“Only select news items are featured in the echo chamber. A nice illustration of what “makes the cut” happened during the 2004 election. In August of that election year two separate but related news releases occurred on the same day: one stating that the percentage in poverty had increased and the other that the percentage of uninsured had increased. Though the statistics were released on a Friday to minimize coverage, news media with a slight anti-authoritarianism bias could have provided sustained coverage juxtaposing these statistics, if they were judged to be “newsworthy.” They could have even tinged their coverage with emotional bias, something they can do quite well when they have a mind to. Can you imagine the video clips and other methods corporate media could have used to hype uninsured people falling out of the middle class? Alas, nary a word could be heard in the echo chamber about poverty or being uninsured.
Instead, the echo chamber focused mainly on two topics during that month: the character of John Kerry, as portrayed by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth; and the character of George W. Bush, as inferred by the quantity and quality of his service during the Vietnam War. Corporate media took some heat for their lack of investigative reporting to determine if the more outrageous claims were true. Conservatives used the Bush II focus as evidence of liberal bias while liberals used the Kerry focus as evidence of conservative bias. If anything, these cross-accusations of media bias had to please corporate media, since no one noticed if there might be corporate bias at work. The echo chamber focused the public’s attention on character issues of political candidates rather than economic issues that could be damaging to corporate media and other corporations.”
From “Essay 12 – Corporate Media” in Systems out of Balance
Defenders of media consolidation will point out that with the Internet we can get any information we want at any time. We are in the midst of the Information Age! This is true, but since the time of FDR we are also in the only age where Presidents can get 80% approval ratings for even their bad decisions.
What matters is not so much what gets reported but what gets repeated, and repeated, and repeated. Outlandish claims can be made by one source and be repeated without any investigation by another source. People of like minds from like think tanks can even quote among themselves incessantly to create the impression of a groundswell of authoritative opinion. If you say something enough times, no matter how outlandish, you will get quite a few people to believe you. This practice has become common enough to be branded a cultural phenomenon, known as echo chambers.
The character of presidential candidates is perfect fodder for corporate media and echo chambers to feast upon. At the least the public becomes cynical of all politicians and government in general, allowing corporations to shine in relative comparison. But if you are going to echo something repeatedly, even juicy tidbits about a candidate’s character, you need to add a little entertainment value to it. That is where news talk hosts come in.
Some of these news talk hosts claim to be champions of the middle class, but they do not remind me of the middle class people I grew up with. We treated each other civilly in this middle class neighborhood, thank you. News talk hosts seem to thrive on belligerence. Perhaps you enjoy this entertainment, er, news, but let me ask you this. Would you want your kids listening to and emulating the rude behavior of some of these news talk hosts?
The ill behavior of news talk hosts actually serves the agenda of wealth, power and special interest elites. They want a society where emotions run high. People filled with apprehension, vanity and cynicism can be manipulated more easily to support an urgent agenda. We stop looking within ourselves for answers and depend on the same authorities we have grown more cynical about.
For this election year do yourself a favor. Shun the belligerence. Listen for actual events rather than opinions. Turn the channel if need be. Go for a walk. You may be giving up some fine entertainment, but you also might find yourself acquiring greater peace of mind, and an enhanced ability to make wise decisions.
Tags: Corporate Media, Cultural Misinformation, Middle Class Politics
