Election Year Debate

[Roarian]

Isn't that precisely what you just said as well? I never said one should never watch any news, I simply stated there are no reliable sources for news. They all exist to sell the party line and not much more.

I think that, to cut to the chase, major media outlets exist to milk their respective audiences (i.e. target demographic) and make money. I would bet a large amount of money that every outlet does a voluminous amount of market research and analysis before they schedule their programming or hire new talent, catering their content to precisely the crowd that their analytics tells them comprises the majority of their viewership (or, to a lesser extent, readership). Going beyond the actual content (both of actual reporting but also in terms of personalities hired), I would also wager that said analytics informs even the presentation of news and commentary as well. You could then begin to form a general list of character traits, personality preferences, and aesthetic sensibilities that are common to the median viewer of a given outlet. I would postulate the following:

 

1. MSNBC -- Liberals like to view themselves as dispassionate and sober. Hosts will emphasize the intellectual validity of their positions (polling and research data) and defer to data whenever possible. Diversity is regarded as desirable which will be manifested in selection of program hosts and featured commentators. Viewership, however, is mostly white, urban, college-educated, and middle/upper middle class.

 

2. Fox News -- Conservatives like to view themselves as realistic and reasonable. Hosts will emphasize the "common sense" practicality of their positions versus the overly intellectual/elitist opinions of those they disagree with. Diversity is not viewed as a desirable end unto itself, thus ethnic and sexual minorities are largely absent from their hosting cadre and Commenteriat. Viewership is overwhelmingly white, with majority of viewers in the lower middle and lower tiers of the upper classes (owners of small, traditional businesses), and is drawn more heavily from the rural and suburban areas of the country. Commentators are chosen for bombastic rhetorical talent and charismatic personality;* content presentation is designed to visually stimulate and appeal to various emotions--especially love, patriotism, and derision.

 

*A special feature of conservative programming, especially prevalent in talk radio, is the sense of being aggrieved and/or besieged and/or persecuted by society as a whole, and it being the responsibility of the conservative to react against this. I could elaborate on this, but it's not really material to the discussion at-hand.

 

3. CNN -- The Middle Path of American news, adhering to a strict belief in the neutrality of journalists. Hosts will take great pains to present both sides of the issue--while continually reminding the audience of this--even if both sides of an issue are not equal in terms of their claims to legitimacy. Viewership is likely more non-partisan than the other networks, as well as more politically apathetic in general. This despite likely having the most authentically diverse audience out of any of the major networks. Diversity is regarded as important, but not overly so. Viewers are probably evenly distributed throughout the economic spectrum, with most culled from the middle of the middle class, as well as being geographically well-distributed throughout the country.

 

4. CNBC/Bloomberg, etc. -- These are for the high-earners or those that aspire to be high-earners. Viewership probably skews Republican by a mile, but these are likely not social conservatives nor defense hawks. Viewers are fiscal conservatives and pro-Big Business/unregulated capitalism, though demographically viewers are probably white collar professionals or managers in larger-sized companies. Audience is likely heavily, heavily white. Despite political leanings, viewers do not share the "real Americans" aggrieved mentality of conservative radio listeners, as, by and large, they are doing quite well in this economy. Viewers are largely urban and well-educated, likely residing on the coasts or in affluent enclaves/capitals in rural states. Diversity is not regarded as something important, but small amounts of ethnic personalities are featured to (perhaps more subconsciously than intentional) insinuate that our present manifestation of capitalism works for people other than "well-born" whites.

 

5. ABC/NBC/local -- Honestly, I have no idea. These are probably the last of the bastions for classical liberal journalism (i.e. "just the facts" non-partisanship) in an age of partisan niche specialization. It would then be no wonder that they are losing ground vis-a-vis the demographically focused outlets, as they are essentially ignoring the demands of the market. Viewers of these stations are likely either the poor (unable to afford cable/satellite), the truly politically apathetic (again, perhaps also poor) or those of a certain subset of liberals who are more concerned with local issues than the national political landscape. Diversity is probably contingent on the locality of the broadcast, reflecting the local distribution of minorities/attitudes toward minorities. Once upon a time, this is what our news used to be like. It is sad, in a way, that this is no longer the case.

 

Eh, I had more to say, but I've lost my head of steam. All of the above is strictly "IMO."

This is pretty much explains it perfectly. I would change the Fox News one a bit, but for the most part it explains the news outlets spot on.

 

I think this fits here best :

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DApjHZq9o7M

 

... Is he actually competing with Rick Perry for most ridiculous ad of this election?

[marharth]

Isn't that precisely what you just said as well? I never said one should never watch any news, I simply stated there are no reliable sources for news. They all exist to sell the party line and not much more.

I think that, to cut to the chase, major media outlets exist to milk their respective audiences (i.e. target demographic) and make money. I would bet a large amount of money that every outlet does a voluminous amount of market research and analysis before they schedule their programming or hire new talent, catering their content to precisely the crowd that their analytics tells them comprises the majority of their viewership (or, to a lesser extent, readership). Going beyond the actual content (both of actual reporting but also in terms of personalities hired), I would also wager that said analytics informs even the presentation of news and commentary as well. You could then begin to form a general list of character traits, personality preferences, and aesthetic sensibilities that are common to the median viewer of a given outlet. I would postulate the following:

 

1. MSNBC -- Liberals like to view themselves as dispassionate and sober. Hosts will emphasize the intellectual validity of their positions (polling and research data) and defer to data whenever possible. Diversity is regarded as desirable which will be manifested in selection of program hosts and featured commentators. Viewership, however, is mostly white, urban, college-educated, and middle/upper middle class.

 

2. Fox News -- Conservatives like to view themselves as realistic and reasonable. Hosts will emphasize the "common sense" practicality of their positions versus the overly intellectual/elitist opinions of those they disagree with. Diversity is not viewed as a desirable end unto itself, thus ethnic and sexual minorities are largely absent from their hosting cadre and Commenteriat. Viewership is overwhelmingly white, with majority of viewers in the lower middle and lower tiers of the upper classes (owners of small, traditional businesses), and is drawn more heavily from the rural and suburban areas of the country. Commentators are chosen for bombastic rhetorical talent and charismatic personality;* content presentation is designed to visually stimulate and appeal to various emotions--especially love, patriotism, and derision.

 

*A special feature of conservative programming, especially prevalent in talk radio, is the sense of being aggrieved and/or besieged and/or persecuted by society as a whole, and it being the responsibility of the conservative to react against this. I could elaborate on this, but it's not really material to the discussion at-hand.

 

3. CNN -- The Middle Path of American news, adhering to a strict belief in the neutrality of journalists. Hosts will take great pains to present both sides of the issue--while continually reminding the audience of this--even if both sides of an issue are not equal in terms of their claims to legitimacy. Viewership is likely more non-partisan than the other networks, as well as more politically apathetic in general. This despite likely having the most authentically diverse audience out of any of the major networks. Diversity is regarded as important, but not overly so. Viewers are probably evenly distributed throughout the economic spectrum, with most culled from the middle of the middle class, as well as being geographically well-distributed throughout the country.

 

4. CNBC/Bloomberg, etc. -- These are for the high-earners or those that aspire to be high-earners. Viewership probably skews Republican by a mile, but these are likely not social conservatives nor defense hawks. Viewers are fiscal conservatives and pro-Big Business/unregulated capitalism, though demographically viewers are probably white collar professionals or managers in larger-sized companies. Audience is likely heavily, heavily white. Despite political leanings, viewers do not share the "real Americans" aggrieved mentality of conservative radio listeners, as, by and large, they are doing quite well in this economy. Viewers are largely urban and well-educated, likely residing on the coasts or in affluent enclaves/capitals in rural states. Diversity is not regarded as something important, but small amounts of ethnic personalities are featured to (perhaps more subconsciously than intentional) insinuate that our present manifestation of capitalism works for people other than "well-born" whites.

 

5. ABC/NBC/local -- Honestly, I have no idea. These are probably the last of the bastions for classical liberal journalism (i.e. "just the facts" non-partisanship) in an age of partisan niche specialization. It would then be no wonder that they are losing ground vis-a-vis the demographically focused outlets, as they are essentially ignoring the demands of the market. Viewers of these stations are likely either the poor (unable to afford cable/satellite), the truly politically apathetic (again, perhaps also poor) or those of a certain subset of liberals who are more concerned with local issues than the national political landscape. Diversity is probably contingent on the locality of the broadcast, reflecting the local distribution of minorities/attitudes toward minorities. Once upon a time, this is what our news used to be like. It is sad, in a way, that this is no longer the case.

 

Eh, I had more to say, but I've lost my head of steam. All of the above is strictly "IMO."

This is pretty much explains it perfectly. I would change the Fox News one a bit, but for the most part it explains the news outlets spot on.

 

I think this fits here best :

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DApjHZq9o7M

 

... Is he actually competing with Rick Perry for most ridiculous ad of this election?

Err, how did that have anything to do with my reply?

[Marxist ßastard]

Isn't that precisely what you just said as well? I never said one should never watch any news, I simply stated there are no reliable sources for news. They all exist to sell the party line and not much more.

I think that, to cut to the chase, major media outlets exist to milk their respective audiences (i.e. target demographic) and make money. I would bet a large amount of money that every outlet does a voluminous amount of market research and analysis before they schedule their programming or hire new talent, catering their content to precisely the crowd that their analytics tells them comprises the majority of their viewership (or, to a lesser extent, readership). Going beyond the actual content (both of actual reporting but also in terms of personalities hired), I would also wager that said analytics informs even the presentation of news and commentary as well. You could then begin to form a general list of character traits, personality preferences, and aesthetic sensibilities that are common to the median viewer of a given outlet. I would postulate the following:

 

1. MSNBC -- Liberals like to view themselves as dispassionate and sober. Hosts will emphasize the intellectual validity of their positions (polling and research data) and defer to data whenever possible. Diversity is regarded as desirable which will be manifested in selection of program hosts and featured commentators. Viewership, however, is mostly white, urban, college-educated, and middle/upper middle class.

 

2. Fox News -- Conservatives like to view themselves as realistic and reasonable. Hosts will emphasize the "common sense" practicality of their positions versus the overly intellectual/elitist opinions of those they disagree with. Diversity is not viewed as a desirable end unto itself, thus ethnic and sexual minorities are largely absent from their hosting cadre and Commenteriat. Viewership is overwhelmingly white, with majority of viewers in the lower middle and lower tiers of the upper classes (owners of small, traditional businesses), and is drawn more heavily from the rural and suburban areas of the country. Commentators are chosen for bombastic rhetorical talent and charismatic personality;* content presentation is designed to visually stimulate and appeal to various emotions--especially love, patriotism, and derision.

 

*A special feature of conservative programming, especially prevalent in talk radio, is the sense of being aggrieved and/or besieged and/or persecuted by society as a whole, and it being the responsibility of the conservative to react against this. I could elaborate on this, but it's not really material to the discussion at-hand.

 

3. CNN -- The Middle Path of American news, adhering to a strict belief in the neutrality of journalists. Hosts will take great pains to present both sides of the issue--while continually reminding the audience of this--even if both sides of an issue are not equal in terms of their claims to legitimacy. Viewership is likely more non-partisan than the other networks, as well as more politically apathetic in general. This despite likely having the most authentically diverse audience out of any of the major networks. Diversity is regarded as important, but not overly so. Viewers are probably evenly distributed throughout the economic spectrum, with most culled from the middle of the middle class, as well as being geographically well-distributed throughout the country.

 

4. CNBC/Bloomberg, etc. -- These are for the high-earners or those that aspire to be high-earners. Viewership probably skews Republican by a mile, but these are likely not social conservatives nor defense hawks. Viewers are fiscal conservatives and pro-Big Business/unregulated capitalism, though demographically viewers are probably white collar professionals or managers in larger-sized companies. Audience is likely heavily, heavily white. Despite political leanings, viewers do not share the "real Americans" aggrieved mentality of conservative radio listeners, as, by and large, they are doing quite well in this economy. Viewers are largely urban and well-educated, likely residing on the coasts or in affluent enclaves/capitals in rural states. Diversity is not regarded as something important, but small amounts of ethnic personalities are featured to (perhaps more subconsciously than intentional) insinuate that our present manifestation of capitalism works for people other than "well-born" whites.

 

5. ABC/NBC/local -- Honestly, I have no idea. These are probably the last of the bastions for classical liberal journalism (i.e. "just the facts" non-partisanship) in an age of partisan niche specialization. It would then be no wonder that they are losing ground vis-a-vis the demographically focused outlets, as they are essentially ignoring the demands of the market. Viewers of these stations are likely either the poor (unable to afford cable/satellite), the truly politically apathetic (again, perhaps also poor) or those of a certain subset of liberals who are more concerned with local issues than the national political landscape. Diversity is probably contingent on the locality of the broadcast, reflecting the local distribution of minorities/attitudes toward minorities. Once upon a time, this is what our news used to be like. It is sad, in a way, that this is no longer the case.

 

Eh, I had more to say, but I've lost my head of steam. All of the above is strictly "IMO."

This is pretty much explains it perfectly. I would change the Fox News one a bit, but for the most part it explains the news outlets spot on.

 

I think this fits here best :

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DApjHZq9o7M

 

... Is he actually competing with Rick Perry for most ridiculous ad of this election?

Err, how did that have anything to do with my reply?

Well it's relevant to the thread.

 

http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/4743/shark1.gif

[grannywils]

Well, bless my soul.... Please tell me that was not a real advertisement... Please, please, please..........:mellow:

[marharth]

Well, bless my soul.... Please tell me that was not a real advertisement... Please, please, please..........:mellow:

It seems that every political ad is like that now days.

 

Have you seen the one Rick Perry did?

[grannywils]

no

[sukeban]

Hrmm, I actually saw that ad today watching Chris Mathews. While it's obviously laughable in its hyperbole and imagery, I actually thought that it was an effective political ad. I say that because, as we all know, political ads--propaganda--are most effective when they bypass the intended audience's brain and proceed directly into their heart. The ad is, as far as I can tell, going for a horror (probably zombie if you drill down into sub-genres) movie trailer atmosphere, eliciting a sense of dread from the audience, almost without regard as to the actual content (i.e. voice-over) of the ad. He could be talking about Big Bird or the A-Team and the audience would have felt the exact same sense of dread. Since the content of the ad, then, doesn't matter, it can be reasonably estimated that it is the atmosphere of the ad, and the emotions that it elicits (fear, dread, anxiety), that are its entire raison d'etre.

 

It reminded me of earlier this year when I was re-watching (the first time being in school) The Triumph of the Will, Joseph Goebbels' masterwork of Nazi propaganda from the mid-1930s. I won't lie, as I was watching it I was most definitely thinking that I wouldn't necessarily have blamed a German youth if they'd have signed up for the Hitler-Jugend immediately after watching the film. It's dated, of course, but the images are timeless. The appeal to--and aggrandizement of--authority is breathtaking. The sense of wanting to belong to the larger group and the spectacle that they are participating in is palpable. The martial uniforms, the strict discipline, the Nazi symbols, banners, and flags, the charisma of Hitler himself--all designed so that the viewer might check their rationality at the door and drink deep from the chalice of camaraderie, sameness, and belonging. Many times during its viewing, chills ran up and down my spine what for the sheer spectacle of it all. There most definitely is an undeniable natural awe to a massive production. And it is not so much different here, either; I mean, we still have military parades, Fleet Week, and the Blue Angels.

 

Not that such productions have to be martial in nature at all, though, admittedly, it does help. My point, of course, is not that Santorum's campaign advert = The Triumph of the Will, rather that they're both making use of and manipulating a viewer's emotions rather than their mind. The trick of a good political ad (of which TotW is but a feature-length example) is forcing the viewer to ignore their mind and make decisions based on their emotions and instincts, with the parameters of their emotional response tightly controlled (or dictated) by the ad itself. So viewers feel what the advertiser wants them to feel; they respond using the advert-supplied contents of their own hearts, absolving them of any responsibility to think for themselves.

 

This phenomenon isn't new, of course. As I stated previously, it is almost the definitional property of a political advertisement. What is new, however, is the medium and the high production-values that campaign ads are now attaining. For an easy example, just look at Thomas Paine's revolutionary (with both an upper- and lowercase "r") pamphlet "Common Sense:"

 

In England a king hath little more to do than to make war and give away places; which in plain terms, is to impoverish the nation and set it together by the ears. A pretty business indeed for a man to be allowed eight hundred thousand sterling a year for, and worshipped into the bargain! Of more worth is one honest man to society and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived.

 

Bombastic, hyperbolic language--check. Exaggerating the negative qualities of monarchy whilst categorically denying any potential benefits thereof--check. Setting up a strict and obvious dichotomy of good and evil--check. Stipulating that God Himself is on the side of the writer--check. Appealing to the common man in the colonial United States--check. Making said appeal based primarily off of emotion and misinformation--check. Certainly, this passage is covering all of the bases that it is able to, and is thus scoring in my book as an exemplary piece of political advertisement (again, read: propaganda). However, it is limited in the sense that it is merely text, lacking both in its presentation and medium. Sure, it's possible to get worked up and huffy over text (witness, oh--nearly the entire internet), but it is ephemeral and still gives cause for the reader to think. Truth is, it is almost impossible to read anything without simultaneously thinking about and toying with the ideas presented in the passage. Such is the reason why, IMO, reading > anything else in terms of critical thinking and engagement.

 

But, just think of what Thomas Paine could have done had he been or had access to a talented director or cinematographer! What wonders of gut reaction and impulse could he have set to the already incendiary character of his words? Sadly, the world will never know. Sergei Eisenstein did, however. And every time I watch "Battleship Potemkin" I wish to spill the blood of the czars anew ;-) And that was in 1925.

 

Fast-forward, for the sake of brevity, to the present. Rick Santorum's ad has just come out. I don't really want to go through it scene-by-scene and dissect its imagery and multifarious appeals to emotion, but I would invite anybody who is interested to potentially do so for themselves. Instead, I'd rather voice my concern about two forces, each a feature of the most modern present, that I do sort of worry could spell some trouble for both our electorate and political process. These would be the effect of the "Citizens' United" decision on campaign finance and the availability of relatively cheap and effectual digital cinema and post-processing.

 

The first is potentially the most obvious. For example, Sheldon Adelson is essentially bankrolling the Gingrich campaign by himself, by donating untold millions of his Macao casino dollars--not the the candidate himself, but to his SuperPAC (que the joke about Stephen Colbert "giving" his SuperPAC to Jon Stewart here). Yes, friends, we now live in an era where the caprice and eccentricity of literally one man is enough to prop up an entire candidate for president--on the national stage. Before, oh--he'd actually have to have small donors as sponsors and actual grassroots support (to be fair to Gingrich, he has grassroots support--in Georgia and South Carolina). Now, all he needs is one very rich man. I would venture that Rick Santorum would be on his way toward the Republican nomination by now had it not been for Mr. Adelson's assistance of Gingrich, assistance that may as well have been given directly to Mitt Romney if the effect of Mr. Adelson's dollars are actually taken into consideration. Mr. Adelson has propped up Gingrich, who has in turn eaten into Mr. Santorum's natural conservative base, denying him a plurality in many states and tipping the scales toward Mr. Romney's minoritarian triumph. That is obviously a tangent, but the effects of a one-man-bankroll is quite clear. Mr. Adelson's unlimited dollars have been subverting our (well, the Republicans' - but soon to be "our") traditional political process in ways that had been very much impossible in the not-so-distant past.

 

The second aspect to be considered is the increasing frequency and "quality" (used in the sense of the medium and not in the sense that they are beneficial to our democracy) of political advertisements. This relationship and trajectory should be clear enough, yes? Combined with the above, we get essentially "Sheldon Adelson's dollars + increasingly high-quality digital cinema = potentially movie-length, immersive, emotional political advertisements," able to emotionally manipulate (and entertain) the viewer more and for longer periods of time than any other form of political media ever before it. It, then, is also not a terrible leap of imagination to consider that this ultimately ends with glitzy, high-definition versions of Triumph of the Will, ready for the multiplex and coming soon to a theater near you (and all, of course, bankrolled by one man or corporation). Consider Orwell's "10-Minutes Hate" writ large (feature-length at 110 minutes, Rated R) and playing nationally. Gradually ramp-up the extremism and the hatred, include ever more bombastic rhetoric and inflammatory imagery, focus-group-test the audience to make sure that the emotional response is both visceral, uniform, and unquestioned. Soon you would get to a point where you could say literally anything, realistic and rational--or not--and the reaction would be the same: disgusted, wrathful, and howling for revenge.

 

What I mean to say is that we are beginning to swim in some very dangerous waters when it comes to the health of our democracy. Luckily, the economy seems to be picking up, otherwise I would be all the more pessimistic. I speak again of our increasingly subjective and individual understanding of "truth" and "fact" in our consumption of media, about how both parties are speaking past each other as they cannot agree on a common epistemological framework (truth) in which to work out their differences. I speak of how this epistemological failure has--unlike money--trickled down into the very seedbed of our democracy, the citizenry--each relying on their own narrow subset and understanding of "the truth" and only listening to news outlets and commentators that tell them exactly what they already knew they wanted to hear. News outlets exist to make money and are catering to us, the market, when they mutate the truth into twenty-five-thousand distinct and individualized flavors, each one catering to a different sub-demographic of the population. What I mean is that the failure to arrive at a mutually agreed-upon understanding of the truth lies with us, the people of this country, and not with the nefarious machinations of large and distant corporations (though they do not help us out any). They are merely catering to the market, but they did not create the market. We did. And only we can fix it.

 

Unfortunately, "fixing it" means battling against inertia and actively defying psychology by seeking out sources of information that we do not actually want to hear out or give legitimacy to. To do so runs counter to the "confirmation bias," which is, IMO, how we arrived at this predicament to begin with. Out of intellectual laziness on the part of our citizenry, born out of our collective running home to mom when the realities of the world fail to accommodate themselves to our preexisting biases and prejudices, which in an earlier age would have forced us to rethink and to reevaluate them. But not now. Now we have a fractured media landscape and we can chose to listen only to sources that confirm our worst fears and point us in the directions of new ones, new ones that media outlets' data-mining protocols tell them that they should recommend to us. We might like it. And given that they now know us better than we even know ourselves, they are probably right.

Edited March 27, 2012 by sukeban

[marharth]

no

Well here it is. It is also laughable.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PAJNntoRgA

Edited March 27, 2012 by marharth

[HeyYou]

And there you have it folks. The primary reason I STOPPED watching broadcast television. Campaign season........ What a waste of airspace.

[grannywils]

HY, I'm with you....:rolleyes: And Perry's ad was just as bad...

 

Sukeban, (note I sent you a PM). Just wanted to address one of the points you made regarding the similarities to the films and the hypnotism of the Hitler age. Well you brought to mind an extraordinary book by a woman named Naomi Wolf. It is called The End of America, Letters of Warning to a Young Patriot. This book is well worth reading for innumerable reasons. However, one similarity is how comfortable we seem to be becoming with this sort of hyperbole in our national forums. Political Correctness aside, we now find it perfectly ok to slice each other down the middle in order to find a common enemy among ourselves. We seem to have forgotten on what grounds this Nation was founded.

 

That is all I will say for the moment.