The modern polarization of the media began in the 1990s with Newt Gingrich...with help from his patron Rupert Murdoch, an ultra-conservative Australian who owned television stations, tabloids, and newspapers in the US, Australia, and the UK.

Before them, politics was still very cutthroat but not polarized along party lines.

True - but something happened in the 2010's when Big Tech started taking sides in a way it hadn't before. I cannot picture Google doing this when it was still Google.

> The modern polarization of the media began in the 1990s with Newt Gingrich...with help from his patron Rupert Murdoch, an ultra-conservative Australian who owned television stations, tabloids, and newspapers in the US, Australia, and the UK.

That was certainly a thing that happened, but as far as I know Rupert Murdoch never got Gore Vidal blacklisted by book publishers or whatever.

It's one thing to say your piece, something else to stop the other guy saying theirs.

This- among side the cable news cycle effect were the genesis of today’s virus.

Have to say — Murdoch has been remarkably influential as a massive negative impact on humanity

I could say the same about disney, their ownership of certain networks and their ability to influence politica to single handledly redefine trademark laws on behalf of the US government

Talk about impact.

Truth is in the eye of the beholder

It seems very similar to McCarthyism and the anti-communist messages from the late '40s and early '50s like the "loyalty review boards", just with wider media available in the modern world. McCarthyism also adopted similar conspiracy theories concerning vaccinations, mental health care, and fluoridation.