Face It. Its All Traditional Media's Fault That Republicans Control All Three Branches of Government!

[TomCADem]

Here are the reasons:

1. Newspapers have continued their declined in circulation with the average circulation of weekday newspapers dropping to 24.3 million, down from 63.2 million in 1990.

2. Most Americans now rely on social media sources like Twitter, influencers, youtube, etc. for their news and information. For example, in 2022, only 12% of the US population turned to newspapers for daily news consumption, while 37% used social media. For younger generations, this shift is more pronounced with 50% of Gen Z getting their news from social media sources.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1124119/gen-z-news-consumption-us/

3. With more Americans increasingly relying on social media for news, they are increasingly vulnerable to be radicalized through use of algorithms that funnel increasingly extreme content to viewers.

How TikTok bombards young men with misogynistic videos
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/aug/06/revealed-how-tiktok-bombards-young-men-with-misogynistic-videos-andrew-tate?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Inside the online offensive that turned out a new generation of men for Trump
ttps://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/11/10/trump-voters-gen-z-memes-podcasts-joe-rogan/

Inside the violent, misogynistic world of TikTok's star, Andrew Tate
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/aug/06/andrew-tate-violent-misogynistic-world-of-tiktok-new-star

Algorithmic Bias: Reinforcing Prejudice on Social Media
https://dhananjaymittal.medium.com/algorithmic-bias-reinforcing-prejudice-on-social-media-46de22eef5dc

4. Right winger grass roots groups engage in grass efforts to effect government at the local level by speaking out at city councils and school boards in support of right wing policies while progressives largely ignore such opportunities to express their views. Indeed, rather than try to engage with people who do not share our views in the real world, a lot of progressives preach to the choir on boards like this to reaffirm the truism that it is all of the media's fault.

Far-right group Moms for Liberty poised to clash with teachers unions over school board races nationwide
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/education/moms-for-liberty-poised-to-clash-with-teachers-unions-over-school-board-races-nationwide

Anti-Vaxxers Bring Chaos to Healdsburg, Rallying Around Unvaccinated City Council Member
https://sfist.com/2021/12/07/anti-vaxxers-bring-chaos-to-healdsburg-rallying-around-unvaccinated-city-council-member/

So, it is correct that it is traditional media's fault that it is no longer as important as it used to be, as less people read or view traditional sources of news for their information and news choosing to rely on non-journalistic sources like social media, which in turn funnels and reinforces the prejudices of its viewers. Moreover, while progressives are fooled into thinking that the secret sauce is to rely on and blame traditional media while right wingers have engaged in grass roots efforts at the local government level to implement right wing policies by speaking at school board and city council meetings that progressives have largely ignored.

Indeed, when traditional media is finally dead, then we can really blame them for failing to shine a light on the corruption and prejudice that has grown because no one is listening any more as they tune into their latest force fed social media influencer content that has gone viral.

[elleng]

1. Media AND FAILURE of Electorate to do OUR business, that is,

INFORM OURSELVES.

[TomCADem]

5. Right! It Is Way Too Tiring to Show Up at a School Board To Defend Educational Standards

Sure, a whole army of right wingers will show up to complain about the teaching of critical race theory at an elementary school even though no such classes exist under the premise of defending "parent's rights."

Why should we as progressives have to get away from our keyboard or couch and take the time out of our day to defend the premise that schools should should not simply reinforce the latest right wing myth that their parents read on Facebook? That is hard work to engage with people who disagree with us in the real world.

[Silent Type]

2. Yet, we blame MSM for trump.

[TomCADem]

3. Heck Yeah! The Same Way We Blame A Deceased Boxer For Failing To Defend Their Title!

nt

[W_HAMILTON]

15. Uhh, the two are not incompatible.

The decline of traditional media and the current conservative slant most mainstream media has -- you have a small handful of actually pro-liberal shows, with the rest being heavily conservative or """both sides""" types (which only benefits conservatives because it puts their lies and propaganda on equal footing with the truth and reality) -- and it's not hard to see how they can both be responsible for Trump and their own demise.

And as bad as traditional media has been regarding Republican propaganda for decades now, social media is even worse.

When Americans are increasingly less and less informed, who would you blame, if not the sources from where they get their news?

[Abolishinist]

4. I can't tell if this is from

The Onion or the Borowitz Report.

?????

[arthritisR_US]

6. Go into each of the links and they will enlighten you.

[Abolishinist]

7. How so?

I read the synopsis of each, are they not valid?

[Blue Full Moon]

8. The media is as liberal as the conservative that owns it.

[TomCADem]

14. Sort of like a rotary phone. If a leftists owns it, then if you talk on it you are a leftist!

Of course, no one uses rotary phones. Sort of like newspapers, which is their fault of course!

Finally, given that it is the media’s fault, why don’t progressives take matters into their their own hands by showing up at city council or school board meetings to fight for liberal policies the way right wingers do? After all, they also distrust the media, but they do something about it by showing up at school boards to share their extremist views.

[stopdiggin]

9. I have no trouble squarely laying the blame on the American voter.

Irresponsible choices and behavior - are still the responsibility of the individual. (unless we are talking someone who is truly incompetent to make choices - and then that engenders a different set of rules and expectation) But, quite evidently that does not apply to the masses of voting population. Maxed out the credit card ? - financed that new vehicle you can't afford ? - blew 45 thousand on a destination wedding ? Had an affair with the boss's 19 year old daughter ? Guess what, chump ? Nobody was telling you that any of that was a good choice - and if they were, it's still your responsibility to know that they were feeding you a line of horsehockey! You don't get a free pass because someone was running advertisement that made it look like you life would take on a new 'glow' if you owned a new pickup!

And I am sick to death and absolutely rejecting the idea that the American voter was somehow 'hoodwinked' into a vote that they didn't really understand. That they somehow - after all this time - really didn't KNOW who Donald J Trump was. Poppycock! They knew EXACTLY who this man is and was.

The media was never successful in painting this man as anything other than what he was at base. And if, after years of exposure to this 'personage' - you then decided that he was the better choice to sit in the White House (for a 2nd time).
THAT IS ON YOU ! And not the media - whatever their efforts or derelictions might have been.

[TomCADem]

16. What about right wingers working at the grass roots level?

There was once a time when progressives had the advantage of a ground game in the real world. Now, we see right wingers showing up in real life at local school boards and city council to push their agendas. The DU board was a classic example of progressive keyboard warriors who would convince themselves that no one could follow a blatant racist and fascist, and they ignored polls showing that the race was basically a toss up. They thought for sure that because Trump decided to ditch debates and main stream media interviews and chose to just do social media and podcaster interviews on Joe Rogan and Dave Ramsay that we would win. Of course, right wingers figured out that mainstream media is dead, long live social media. This is why it is mainstream media’s fault. Instead of journalists with any sense of journalistic ethics, you have a bunch of influencers who are just looking for views.

This in turn emboldens right wingers who are not only plugged into this social media rabbit hole, but they actually see the need to get out in the real world to spread their racist gospel. That is the key difference. While many progressives also say they distrust the mainstream media, their response to hide in their echo chamber, post on DU or watch their own liberal channels, but fail to spread the word in the real world by speaking at city council meetings or school boards.

[BigmanPigman]

10. I think it is 50/50

50% of the blame is the purposeful ignorance of the lazy American voter and 50% the MSM.

Both equally brought this shit show to us for 8 fucking years. I realistically do not see this changing in my lifetime.

[B.See]

11. I too hold that those who willingly and enthusiastically voted

for Trump knew precisely who and what he is, and it's BECAUSE they know that they so vehemently supported him. He is the embodiment of the worse of what they ARE, the love him for it, and there's no disputing that, imo.

I also think the MSM played the role of complicity and cowardice in normalizing all of this. And are equally to blame as they. They have failed America.

However I've also long thought that far right zealotry needed be met with an equal and opposite zealotry of our own, and had written of it before. Because, imo, if it were, nothing Biden or Harris could've said or done would've lessened our commitment. Nothing.

Clearly, nothing Trump did or said lessened theirs.

[Midnight Writer]

12. I think the opposite is true. I think social media is the culprit.

Your post points out that "legacy media" numbers are falling and "most Americans now rely on social media sources".

That is exactly true. This mirrors the rise of crackpot conservatives and crank influencers as a power base for the Republican Party.

Legacy media has its faults, but let's not throw out the baby with the bath water.

Legacy media would not platform people like Alex Jones, Steve Bannon, Joe Rogan, Andrew Tate, Nick Fuentes, or many of the others who dominate the social media scene.

I like getting my information from professional journalists who are overseen and checked by professional editors. We would not know a fraction of what we know now about the corruption and cognitive dissonance of the GOP if not for the pros who dig deep and report on it. Most of the valid information on social media is cribbed from legacy news sources, then repackaged with some rando's opinion spliced throughout. These opinions may be entertaining, but they are often scurrilous, distorted, or tailored to fit an agenda.

News gathering is a resource-intensive operation, and I can't think of any social media sites that have the firepower of a major newspaper or network news operation to conduct in-depth investigations and to filter out the worst of the disinformation presented to us by internet influencers.

We did not see legacy media reporting that schools have litter boxes to accommodate furries, or that immigrants are eating the cats and dogs. That disinformation is presented as fact on social media.

I predict that, if we see an autopsy of the 2024 election, the people who rely on social media for their news mostly voted for Trump and the people who read newspapers and watch network news voted mostly for Harris.

[Elessar Zappa]

17. You're correct.

But there’s no saving legacy media. Social media and podcasts are the future. So we have to compete with them on their own turf.

[Johonny]

13. I blame the American voters

At some point, feeding the slop feed to you is your fault. This was not a hard election to figure out the two candidates.