Quote:
Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop
I admire your ability to throw some Both sidesism into an exchange where we weren't even talking about political parties. Well done!
My point was that he paints with too broad a brush. So you slopped on some more paint. Don't mind the windows or the molding -- just throw that paint on everywhere.
My point about the preening is that you are doing what you would call virtue-signaling, dumping on the media generally (and both sides!) to signal your own superiority. They may be manipulating both sides, but you are certainly above that. (When is it time to do horserace journalism again?)
As you would know if you ever read my posts on the subject, I have plenty of issues with the media. But you (and Taibbi, if he has the nuance you attribute to him) are not interested in distinguishing better from worse in the media -- you're dumping on everyone to say that you're above it all.
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Have a Midol and a Xanax, Karen.
Taibbi is acknowledging the better and worse. (Which I stated, but nevermind that.)
What brush would you prefer be used in an assessment of the media? Should Taibbi write discrete chapters on each pundit of note and accord them a credibility rating of some sort? That'd be a riveting book. All 7,482 pages of it.
Some things have to be assessed in aggregate. Particularly when, as Taibbi notes, our modern media, whatever brand you choose - right, left, or center - runs a similar playbook.
Here's what I think you mean to say but won't:
I like criticizing the media for giving too much attention to Trump. I think that's a valid indictment. But I do not like when I hear criticism of the media for focusing on false narratives that I have adopted, such as bigotry or dumb rubes reactively rejecting their 'betters' (who I think think like me) being the main reasons Trump won, as opposed to economic issues. I don't care for that criticism because it tanks my sense of superiority. That's a media narrative that I don't want to see dismantled.
I also don't like criticism of the media that doesn't lay most of the blame at the feet of right wing media and corporate media that puts profits above all else. If one attacks the right and the left and suggests any similarity, that challenges the credibility of the notion that we are seeing a conflict between ideologies and political movements in which my side is better. If it's all a bit of a charade, if it's largely made up stuff - entertainment - then it's not a contest. I can't take a side and blame an 'other' for being the bad guy. I have to live in the deepest of grey areas. I don't like that kind of relativism, or cynicism, because I think I know what's best, but if I hear that I'm manipulated as well, I'm on a continuum with the Fox News sorts. And that bugs me.
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