12mo ago

Only Cable News Viewers Think Israel isn't Committing a Genocide, Survey Finds

Cable News Viewers Have a Skewed Attitude Toward Gaza War, Survey Finds

Americans who get their news primarily from cable are the only people who believe that Israel is not committing a genocide in Gaza, according to a new survey that examined the relationship between attitudes toward the war and news consumption habits.
The survey puts numbers on trends that have become increasingly apparent: Cable news viewers are more supportive of Israel’s war effort, less likely to think Israel is committing war crimes, and less interested in the war in general. People who get their news primarily from social media, YouTube, or podcasts, by contrast, generally side with the Palestinians, believe Israel is committing war crimes and genocide, and consider the issue of significant importance.

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12mo ago

Cable News Viewers Have a Skewed Attitude Toward Gaza War, Survey Finds

theintercept.com /2024/04/30/gaza-israel-palestine-cable-news-poll/

52 comments

Presumably a big chunk of the cable news demographic are watching Fox, which notoriously has been proven to leave its viewers knowing less than people who don't watch news at all.
- I don't think you understand just how aligned all of the networks are on this issue.
  
  Fox's rhetoric is just the most obvious / laughable (assuming you have a brain)
- Yeah regular viewers of CNN, which runs every story about Palestine by the IDF first, are totally on the side of genocide is happening...
  
  Just to be clear I'm not trying to disagree with OP's article.
  Let alone set up some kind of binary where CNN is somehow exempt. I was just making an observation about this demographic.
  I'm not American so I don't see these channels but their online coverage is biased AF.
  In some of the threads about Tiktok I've been saying that I think the generational divide is more between boomers who watch TV news cycles versus people who get more varied sources of info online. Had to watch our free-to-air TV a couple of weeks ago and the news on the Gaza Genocide was ridiculously pro IDF.
  Tagging @macabrett who made a similar point to me.
- This isn't as much of a left / right issue as other things. Coverage of cable news across the entire political spectrum is running cover for the genocide.
  
  democrat/republican issue...ftfy. Pretty sure the left is clear about what's happening here
  
  Democrats and republicans are both right wing; cable news really only ranges from far right to centrist.
  There aren't any leftists siding with genocide.
  
  Yeah I agree. It's a Boomer/GenZ thing.

And yet there are still lots of people on here who tell us that western media is not biased, and trot out nonsense like mediabiasfactcheck to argue why we should only consume information from mainstream western sources.
- I talked to a boomer fox news watcher recently, and apparently the current party line is that since the US firebombed dresden, what Israel is doing to Gaza is justified. The US even bombed white europeans, so how can you criticize them for killing middle-easterners?
  IE, nothing wrong with murdering civilians as long as the US did it first, and to criticize Israel for doing what the US already did is unpatriotic, and the protesters have no right to protest this genocide.
  At least the US right is honest about their values, and make no justifications or apologies for civilian murder.
  
  Indeed, this is the key difference I see between liberals and conservatives in US. Conservatives are just more honest about their support for US hegemony by any means necessary. Meanwhile, liberals will do hand wringing and talk about lesser evils to justify atrocities.
- Meh, Reuters, which is pretty much the mainstream western source, has been relatively good on calling out Israel, and even funded an independent investigation that found that the IDF probably purposefully shelled one of their journalists.
  Doesn't mean that having a wider variety of sources isn't still good, of course.
  
  It's becoming very difficult to hide what's happening in Israel, so it is starting to leak into western mainstream media now. However, it's pretty clear that there has been a strong bias from the start. And the question you should ask yourself is what other biases western media promotes in a similar fashion.

TV will be known as the lead in the pipes that drove Rome mad.
- Specifically the 24 hour News Cycle.
- Also the lead in the pipes and (previously) gasoline.

Its sad how effective tv propaganda is. I'm glad social media, despite all its flaws exists now.

Only social media users said they’d be more likely to support a candidate who supported Palestinians (33-19 percent). Just 15 percent of cable news viewers said the same, even though 31 percent of cable viewers agreed that Israel was committing genocide against Palestinians.
Does this mean what I think it means? That roughly half of the cable news watchers who believe that Israel is commiting genocide literally do not care?
- No necessarily half but that's the logical result. theoretically there could be some weird group that doesn't believe in genocide (part of the 69%) but would still support a pro Palestine candidate. Furthermore, as bad as the destruction of Palestine is many people only consider genocide to literally be the Holocaust and that style of commiting it. I could conceive of some pedants saying there isn't a genocide but to stop the violence.
  Though, I unfortunately think you might be right.
  
  In your scenario, if some of the people who think there is no genocide still supported a pro Palestinians candidate (likely that there are at least some), then the number of people who believe there is a genocide, but still wouldn't support a pro Palestinians candidate would be even higher. My scenario is actually the most optimistic one.
- Uhh, worse actually. I think it means about 50% of Cable news watchers (Fox, OAN) who feel it's a genocide, think getting rid of Palestinians is a good thing and that they had it coming.
  They're the creepy Americans, sorry...we hate them too.

I used to think there wasn’t a conspiracy until I visited the states and heard a neoliberal loudly ranting to themselves about how they’re “not able control people through the media anymore because everyone’s on the internet” There it was, straight out of the horse’s asshole.
https://lemmy.ml/comment/10540478
- Hence the TikTok ban

Jesus Christ, what is CNN airing? That's pretty much the only story in Israel/Palestine. Legitimate argument is just about whether it's genocide, or "only" close.
Edit: Unfortunately I can't see the study for the exact percentage of cable news viewers. Fox, of course, is unsurprising. Fluff pieces go where important ones that are too politically inconvenient would. CNN usually likes to follow the bleeding wherever it goes.

That thumbnail hits different all of a sudden.
- That’s what the revolution will not be televised has always meant though

Ah yes, verified news sources courting genocides.

Cable news viewers and Redditors.

Very interesting, if not surprising.
I wonder if this would remain true if you controlled for other highly correlated factors like age and political affiliation. Do young leftists who watch cable news (admittedly likely a very small population) still support Israel's genocide? What about old conservatives who use TikTok?
While on the subject though, why the emphasis on cable news? The article made no mention of traditional free-to-air TV.
- I think the key term is "primarily". The only young leftists who get their news primarily from cable are basically in a household hostage situation.
- Do young leftists who watch cable news (admittedly likely a very small population) still support Israel’s genocide? What about old conservatives who use TikTok?
  I mean the sum of those two cohorts make up such a vanishingly small percentage of anyone its a rounding error. Its likely what you originally assumed, that the breakdown is going along pyschodemographic lines. Old ill informed people watch TV news, and the local stations have offloaded all that unsightly political stuff that ruffles advertiser feathers to cable news. And then your only getting the illusion of variety. Its always the same procorporate, neoliberal, neoconserivative uniparty.
  
  BoTh SiDeS
- The article made no mention of traditional free-to-air TV.
  Free = socialist

That seems somewhat surprising, considering how much internet media post bias also exists.
I guess cable users only stick to one or two news channels?
- It's not surprising to me. There is no more "news" anymore, it's all opinions at this point. Usually not good opinions either, it's all just a carefully crafted narrative or crafted to generate outrage.
  This is why I think things like Tiktok are actually useful. I don't know another place to easily find 24/7 live video of the protests.
- Cable news seems to be allergic to providing any kind of context no matter what the issue is, despite having 24 hours to fill. They'll typically just loop the same 10 second clip from the event and then have 2 pundits who don't actually know anything talk about it.
- Well, if you open up Tiktok, Instagram, Twitter and co. you can see the destruction, you can see Palestinians searching through the rubble to find survivors and recover the dead. You can see children starving and you can see crying people holding the bodies of their loved ones. And then you can also see IDF soldiers bragging about the people they killed, filming themselves looting, burning down houses and desecrating peoples belongings. You can see them filming themselves torturing and abusing prisoners and laughing about it all.
  When you are exposed to the stream of more or less raw information, it doesn't take much to understand the situation as what it is. Yes there is bias in there. But when the supposedly "good guys" from the IDF are showing themselves proudly committing atrocities, then the only people to not consider it a genocide are completely brainwashed. And unfortunately that audience exists too, cheering on the atrocities committed in their name.
- It does say primary source of news is from cable, that doesn't mean they don't use these other platforms.
  And you have to believe these people's social media is an echo chamber of their cable news

Imagine having the free time and money to just watch cable.
- Cable's target audience is affluent old folks so it makes sense.

you're going to get that when
a) western media and journalists are deathly afraid of being labeled antisemites for reporting on what the secular government of israel is doing and
b) cable news viewers skew overwhelmingly republican and conservative who are already antimuslim and pro israel to begin with.
these are the people who are keeping the current administration from telling it like it really is. because I honestly don't believe that bibi would be as empowered to do what he's been doing in gaza if the us government isn't actively publicly condemning in plain language what has happened already.