Social media has the exact same problem magnified 100 fold, because there is so much more content to cherrypick from. People only see the actions of extremists and attribute that behavior to everyone that doesn't agree with them.

Traditional media definitely has flaws, but rejecting them in favor of social media because of it is an absurd and incredibly destructive reaction.

This is not (as) true of most other traditional media, e.g. local newspapers to the extent that they still exist. But cable news really is propaganda. Fox used to be the worst offender, but now they're all that bad, though playing for different teams of course.

There seems to be some kind of law that the larger a media outlet is, the more partisan it gets. Which is why social media is like the Exxon Valdez crashed into Deepwater Horizon and caught on fire.

It’s because the masses are trying to partake in serious discourse in a non-serious way.

On any given day, two different perspectives agreeing to intellectually consider why the other side is objectively incorrect (as in, not just agreeing they are simply different) is a serious undertaking. If you casually take any topic, every single day, and allow people to do the thought experiment that one argument is more valid in a casual manner, you will 100% have to cut corners because you did not seriously approach the task. The most obvious way is you paint an enemy, or the notion of the other, an idea of a threat.

The average person in NYC really has no business having a dinner time objective discussion with someone from Missouri about gun ownership. Really the discussion should come down to ‘we have a lot space and gun culture in Missouri and it’s something we enjoy’, followed by ‘Interesting, it’s not the biggest thing here in NYC actually’. That’s about it.

But if there is an institution, I don’t know, let’s call it a fight club (the media), that says ‘you two at dinner, get ready to fight’, the two contestants will fight in an inexperienced way. Hair pulling, throwing rocks, no real jabs, conditioning, submissions, no fight experience.

It is not a casual ordeal to debate, and this is what the media is making people do.

We are not ready amongst ourselves to debate constitutional law and the rights of man, and the compromises needed to maintain society. It’s a serious thing to enter into that discussion.

The only take away I see in all of this is that there is a market for the un-serious, and there are some serious people (media) interested in that market.

Well put. This political battle is being fought at the lowest levels of discourse that's barely above animalistic screeching while trying to tangle some of the most complex and nuanced topics; and the results are predictably ridiculous.

Sorry, but no. CNN, MSNBC, etc are far from perfect, but let's not pretend that "both sides are as bad as each other".

Fox (to say nothing of the absolute swamp that is OANN or Newsmax) are an order of magnitude worse than the so called "left" channels (only in the US would CNN be considered a left wing news channel).

The reason that CNN, etc are "biased" against Trump is because reality is bisaed against Trump. He's just a terrible president, a lousy business man and an awful human.

Again, only in the US would that be considered a controversial statement.

Just consider the birther gaslighting, or everything else.

people forget the dominionist gaslighting of Sarah Palin. Pretty much every republican is seen as mini hitler these days-the shit that was said about George Bush Jr for example.

The criticisms of those people were about what they said and did though, not who they are. That is not gaslighting but speaking back at power.

"Only in the US" is only what matters when discussing US politics. Who cares what a news channel is considered in some other country?

And yes, all the news channels are equally terrible. This is not at all hard to find, but it may be hard to accept.

> “Only in the US" is only what matters when discussing US politics.

And only in the US would someone be so insular as to make such a statement :)

The US is still the largest economy in the world. As much as the rest of us would love to turn a blind eye when they elect an incompetent sociopath, unfortunately, we have to deal with his bullshit.

We're not discussing foreign policy but domestic politics and media as they are within the US. How the rest of the world judges them isn't relevant, and would be the same as someone in the US talking about how things are going in Zimbabwe as they look to us here.

The rest of the world is not a single monolithic group either so I don't see the point of your sweeping generalizations.

Because sometimes you need the persepective of an outsider to point out how completely crazy you've become.

signed,

A Brit.

> How the rest of the world judges them isn't relevant, and would be the same as someone in the US talking about how things are going in Zimbabwe as they look to us here.

Nonsense. Of course, people’s opinion of internal politics is relevant. If it wasn’t, we’d still have apartheid in South Africa, for example.

And no, the rest of the world is not a single monolithic group, but the vast majority of it (especially in comparable western democracies) thinks trump is a laughing stock.

Brilliant summary. Let's not pretend it isn't. Everybody would agree that it was cogent, persuasive and utterly compelling. Good to be know what world outside the US thinks and I like the cherry on top: 'reality is biased against Trump'.

The more cable news you watch the stupider you get. You can actually feel your IQ dropping minute by minute as you watch Fox or MSNBC. They aren't there to make you more informed, their sole purpose is to say whatever will keep you engaged long enough to sell you deodorant, prescription pharmaceuticals and pickup trucks. They are a Dunning-Kruger effect generator. Whenever someone mentions something they saw on CNN last night my opionion of them drops.

The good news is that your cognitive function is not permanently lost, it can be quickly recovered by just turning off the TV and reading a book, playing with the dog or going on a long walk.

I wish this wasn’t being downvoted. It’s so tempting to sit back and let the news networks do your thinking for you. In reality, just 10 minutes of news browsing a day will garner 80% of the news you need to know about.

Yes, keeping up with current events is an important part of being a good citizen but there are quickly diminishing returns on that and it’s never worth sacrificing parts of your life and livelihood for.