| Do you really see MORE blatant propaganda/bias in the media today than there ever has been? Sure, there is some.. But there always has been and we have such diverse sources for opinion bits that it makes this a nonissue, right? I mean there is a difference here: News: "US Bombs Syria"
Opinion: "A line was crossed and Trump acted", "XXX Unproved actor did Y so We did Z", "One country just attacked another without going through the UN" Yeah, states have agendas. Big media groups tend to have interests/friends that aren't totally obvious. Mass media is probably skewed on their commentary as a result. But, we seem to be extending this warp field as an instant invalidation of all views counter to our own. Something we don't like? Obv ;fake news' and 'propaganda'. It's making lots of silos. Those with different views are no longer tolerable. Instead of sitting down and listening to someone with a different take, we (generally as humans, I mean) seem to be increasingly looking for ways to invalidate and cheapen them to avoid having to be challenged. "You think that drugs should be legalised and want to have a serious conversation at a national level about changing our strategy which has clearly failed? Dope head! You must be one of those pink floyd people" "You're pro-immigration and I'm pro-isolation? Well you're clearly a lefty socialist guardian reading oolong drinker!" "You're a business owner with serious concerns about the economic consequences of brexit? Remoaner scum!" This goes both ways than those right/left examples above -- I do it too. I really think we're getting to the point where we can barely even discuss things any more though, we're so divided and unwilling to even listen to each other it's scary. Yeah, someone might have an agenda. If someone says to you "obamacare gave millions of people health insurance, why do you want to remove it?" and nine times out of ten this discussion ends with nothing achieved other than discussing the motivation of the origional poster, rather instead of discussing the actual issue: don't you think we've lost something? When did we stop respecting the right of our fellows to have a different opinion, and when did our petty insults of his motivations become more important to us than his points? One of Churchill's nice ones: "A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject" and we all seem to be getting fanatical... |
I mean, I kind of agree. I just don't get what you're worked up about in this context.