Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Derek A Evans's avatar

Above and beyond the individual news articles, I think what we're seeing is the unequal nature of US political demographics and the business approaches of media markets, overall.

"Left-leaning" or central outlets try to appeal to potential right-wing readers by being "fair" (read: hyper-critical) of Democratic reps, in attempt to grow their brand and repair reputations after decades of the Repubs 'working the refs' by claiming all non-rightwing news is biased again Repubs.

Meanwhile, right-leaning outlets have no similar compunction. There is no goal for these outlets to bring in left-leaning eyeballs because their mission statement isn't to present news, but to instead explicitly present the rightwing view of everything as a counter to "mainstream" news.

The losers in this dynamic are ordinary people. There is no outlet that presents a good view of the left, as whether it's left-leaning or right-leaning, all outlets are being super critical of leftwing politicians. There's no home for people who don't want to be influenced by ulterior-motive backed articles hyper-critical of democratic politicians, like there is for rightwingers during rightwing admins. Nobody is asking for that same level of propaganda for the left -- but at the least not a failure in the other direction. Every outlet reads like the WSJ opinion page now, all a "yes but" rebuttal to actual good economic news and progress forward as a nation.

Expand full comment
Beth's avatar

As one who is almost alway supportive of the press, this has been bothering me for some time and I thought it WAS just me! That it's not, and it's happening somewhat consistently, is disturbing.

Expand full comment
7 more comments...

No posts