trend -- by definition it appeals to a narrow audience, and no one is sharing city council minutes. People do share outrage -- forcing the most polarizing content to the top. And, not for nothing, newsfeeds often put propaganda and disinformation -- or just lowest-common-denominator ("7 child stars: where are they now?") -- to compete at the same level as traditional journalism. I (previously) wrote some thoughts here: https://blog.nillium.com/news-was-never-meant-for-social-platforms/ https://blog.nillium.com/news-was-never-meant-for-social-pla...

kyle_martin1 5y ago
Local news stations get their agenda for their parent companies. They are told what to cover, what not to cover, and how to cover things to fit the overarching narrative from executives/producers.
- xadhominemx 5y ago
  Yes, and the largest of those parent companies are explicitly right wing / Republican aligned.
  - rscoots 5y ago
    Why mention company size and not the far more relevant total viewership #s?

mc32 5y ago

On the other hand, the media has truly earned this distrust and isn’t the result of “foreign agitation”. Both mainline ideologies constantly and pathologically deceive and withhold information to make things one sided increasing polarization. MSNBC argues that its audience knows that its news isn’t actually news...(!)

freshpots 5y ago
You misspelled Fox: https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-believe-the-facts-tucker-carlson-tells-you-so-say-fox-s-lawye https://www.npr.org/2020/09/29/917747123/you-literally-cant-... Don't both sides a phenomenon that is far worse on the right.
- mc32 5y ago
  No, it really looks like I did not misspell MSNBC: https://greenwald.substack.com/p/a-court-ruled-rachel-maddows-viewers https://greenwald.substack.com/p/a-court-ruled-rachel-maddow... Court-ruled: >"Cynthia Bashant, dismissed the lawsuit on the ground that even Maddow's own audience understands that her show consists of exaggeration, hyperbole, and pure opinion, and therefore would not assume that such outlandish accusations are factually true even when she uses the language of certainty and truth when presenting them (“literally is paid Russian propaganda")."
  - freshpots 5y ago
    ah, yes, comrade Glenn. He lost it a long time ago.
  - freshpots 5y ago
    https://www.reddit.com/r/neutralnews/comments/j04eqv/fox_news_won_a_court_case_by_persuasively_arguing/g6otnd5/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/neutralnews/comments/j04eqv/fox_new... Key points from the article: But Fox News argued that Carlson "cannot be understood to have been stating facts, but instead that he was delivering an opinion using hyperbole for effect," the ruling said. US District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil agreed with Fox's premise, adding that the network "persuasively argues" that "given Mr. Carlson's reputation, any reasonable viewer 'arrive[s] with an appropriate amount of skepticism' about the statements he makes.""This 'general tenor' of the show should then inform a viewer that he is not 'stating actual facts' about the topics he discusses and is instead engaging in 'exaggeration' and 'non-literal commentary,'" the ruling said This was the same defense used in the rachel maddow lawsuit. Why not use a defense that is known to work? "For her to exaggerate the facts and call OAN Russian propaganda was consistent with her tone up to that point, and the Court finds a reasonable viewer would not take the statement as factual given this context," Bashant added. https://thehill.com/homenews/media/499294-judge-dismisses-one-america-news-defamation-lawsuit-against-rachel-maddow https://thehill.com/homenews/media/499294-judge-dismisses-on...

karaterobot 5y ago

In this respect the U.S. is ahead of the rest of the world by a few years. It isn't as though media is siloed geographically. Wherever there's the internet, there's media that is locked in a ratlike struggle for survival, cannibalizing its reputation and standards to stay alive. That pressure is already evenly distributed, even if the dawning realization that it exists is not.

xadhominemx 5y ago

It’s because we have only two major political parties and one of them has increasingly right wing authoritarian and nihilistic tendencies. It’s in their interest to sow distrust of the media / reality despite the damage it is doing to the country, and they have a willing coalition of right wing traditional (Fox, Sinclair) and social media properties to tow the party line on grievance and mistrust, with this latest astroturfed meltdown over “critical race theory” a prime example. As far as I am aware, no other rich Democracy has a set up as bad.

xtian 5y ago
> It’s because we have only two major political parties and one of them has increasingly right wing authoritarian and nihilistic tendencies. You mean the Democrats?
- xadhominemx 5y ago
  No, I don’t
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - dexterdog 5y ago
    I think you might want to look at the actions of your party. You may not have meant both, but you should understand why somebody who is not on your team would think you did.
    - xadhominemx 5y ago
      He didn’t actually think it, he was trolling.
      - xtian 5y ago
        I'm trolling? No, I'm being completely genuine. The present-day Democratic Party is objectively more right-wing, authoritarian, and nihilistic than it was 50-60 years ago.

asjdflakjsdf 5y ago

I'm at the point where I instantly dismiss any "world" news that comes from the US. I'll simply wait for an independent source from another country to report on any such story. I also hold the opinion on US political news that it is beyond the stage of a possible recovery without some dramatic changes to the fabric of the country itself. Every argument is wedged into an imaginary Team A vs Team B battle and it seems that to remain relevant as a publisher, you have to play that game. People feel personally attacked/validated by every article now because those are the most engaging and publishers will omit certain contexts and facts in any story to facilitate that emotional trigger. Given that the journalism industry is energised by advertising and political propaganda, it has reached a point where it has become nothing more than an itchy wound that the public keep scratching. The 24 hour news cycle isn't an issue in itself, but the power games combined with a dangerous economic model and all of the mass media manipulation on sites like reddit, are the core of the issues imo. Having the 24hr cycle (online, and on cable) just amplifies it all and makes it so omnipresent to the fact that despite the great efforts of dictators who put their picture in every place they can, I can bet that Trump managed to become a part of everyones daily life, and in a much more direct fashion, than any dictator could ever dream of, in the anglosphere during his term.

read_if_gay_ 5y ago
> I'll simply wait for an independent source from another country to report on any such story. Which countries specifically? I know that German-speaking news outlets aren’t any less partisan, and I have little reason to think that the rest of Europe is much better.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  I think if you arithmetically add a US and a Russian article and divide it by two, you are as informed as if you had read them separately. Obvious advantage: You can read two articles in one.
- zwieback 5y ago
  In fact, when I was growing up in Germany there was a discussion about whether the US' noble goals of achieving a balanced media was possible or even desirable. The general agreement was that recognizing news sources implicit bias made more sense than trying to balance out reporting. This was in the 70s and 80s, I've been away from Germany for so long now I have no idea which direction things have taken there.

snarfy 5y ago

Nope, nothing wrong with US news [1] [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI

brsg 5y ago

It's no coincidence that the following events seem to coincide * Distrust of traditional media * Collapse of local media * Rise in social media platforms Traditional media isn't competing with rival newspapers on a stand anymore. It's competing on platforms like facebook, twitter, and reddit. Getting clicks on these platforms is correlated with what drives engagement - usually some cultural outrage or some "out-group mocking". Newspapers are really just catching up to the psychology hacking that social media has already profited from. It's more economics than ideology that enforces this imo. Frankly, you see this shift on HN as well. Half the time I log on here, at least 2/10 of the top articles are appeals to whatever cultural outrage triggers this site's demographics (let's be honest, this article does that too), and these articles will always have 10x the comments of other on the front page.

titzer 5y ago
Don't forget that the President of the United States called the press "the enemy of the people" [1]. [1] https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/437610-trump-calls-press-the-enemy-of-the-people https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/437610-trump-cal...
- Quillbert182 5y ago
  I disagree with that president about many things, but that I agree that the press is the enemy of the people.
  - zero_deg_kevin 5y ago
    If he'd said that for-profit news media is the enemy of Democracy, I'd have probably bought a hat.
  - boublepop 5y ago
    I guess your American? If so, please consider that you are not just one of the voices putting US at the lowest trust in the media, but currently also arguing that it would be better if America was literally at the bottom of the list.

andyxor 5y ago

Or God, 24% pay for WaPo brainwashing subscription

djanogo 5y ago
It's amazing people pay for WaPo, they literally have so much power, they get to decide what internal government info to leak or not leak and create the sentiment for ruling party.

FpUser 5y ago

Trust is very loaded term. Trust what? If the article says there is a tornado in progress at such and such place I trust it. As for the rest I think that journalism now is distorted to the point of no return. Most articles are heavily riddled with propaganda, things taken out of contest, hypocrisy etc. etc. It does not really matter to me whether it is Canadian press, US or whatever other country. All the same.

giantg2 5y ago

If you give people reasons to mistrust you, it should be no surprise when they don't trust you.

ericls 5y ago

At least people knows media are bad.

minikites 5y ago

>This study, like many others, found extremely high levels of distrust — 75% of those who identify as being on the right thought coverage of their views is unfair. When one party consistently attacks "the mainstream media" for decades for telling the truth about reality, you get this. It's not a "both sides" problem, the problem is only on one side. >Interestingly, partisans, including conservatives, at least say that they prefer a range of views (74%) and neutral treatment of issues (66%) rather than reports that just reinforce their views. People say they want that, but people also say they hate negative political attack ads, and we get something other than what we say we want because the product we actually get instead is appealing to many people.

incrudible 5y ago
> telling the truth about reality More like telling part of the truth about a carefully selected aspect of reality: https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/10/17/fact-check-trump-quote-very-fine-people-charlottesville/5943239002/ https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/10/17/fact...

murbard2 5y ago

US ranks first among 46 countries in distrust in media. FTFY.

d--b 5y ago

That France ranks so bad is much more newsworthy than the US. News in the US is terrible, and everybody knows this. In France, it is not so bad, yet, people equally distrust the industry. Social media conveyed news took over the country like crazy. People are so misinformed, it's beyond scary.

ctrlp 5y ago
Could dissatisfaction with EU membership and the a pro-EU French media class play a part? Asking for a friend.

werber 5y ago

The article mentions a higher level of trust in local news. My local news in Detroit is very matter of fact, here’s an event that happened, here’s visual proof, and with a few exemptions free of opinion. National news, in my experience, is more pundits talking about the events and extracting larger meaning from it. I personally have a very hard time consuming news outside of the local because of this.

cletus 5y ago

The US political system has weaponized religion for political power and minority rule. Gasoline has been thrown on the flames of anti-intellectualism legitimizing feelings over peer-reviewed scientific research. The US political system is under siege by what is essentially minority rule. Every public institution (notably including the judiciary and elections themselves) is simply fodder for a scorched earth policy of politicization. Ayn Rand billionaire acolytes have poured billions into reshaping policy to the benefit of the 0.01%. What I'm most sick of seeing of psuedo-intellectuals who say in a self-satisfied tone "both sides are biased" usually followed by "I only read independent news". This is the definition of false equivalence. The so-called "left media" in the US isn't without fault but it's fine. The "right media" is an active participant in the subversion of democracy that panders to and enables anti-vaxxers, conspiracy theorists, insurrectionists and white Supremacists. "Bias" is just an excuse to justify the self-reinforcing unsubstantiated echo chambers that people like to inhabit.

ctrlp 5y ago
You check all the boxes of having been very effectively propagandized by pseudo-State media. Don't give in. Think for yourself. It's not too late. There's the road to Damascus. Take it. Good luck.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  There is certainly no road to Damascus from the US. Chances are that the US also bombed that away. Still good advice.

theli0nheart 5y ago

One large country in Asia is notably missing from this list.

cirrus-clouds 5y ago

For comparison, a 2019 survey of 33 European countries ranked countries by their trust in the written press [1]. The UK ranked last (75% do not trust the written press, just 15% trust the press, 10% don't know). Unlike newspapers, TV and radio in the UK is regulated by a government-funded body called OFCOM (Office of Communications) where broadcasters are required to follow rules around impartial news coverage. These rules exclude opinion-based shows e.g. talk radio shows. These impartiality rules apply to all broadcasters i.e. public service broadcasters (PSBs) like the BBC and Channel 4, and commercial broadcasters like ITV and Sky News. People often criticise PSBs for their news coverage (justified in some cases), but there is no editorial standard or code of ethics for national newspapers in the UK. Most of the national newspapers in the UK lean to the right, and a few to the left. But they are all awful. The Financial Times is the only half-decent national newspaper in the UK and even they have their biases. I have long held the belief that the national press in the UK has poisoned political discourse in the UK for decades. Despite declining newspaper circulation, they continue to exert outsized influence on public discourse (and on politicians). The relationship between journalists and politicians is uncomfortably close and unhealthy. (Journalists often move to positions of influence into political parties). Interesting tidbit about UK newspaper columnists: attendence at private schools makes up just 7% of the general population. Yet, in UK national newspapers, the proportion of news columnist who were privately educated is disproportionately high: 44%. [2] [1] EBU (European Broadcasting Union) Media Intelligence Service – Trust in Media 2020 Report [2] The Sutton Trust: Elitist Britain 2019

JoshTko 5y ago

News needs to become a protected class of information that has strong controls against misinformation. It should not be in a similar class of freedom of speech which includes any and all opinions.

andrewclunn 5y ago
Hahaha. Yes, the solution is more centralized control. More power concentration... less competition... There is alternative media for anyone who actually looks for it. We don't need to save the media. We need it to die.

andrewclunn 5y ago

Is US media worse, or has the ability of alternative media to thrive in the US (largely because of the First Amendment) just meant that the US citizens are more clued in on how corrupt their media are? Perhaps both.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

“If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're mis-informed.” ― Mark Twain

mountainb 5y ago

I think one issue that has emerged with the 'free' internet is that more people than ever are reading news, but very few people are paying for it. This statistic is often cited by failing newspaper companies about why they are worth investing in. The issue is qualitative more than quantitative. The engagement that most people used to have with news was casual and occasional. There were a minority of cable TV news viewers but for most other people it was limited to short summary programs on network TV. The news magazines and opinion journals used to be much more cordial and high brow on both the left and the right, more focused on digesting books and important issues and less dedicated to parsing the trending issue of the picosecond. Now you have tons of casual news viewers participating in social media sharing mostly shallow 'opinions' which are just repetitions of what they have just consumed. It's kind of like what used to be the rich person seafood section with highfalutin organic varieties of wild caught fish has been replaced with 16 aisles of DISCOUNT IMITATION "CRAB" MEAT that all tastes the same and comes out of an industrial tube. When social media was new I think most tech forward people's opinion was that this was good, and that people would move on from "CRAB." Sure we have one whole aisle of synthetic flavored "CRAB," but in the future it will be better. Instead we just got 16 aisles of "CRAB" and no more good fish, just the memories of what used to be a more refined news culture. Mass participation in national issues is very distorting for the United States as it is constitutionally composed. Our laws are designed for intense local and state-level participation in politics, with representatives mediating the passions of democracy at the national level. The media optimizes for intense national/international 'engagement,' but this must lead to frustration and unhappiness because mass participation can have zero impact on national issues of import (for the most part) because of the fundamental structure of our system.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

I'm looking forward to the media Kino of the anniversary of the January 6th Insurrection. The show will be spectacular. I'm buying popcorn, inviting friends and turning on CNN. Expecting North Korea level of wailing and Jim Acosta tears. Will take shots to every "insurrection" bellowed.

pram 5y ago

The thing that has most shocked me throughout the years is how lockstep the media is on foreign policy, no matter what 'side' they are ostensibly on. Theres no war the media doesn't like! Iraq, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, etc. One particularly shameful episode I remember was Trump being described as finally 'presidential' when he fired missiles at Syria. I genuinely think if he had started some disastrous war it would have rehabilitated him with the MSM.

carapace 5y ago

"Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media" was published in 1988. > It argues that the mass communication media of the U.S. "are effective and powerful ideological institutions that carry out a system-supportive propaganda function, by reliance on market forces, internalized assumptions, and self-censorship, and without overt coercion", by means of the propaganda model of communication. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent The advent of the Internet has rocked the "mass communication media" and exposed their "system-supportive propaganda function" in a way that is pretty hard to counter. It's a case of "How Ya Gonna Keep 'em Down on the Farm (After They've Seen Paree)?" > a World War I song that rose to popularity after the war had ended. The lyrics highlight concern that American soldiers from rural environments would not want to return to farm life after experiencing the European city life and culture of Paris during World War I. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Ya_Gonna_Keep_%27em_Down_on_the_Farm_(After_They%27ve_Seen_Paree)%3F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Ya_Gonna_Keep_%27em_Down_o...

RickJWagner 5y ago

Well deserved. Media sources are so politicized you have to question anything you read. I had this graphically illustrated in the gym one day. There was a wall of televisions, with Fox on one tv and CNN on the tv next to it. Both stations were showing then-President Trump as he addressed a group of elderly veterans. Fox ran subtitles extolling the popularity of the visit, explaining the increased benefits Trump was bringing. CNN ran subtitles describing looks of 'disappointment' and calling the benefits sub-standard. Both ran the exact same video. The media richly deserves it's poor reputation.