With democracy on the ballot, the mainstream press must change its ways
The American press is failing to adequately emphasize the stakes of the coming election
Inflation is low, unemployment is low and there’s virtually no hint of a recession. But many Americans, according to surveys, are convinced the economy is terrible.
In the last 3 years, The cost of virtually everything went up. food, clothes, building materials, transportation, housing, real estate, and anything else people need not want. Wages didn’t rise to meet them. Don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining, Margaret.
Straight up gaslighting. Inflation is low? We just got battered by rising inflation for two straight years. That doesn't go away because a month turned over. Everyone's dollar devalued hard and prices aren't coming back down again now that they're standard. You could only believe this if your job depends on believing it.
Inflation is low now. Cost of living went up by like 25% over the last 3 years. Not to mention, I still have pretty slim prospects of owning a house in a convenient and desirable location, and I’m on a software engineering salary. So yeah, economists, you can absolutely shut the fuck up about the economy being so “fantastic”.
And hey, you know, maybe maybe Democrats shouldn’t campaign on how “great” the economy is if nobody who actually works for a fucking living is seeing in real life how “great” it is.
Yeah, that was a bit of an insidious statement. Month over month or year over year inflation may be manageable now, but that does nothing to reverse the price spikes over the last two years. And the vast majority of us did not see pay raises to match them.
When media and government talk about "the economy", they mean rich people's stock prices, not working people's ability to afford food and shelter.
Where do you think all that extra money we're paying to live is going? To "the economy" of course! Rich donors to politicians are doing better than ever, so the system is working as intended.
My theory is the buoyed perception of the economy is because there are still surplus jobs available in many middle-class industries. IT workers may be getting laid off en masse by several large companies but (for now) they've been able to get jobs elsewhere.
In reality the average person or middle class family is suffering though and it isn't perception. I literally went through grocery and consumables receipts and many categories of items cost 1.5 to 2x what they cost 18 months ago.
I get really sick of being told by douchey think pieces that things that are happening aren't happening, and vice versa. Fuck whoevers poll numbers they are trying to boost.
I agree with the article on reporting accurately about the threat and illegitimacy of the Right.
I started walking away when it got lumped in with this bullshit.
Christiane Amanpour has reported all over the world, so she recognizes a democracy on the brink when she sees one.
“We have to be truthful, not neutral,” she urged. “I would make sure that you don’t just give a platform … to those who want to crash down the constitution and democracy.”
It’s a great suggestion, which will be summarily ignored by every major tv news outlet.
Neutrality isn't the mark of good journalism. Questioning the position of governments is. Asking "why" in the context of how it affects people is.
No news organization is neutral. There's a story and a length of time for each segment. The editors and anchor decide what to say and how to say it in that allotted time. That forms a message, and that in itself shows bias, intended or otherwise.
Instead of focusing on neutrality, they should focus on objective truth, and stop worry about which party they're implying to support.
You are so right. Media/government/society has been conflating objectivity with neutrality. Many things are objectively right or wrong.
I would say questioning the position of the powers that be is the mark of good journalism, whether that's government, religion, the wealthy, business, whatever.
Questioning the position of governments is. Asking “why” in the context of how it affects people is.
However, questioning isn't the same as attacking or undermining.
For example: It's important for journalists to look for corruption in every government. However, it is an error to expect to find the same amount of corruption in every government; or to inflate the small corruptions of a less-corrupt government to make them sound as important as the large corruptions of a very-corrupt government.
If the Trump administration illustrates one thing, it's that there actually is a big difference between a good administration and a bad one. Everyone who said "the major parties are the same" or "they're all just politicians" was shown to be making a serious mistake.
the media only cares about click and impressions /FULL STOP not sure how to fix, but until that changes, it'll be status quo.
Fixing requires readers support their preferred news outlets with subscriptions. Currently headlines need to drive the ad machine if the lights are going to stay on. Challenging the ad buyer's main revenue stream is not financially viable. It's the main reason news outlets do not want to touch Medicare For All, pharmaceutical ads are big money makers. Money in politics is a no-go because it's a guaranteed cash infusion every two years, not to mention the overlap with other ad buyers. Decoupling the ads from the main revenue gives media outlets the freedom they need to address the news as they seem fit.
This is definitely a factor although advertising alongside subscriptions for news print was a thing for at least 100-130 years. So I don't know if subscriptions are enough.
Too, better journalism requires news media oligopolies to be dismantled and to have more independently owned news media companies.
Corporate News is for-profit and run by republiQans. It’s really that simple. Trump showed that corporate news will never do the right thing at the right time, even in the face of the most arrogant, ignorant, outrageous lies and attacks.
It’s time to stop pretending that corporate news can be “saved” and start accepting that it absolutely can not be saved. Then we can move on to a truer form of journalism. We have the ability to publish globally in our hands, literally.
Yeah, the "liberal media" is just the wing of the corporate propaganda machine that packages its propaganda in a way that is palatable to liberals.
democracy? again?
It’ll never work. The Athenians tried and failed. Get back to your plow. Feudalism is the only realistic system that accommodates human nature.
/s, icymi
Democracy forever!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Last week, as she celebrated her 40 years at CNN, she issued a challenge to her fellow journalists in the US by describing how she would cover US politics as a foreign correspondent.
Add to this the obsession with the “horse race” aspect of the campaign, and the profit-driven desire to increase the potential news audience to include Trump voters, and you’ve got the kind of problematic coverage discussed above.
The Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman pointed out last week that the media apparently has failed to communicate something that should be a huge asset for Biden: the US’s current “Goldilocks economy”.
Two-thirds of Americans are unhappy about the economy despite reports that inflation is easing and unemployment is close to a 50-year low, according to a new Harris poll for the Guardian.
“When one of our two political parties has become so extremist and anti-democratic”, the old ways of reporting don’t cut it, wrote the journalist Dan Froomkin in his excellent list of suggestions culled from respected historians and observers.
It’s our job to make sure that those potential consequences – not the horse race, not Biden’s age, not a scam impeachment – are front and center for US citizens before they go to the polls.
The original article contains 720 words, the summary contains 206 words. Saved 71%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
If the lives of the working class were better they wouldn't have to keep telling us we are doing good. If we were better, credit card debt wouldn't be at the highest levels, car sales wouldn't be down, home sales wouldn't be down
They can't gaslight us into prosperity.
No less than you’d expect from an opinion price in the Guardian. The idea that American media is too un-biased is laughable. The exact opposite is true, and the Guardian gleefully participates as one of the more overtly biased outlets.
Everyone in the media has an agenda, and they’re all pushing it 100% of the time.
None of those agendas are "left", buddy.
It's not even always that they are pushing an agenda is that they make money off of horrible things and others misfortune.
We're really going with the tired democracy is on the ballot trope again?
It's just a factual statement about most modern American elections, what are we supposed to do, pretend it's not true because you want fresher material?
Woah, there. Can't have them actually run on a platform or promise to deliver things. Orange man bad and scary. The DNC has been gifted the biggest get out the vote candidate ever on the other side and still insists on shitting on themselves.
I think Obama was the last time they managed to not completely shit themselves at every opportunity. Coincidentally, it was the last time they campaigned on any form of positivity.
Stop threatening it and we'll stop saying it.
No one is threatening it.
It's beyond amazing you still fall for the same crying of wolf so often.
Edit: I should have checked the comment history. I see you're just another stereotypical blue team cock-riding Reddit migrant.
