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> Between this for new media channels and the breakdown of trust in old media channels there is a lot of reason to be hopeful about the future of the US. One of
by heavyset_go 2y ago
> Between this for new media channels and the breakdown of trust in old media channels there is a lot of reason to be hopeful about the future of the US. One of the big problems of the past was the insane level of trust in institutions that were at best credulous and more realistically just lying continuously and brazenly. It is a big win for the public discourse if people start applying cynicism where warranted.
Instead, people are outsourcing their thinking to people like Joe Rogan and political YouTubers who exploit that cynicism for sponsorships, ad revenue and their own product lines.
Say what you will about corporate media, and I'm also a big critic of it and even PBS, but at least something like PBS isn't pure brain rot and can be informative. I highly doubt Mr. Rogers or the News Hour radicalized anyone.
These days terrorists are literally putting internet memes in their manifestos, along with shout-outs to their favorite YouTubers and internet pundits.
> In many ways this is the real transformation change that the internet posited
The "real change" was the Arab Spring era and powers all over the world quickly learned to not let that happen in their own backyards.
We are currently experiencing a duality between domestic powers doing their best to stifle or direct change for their benefit, and external powers doing their best to generate unrest elsewhere to their benefit. The internet as it exists enables both to extents the world has never seen before.
> Manufactured consensuses aren't holding so easily and people are being forced to acknowledge the sausage factory behind them.
Manufactured consent has modernized, it's happening right now all over the internet. Tech has become the modern Skinner box for owners to manipulate users, and social media has absolutely warped the minds of at least one generation in favor of their owners, too.
I wish I had your optimism, and I did like ~20 years ago, but man, the internet is pure poison for the unprepared mind. And I think we're all varying levels of unprepared for the highly optimized digital manipulation on the internet.
- rightbyte 2y agoAlgorithmic feeds are pure poison for the mind. But what might be even worse is headline reading. Like you don't read articles like you use to. People read the headlines which are rage bait and click bait. Realtime rage on "developing stories" than nothing when the boring conclusion is known weeks later. People are going insane. The death of the boring news paper is about as a big problem as Instagram. Modern newspapers just plainly sucks and are mostly rehashes of agency news anyways. I think we need to figuratively pull the plug on the internet. Like make it some sort of loser thing to be hooked on social media and light minded news.
- _yb2s 2y agoThere’s nothing to read in the articles anymore- they just rehash the title point over and over interspersed with unrelated clip art.
- jjmarr 2y agohttps://youtu.be/Ho9M-q_kcn8 https://youtu.be/Ho9M-q_kcn8 > stop calling me a crypto-Nazi or I'll sock you in the goddamn face, and you'll stay plastered --William F. Buckley Jr to Gore Vidal in 1968 on ABC television Buckley also hosted a show on PBS at the time.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- throwway120385 2y agoThe internet makes you stupid.
- heavyset_go 2y agoLowtax was ahead of his time.
- rayiner 2y ago> Instead, people are outsourcing their thinking to people like Joe Rogan and political YouTubers who exploit that cynicism for sponsorships, ad revenue and their own product lines. Joe Rogan didn't lie us into a disastrous $6 trillion war that destabilized the middle east, created all sorts of knock-on consequences such as mass immigration into Europe from the Middle East that we're still living with two decades later. Joe Rogan didn't spend decades cheerleading immigration, outsourcing, and globalization policies most Americans never wanted (e.g. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/29/podcasts/the-daily/election-immigration.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/29/podcasts/the-daily/electi...). Joe Rogan is popular because people can tell that his gut instincts and general world view are consistent with their own, which makes them trust his takes. If your alternative to that is people who believe in their hearts that the U.S. should bring democracy and human rights to the world, or take on millions of immigrants, you'll never get peoples' trust, just as you probably wouldn't trust someone who thinks the rapture is coming soon.
- lotsofpulp 2y ago> didn't spend decades cheerleading immigration, outsourcing, and globalization policies most Americans never wanted (e.g. Most Americans do want their cheap toys and gas, and if you try to take them away, you’re not going to get voted out. Don’t listen to what people say, listen to what they do. If Americans didn’t want outsourcing and immigrants, they would have kept buying made in America goods and wouldn’t bitch about higher grocery / restaurant prices. However, Americans (like any other group) never wanted to move down the relative socioeconomic rankings, especially relative to other Americans. So when they do, they start wanting to blame others for their lack of competitiveness with the other few billion people in the world.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoI genuinely think immigration is a law and order issue for many voters, and this is why you see a lot of support for controls from legal immigrants. People see right of refusal as a prerequisite to deciding where and how much immigration is desired. By analogy, I prioritize my right over who enters my home over other considerations. I would like to let contractors and cleaners in, but only on my terms.