Subliminal Toxic Journalism

[Jerry_Atrick]

In Australia and the US, the bias journalism is laid bare. It is not pretty and it is designed to sign those up to the cause who may be unsure, or need somewhere they can safely confirm their biases. It is designed to alter minds to meet an agenda, but at least it is obvious in its nature and can be called out reasonably easily. This seems to fester in places like Aus and the US, where accountability of the media is a big fat zero (or near enough).

 

However, in places like the UK, where the press regulator has teeth and has pulled media media licences, issued big fines, etc., the media appears more balanced. As I have mentioned, my son is amazed at what Sky News in Aus gets away with and Sky News here is far more balanced, though still with that Conservatives bend.

 

But, one of the unintended consequences of having a media regulator with teeth is that those media outlets that would be subject to the rules have to be more canny at their persuasive techniques. While it is easy to call out Sky News Australia for it's BS (and its followers would dismiss any objective rebuke of it), the coercive techniques of the media here are more subliminal, but as effective. 

 

As an example, during lockdown 1, Ian Duncan-Smith (IDS), a sort of SFM of the Conservatives, penned an article against lockdown. Apart from the usual damage to the economy and damage to mental health (with nothing to support the relative costs to letting COVID rip), he asserted that the deputy director of the WHO had maintained there was no benefit to lock-down, and therefore, someone of that stature, and speaking from the WHO should be listened to.

 

There is nothing untruthful about what IDS said. But the context he was providing was that the deputy director of the WHO was speaking on behalf of the WHO. This was no tabloid paper, either.. but you guessed it, a Murdoch masthead. While the article was not in anyway inaccurate, it was designed to give the impression that the advice came from the WHO itself. What it omitted helped propose this, as, on a little research, I found out the day after the deputy director of the WHO made the statement, the director came out emphatically rebutting it and emphasising that the position of the WHO was clear - lockdowns work and are on balance, better.

 

This morning, I am on a UK forum, and a term for a movement/philosophy I have never heard of before surfaces. It doesn't matter what it is, but when I googled it, the top results (no ads) were about the evilness of this new concept, based on some political correctness. I read an article in GQ, which should give you an indication it isn't itself a political or terror type thing. That article was scathing, effectively calling it the scourge of the earth. I read criticism after criticism of this concept/movement in many articles

 

After I finally found the site purporting to be the mouthpiece what this concept is, and read the posts of the members, although I cannot say I subscribe to it, the GQ article, the Wikipedia entries, and the other articles I read on it seemed to be misrepresenting it somewhat. They were taking quotes of members/posters out of context. An example would be where, say a man said something like, "then the bitch stole all my money", or a woman said, "then the bastard killed the dog", the examples somehow represented the site as being misogynistic or misandrist (these are theoretical examples) as though these quotes meant all women are bitches, or all men are bastards.

 

I then stumbled across a Ted-ex talk by a documentary film maker whose specialism was the anti of this concept. This film maker interviewed proponents of this concept, recording the conversations and letting them speak - They were more discussions that interviews and they were designed to give the people who subscribe to this concept freedom to talk. The film maker simply recorded the discussions, admitting that disdain for this group of people made it hard to engage in a classic interview style approach.

 

After listening to the recordings, this documentary maker realised that a lot of the problems with, lets call it activist journalism is that rather than hear what the subject has to say, they hear what they want the subject to say to confirm their bias - and then they write, film, etc. that bias on an unsuspecting, but impressionable public. From there, it festers... The doco maker realised that if people listened rather than jumped to conclusions, they would hear the message, which in this case appears to be from people on the receiving end of a system, wanting things to be fairer. The doco film maker subsequently repudiated their alignment with the antithesis of this concept/movement, but not wholly endorsing this movement. The online abuse the doco maker copped was vitriolic and toxic - no one cared to hear the person's view...

 

Had I stopped at the few articles I read from reputable media organisations with apparently no axe to grind, I may have had a skewed view of this concept/movement. Their facts were right, but they were presented in a way to support their conclusion, which to me, anyway, seemed wrong. I am not going to name the movement/concept as I don't want to get into a value debate out it per se.. But I wonder how much we are influenced by subliminal toxic journalism that appeals to our individual biases.

 

[facthunter]

Geez you DO long posts Gerry. I'll leave that till tomorrow so I can do it justice. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

I try and provide full context 😉

 

[old man emu]

1 hour ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

a term for a movement/philosophy I have never heard of before surfaces. It doesn't matter what it is

Maybe not in the context of your post, but please don't leave us in the dark. Those of us who want to find out more, will and those who don't, won't. Nobody will say you are shoving an idea down anyone's throat.

[pmccarthy]

A Clintonesque thought.

[facthunter]

Subliminal effect exists. The advertising "fraternity" use every trick in the book and it's techniques are also being used by  political parties  and  purveyors of false theories.

   "Selective Perception " comes into play with many people who just home in on a half sentence that backs up their prior belief. Nev

Edited November 5, 2021 by facthunter