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by BugsJustFindMe 260 days ago
You're probably not going to find this satisfying, but, online? For sure nothing.

Even in person, I'm not sure that there really is a way to persuade someone to change their politics in the modern media landscape, even if you get a lot of time alone with them one on one in person and you do everything right, because of what we know about media inundation and how people begin from their gut feelings and then work backwards to retcon details that align with those feelings.

You will have conversations where it seems like you've made some kind of progress, where it seems like you've earned some kind of credibility, where it seems like you've gained some kind of ground, and then the next day they will regress because the new thing they just saw will confirm their original vibes and the interpositions you created will be pushed out of mind and forgotten.

And this will happen over and over because the world is psychotically overrun by messaging from media empires that make mindbogglingly large amounts of money from outright conning people.

So, unless you have a few anti-billionaire billionaire friends thinking of starting media empires in your pocket, possibly the one thing you can do is run for local government.

2 comments

> You're probably not going to find this satisfying, but, online? For sure nothing.

Then why tone police the original poster? If these people are unconvinceable then why not enjoy the catharsis?

I agree with the policing thing. I do that from time to time. Hacker News is one (maybe the only one) good place on the internet. Let's try to keep it like that. Snarky remarks are clearly against this site's guidelines. And for good reason: they do not change anyone's mind, and can result in polarizing responses. That's not what HN needs.
I presently view that kind of cathartic expression as worse than neutral and actively harmful. That's not the same as being able to change someone's mind, but it's also still bad.
I legitimately do not understand the idea that it’s harmful if you simultaneously argue that it has no effect on anyone but catharsis for the poster.

If it doesn’t change anyone’s mind then why care?

If it does change someone’s mind then why argue against it? Unless you mean to say that you think it’s actively changing people’s mind in the opposite direction of the original posters intent

There are definitely right wing talking points being shrouded as centrist or other fascism.

Like one thing that I see often are the "they deserve this right-wing grift". Like, there's a lot of people who quickly love to do victim blaming when there's now like one near left mainstream media (NBC) and the remainder are all some right wing grooming station.

There's definitely a center that needs to be reminded that they're currently surrounded by right wing propaganda and they're all trying to move the overton window.

You're right the far right is far gone, but the rest of civil society is still drifting, from apathy or misdirection or serious grift or be grifted realities.

Ok, let's imagine that I agree with what you just said...

Given your stated premise of the major media landscape being manipulative right-wing grooming stations hiding behind veneers of centrism and the unimaginable power that carries with it, what do you think can legitimately counter the state of things you described other than an empire-shifting media effort that would take financial investments on the scale of an entire small nation state?

If they're uninformed, how much can you actually inform them against the background? If they're uncaring, still, after everything, how can you make them care? If they're undecided, still, after everything, how will you get them to decide?

> how much can you actually inform them against the background?

Depends on who you is, in the sense of how many. You seem to be unaware of that choice.

How many of me does it take to reverse https://www.pewresearch.org/chart/sotnm-cable-newsroom-spend... or https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20241107961040/en/New...

What's our message? What's our reach? Are we coordinated? Are we effective?

All the media except NBS is a "right wing grooming station"? Seriously? CNN? AP News? Reuters? Huffpo? They're all grooming people for the right wing?

I mean, I agree that the right wing is pumping out propaganda and trying to move the overton window, but I think you are seriously mistaken about where the media is at.

Well, you're right in that we have to assume the right wing ibllionaire who bought CNN will ensure their editorial view point is properly aligned.

But lets be honest, you want to believe that there's some happy push and pull between left and right instead of a heavy handed skew into far right.

It's not just good business as Fox has demonstrated, it's also good _self interest_ to go into the conservative business.

I'm sorry.

> All the media except NBS is a "right wing grooming station"? Seriously? CNN? AP News? Reuters? Huffpo?

Ever heard of "good cop, bad cop"? Look it up.