I am unaware of to what extent leftists
listen to and engage right wing pundits.
I am under the impression that conservative media outlets are mostly
consumed by conservatives. The popularity of the movie Outfoxed, a film that does nothing but advances the
hypothesis that Fox News is biased, seems to support this assumption. Brock’s
fact checking efforts represent a new era of fighting the right. It is critical that the left engage
right-wing media, but as active participants and not as passive consumers. On
March 8, 2005, University of Madison, Wisconsin published a study that showed
that post 9-11 TV watching tended to push liberals in a rightward
direction.
The survey showed that among liberals who
watched little television, about 20 percent favored more government police
powers. But about 41 percent of liberals who were heavy viewers of TV news
supported such measures - much closer to the 50 to 60 percent of conservatives
who supported greater police powers, regardless of how much TV news they
watched.
(Chaptman
http://www.news.wisc.edu/10779.html)
Many
leftists are aware that popular and conservative television media is biased and
distorted and so to preserve their sanity, refuse to engage it. I do not watch TV. I follow media through Media Matters
and through blogs such as Newshounds (“We watch Fox so you don’t have to”), the
Wonkette and Atrios. TV’s constant stream of biased, corporate-produced images
is overwhelming to me. My
fascination with punditry is as an outsider. My pieces are like tourist photos. I do not know if the locals would consider them trite or
compelling. (My media-obsessed
friends seem to like them, though.)
To fight the echo chamber, we must be
aware of how the far right is changing discourse. I write pieces with the idea that they will help raise
this awareness. I hope that awareness persuades leftists to action or at least
to outrage. At the least, one hopes that all of the Alien Others constantly
attacked by the right wing would begin to feel solidarity for each other. Arabs and queers are often used almost
interchangeably. Imus in the Morning described an Iraqi resistance fighter as “an enemy combatant
who had sworn fidelity to some bearded fatwa fairy.” (http://mediamatters.org/items/200411190009) Queers stand-in for almost any social
“problem.” Bill Cunningham said while discussing classroom discipline on Hannity
& Colmes, “In the
good old days, back when AIDS was an appetite suppressant and when gay meant
you were happy, back in those days there was discipline in public schools. But
not today.”
(http://mediamatters.org/items/200503040003) Ah yes, back when people
knew their place and social norms could be enforced with lynching, in that mythical
golden age, children were well-behaved.
This post is not Creative Commons. It is Copyright 2005 Celeste Hutchins, all Right Reserved
Tag: Celesteh
1 comment:
I just watch C-SPAN.
Here, though, is a link to an article with some data on the degree to which conservative and liberal bloggers linked to each other (among other things) during the Presidential Campaign: Political Influence of the Blogosphere (note the link to a PDF of the study referenced)
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