I almost never write diaries, mostly because my life is emotionally very complicated and I find it immensely difficult to focus my thoughts to the necessary degree to adequately research, analyze, and write a piece of sufficient quality. Still, certain topics keep tapping at the inside of my skull, begging for a chance to become a diary.
The appalling state of our informational media is one such topic.
Yesterday, a migraine (having them is apparently my new hobby) brought on a ragged epiphany about the media problem and what we might be able to effectively do about it. I was driving back from an emergency workplace furlough to buy migraine pills when this idea - or its germ, at least - occurred to me, and I began writing it down as soon as I got back to my desk. As I typed, I wore sunglasses, not to counter the idea’s blinding brilliance but because of extreme photosensitivity. I got as far as the intro and had to put my head down on the desk. Figured I'd finish when my head was clear.
Today, I’m still suffering mild migraine symptoms and realize that if I wait for a clear head, I may as well wait for Santa Claus, world peace, and an attractive haircut for Donald Trump. So I'm going to finish writing this sucker and post it, no matter how it turns out.
We here on dKos know that there is a serious problem with the skewed view of reality presented by the corporate-owned media in the United States. Driven by profit instead of pursuit of facts, the traditional media has two primary goals: 1) presenting events from a perspective that will benefit, directly or indirectly, the corporate structure that owns and operates most media outlets, and 2) packaging events in a way that will create "buzz" and increase viewership ratings and therefore advertising rates. Whenever what we see in the media doesn't quite seem to jibe with what we know to be actually happening on the ground, it's almost always for one or both of these reasons.
The secondary media problem that doesn't get as much thought or attention is the fact that the vast majority of the population doesn't really understand the media problem. Most people don't even seem to realize there is a problem, having paid little or no attention to the decline of quality in news reporting over the years or having news-watching age after the decline was already under way. The rest have either internalized the long-running claim that the media has a "liberal bias" and turned to right-wing institutions (Rush Limbaugh, Fox News) as their source for the "truth," or have resigned themselves to the belief that you can't really believe any media source, which leads to a sense of hopeless apathy. Why try to stay informed if you can never be sure who's telling the real story?
How did we get to this state? Well, I'm sure the answer to that is well beyond my ability to analyze even when all my brain pistons are firing, but two heavily contributing factors have to be the societal trend of denigrating intellectualism along with the "glitzing" of the news reporting industry, which has had the effect of convincing everyone that news is only worth paying attention to if it is simple, dramatic, and/or salacious. So now, people think they are keeping themselves well-informed if they tune in to watch pundits spew fallacy-ridden mental masturbation or read what passes for "reporting" in their local newspaper that purports to give a factual account of current events. They have been conditioned to accept that every story has two "equally valid" viewpoints, and their education has left them utterly ill-equipped to apply their own thinking skills - much less logic - to ensure that the story even makes sense as presented.
Okay, I'm pretty sure what I'm saying here makes at least some sense, but I'm not telling you anything you didn't already know, and the question that remains unanswered is: What can we do about this?
When this question gets presented, a lot of times the answer is sort of vague. People point us to sites like Media Matters and murmur about how we need to "raise public awareness" about the media, etc. And that's good, as far as it goes. But when we're dealing with all the above-mentioned crap - an under-educated population in an environment that discourages independent and critical thinking, combined with either the lingering perception that "the liberals" are out to control what people see or that there's just no way to discern what is true from what is spin - just trying to "get the word out" about fact-checking websites isn't going to make much headway. For one thing, many will be put-off by any site that explicitly affiliates itself with an ideology (as Media Matters does), and for another, we're asking them to use skills they no longer believe they have.
The American people can still think for themselves; the ascendence of Barack Obama to the presidency proves that. But that same event is also proof that people who are capable of independent thought need to be persuaded to engage in it. They are not going to be roused with angry rhetoric; they bought into that for the past decade and a half and they no longer trust people who sling shit at the other side and say, "Stick with me. I'll tell you the truth."
What a lot of people tend to trust these days is cool heads who can make plain arguments in a rational and calm manner. That's the demeanor that got even conservative people with racist backgrounds to listen to the black presidential candidate and eventually vote for him. And that's the way to get the reachable public to listen to us about the gross deficiencies of our media. Merely railing about the evils of the corporate-controlled media isn't going to cut it, and even good arguments will largely go unheard if they are accompanied with anything that smacks of partisan mud-slinging... no matter how justified it might be.
Okay, so what am I proposing? I'm thinking in terms of a real grassroots effort involving no known existing institutions and no stated ideologically-oriented groups. Just a bunch of ordinary people talking to other ordinary people about something that concerns them deeply. I have no concrete idea at this moment where such an effort might eventually lead, but I think it could easily start with a simple campaign of letters to the editor. Pick a news outlet - I'd choose a national forum such as CNN or NBC news or Time magazine - and select a story with a disturbing lack of fact-checking or a deceptively skewed perspective. Use this article as a "visual aid" in explaining to your fellow citizens just how badly the media is doing its job.
Hell, use it to first explain to them what the job of the media is even supposed to be. Then show how far it's falling short of that job. The point is to get the general, non-ideological public to start hearing and reading more and more about the fact that the media whose output surrounds them every waking moment is very often lying to them. And while we are telling them that, we are also showing them. We don't herd them toward our point of view like the sheep they've been treated as for so very long. We tell them, then we show them the evidence.
We do this for story after story, in letter after letter. Calmly. One concerned citizen to another.
Note that this is not a "Republicans are evil" campaign, or even a "corporations are evil" campaign. Shrillness and partisanship are divisive rather than persuasive. They may work to create solidarity among the like-minded but do little to nurture like-mindedness. The purpose here would be to educate people about what they are missing from their media, what the media is doing to mislead and manipulate them, and to encourage people to start looking more critically at the information they are being fed.
Once they start doing that, once they start to see the problem on their own, they will be angry all on their own. They will be looking for something they can do to change things. That's when they will be ready to hear about websites and pressure tactics they can apply to the media-controlling corporations and the legislators who serve them, and so on and so forth. That's when the seeds of this grassroots effort will have actually taken root.
Strangely, I've come to the end of my neurological frenzy-driven diary-fest. I'm open to discussion, criticism, or even utter lack of notice. I'm just amazed I managed to string paragraph after paragraph together in something resembling a coherent piece of writing. Thanks for reading.
Oh, and if you're ever looking for a way to arrive home at the end of the workday in tears for no concrete reason, I recommend the Portland commute on I-5, northbound, to I-84/The Banfield, eastbound, while coping with migraine-induced nausea. It got the job done for me yesterday.