Why does our media suck

[ARCHITEKT]

All the mainstream media outlets seem to have such a superficial and dumb down dialogue. They pose these "proxy arguments" and the public feeds into them and divides themselves among them. truth about how we control one another - YouTube watch!

 

[ecofarm]

All the mainstream media outlets seem to have such a superficial and dumb down dialogue. They pose these "proxy arguments" and the public feeds into them and divides themselves among them. truth about how we control one another - YouTube watch!

Are you just gonna keep posting Youtube videos? I'm never gonna click one (at least, not from your OPs thus far). Present some kind of argument. If you want better media, try The Basement in DP Extras.

 

[radioman]

Are you just gonna keep posting Youtube videos? I'm never gonna click one..

-----------------
Wise choice.
I clicked on one of his vids yesterday.
It consisted of non-stop rambling while waving an unlit cigarette around.....FOR 20 MINUTES!!
I, reflexively, kept reaching for my lighter.

 

[fmw]

I don't even have enough available bandwidth to watch internet videos so I never watch them. But I suppose I could answer you like a businessman would. Media outlets have a readership or viewership. In order for them to stay in business they need to provide entertainment to that base. Whatever they do needs to be aimed at that. You may not view news as entertainment but I can assure you it is.

 

[Andalublue]

All the mainstream media outlets seem to have such a superficial and dumb down dialogue. They pose these "proxy arguments" and the public feeds into them and divides themselves among them. truth about how we control one another - YouTube watch!

I've always thought that we get the media we deserve. If the public wanted better media, it would support the best with its viewing habits and the worst would disappear for lack of support. Your moan suggests to me that people get what they want and what they deserve.

 

[Diving Mullah]

All the mainstream media outlets seem to have such a superficial and dumb down dialogue. They pose these "proxy arguments" and the public feeds into them and divides themselves among them. truth about how we control one another - YouTube watch!

Oh So long ago when the broadcast companies when to Congress to ask for use of public Airways, congress required companies in exchange for 23 hours of whatever the hell they wanted to broadcast 1 hour to be dedicated public good and broadcasting of information and daily news. What congress failed to required is this hour should NOT be used for the commercial benefit of company, but only and only public good. Sadly we have failed at this....

There was a story the other day that PBS wanted to have a documentary about Koch brother but the high up managers decided to pull the program in the off chance of offending one of the Koch brother and lose some of their funding. The same pattern that has been repeated with NBC, CBS, ABS, and CNN, stories that have been less flattering about one of their big customers have often been pulled of the air.

and because of it the news has changed from Information, to enformation (entertainment and information). It has become water down and irrelevant. I actually get most of my news from Daily Shows, which more factual than any of the network TV.

The flip side is as the network tv have been progressively going down hill, the cable networks have been picking up the slacks, they provide much better entertainment and news services. The good news is that the model for Cable TV and Network TV is changing, as it was with Music industry (even though the executives of the Networks have to refused or fighting tooth and nail to stop it). The bad news is that this transition time will be chaotic.

And for those who are dead serious about the US news and want fact free from comments or personal opinions. I would recommend Spiegle and Le Monde, BBC. I know sad that i have to go to foreign news to get detailed US news.


Diving Mullah

 

[Unrein]

I've always thought that we get the media we deserve. If the public wanted better media, it would support the best with its viewing habits and the worst would disappear for lack of support. Your moan suggests to me that people get what they want and what they deserve.

This is a bit of a 'chicken or the egg' argument about social psychology. The media is in competition with ourselves over our minds, and while to all the idealist libertarians out there, the human mind is some impenetrable fortress over which the individual has express influence and control, it's ignorant of material reality to believe such. We are constructed innately with social instincts of trust and needing to rely on the communication of information to be speedy and uninterrupted. We would be long extinct with we didn't have the reflexes to see panic or defensiveness in one person become instantly panic and defensiveness in all.

So in essence, it's clear that we do have a very strong sense of trusting some base source of information, in fact it's completely necessary. All human thought is predicated on accepting some axiomic base without questioning it any further, or no chain of thoughts could ever materialize to begin with. Not to say that we don't have the ability to be skeptical either, but skepticism is much easier to resist than trust when it comes to social norms or perceptions thereof. The media plays into that knowledge by attempting to plant memes in the deepest part of our collective conscience, where no one will notice or see it; but be sure that it will sprout and take root, and manipulate the masses.