This is one thing I did to attempt to make a small difference in the current climate, picked a few media outlets I thought were doing a good job and paid for subscriptions. Living in very solidly blue places, nothing else I have done has likely mattered at all.
You can do a lot in blue states/towns, but it involves pushing the Democratic party further left (Medicare for All, Abolish ICE, Affordable housing, and more) if that's your cup of tea.
It isn't my cup of tea. Pushing democrats further from center makes them lose more than they already do. I also don't think many of those things achieve their goals or are correct for a free society depending on context.
I'm a very blue moderate with some ideas that are sometimes rather far from the traditional one dimensional spectrum.
Sites like The Guardian, New Yorker, Atlantic, etc seem to do a better job. Newspaper funnels are entertaining - I spent some years in the newspaper world when this experimenting with paywalls started.
As a technologist, I see value after consistently accessing more than a few articles a month.. closer to 10 is where I see enough value to pay. I'm sure I'm only one persona though in their funnel.
I did that for a while until I became completely disillusioned with them. They're in the pocket of corporations and the White House (they actually suppress news if the WH doesn't like it). Find a more progressive outlet than them if you want to pay for media. They can certainly use the cash.
I am pretty disillusioned with them too, and they do push an agenda in many areas (pro-military, anti-tech, etc). I loathe their opinion pages, they're a weird mix of bland and constantly pseudo-outraged. But I still like lots of stuff they create and a subscription isn't super expensive, so paying seems like the right thing to me personally. I'm just reading a newspaper, not looking for someone to marry. (I wouldn't want to marry someone who always agrees with me either, come to think of it.)
Yea I knock on them for the same reasons, but when the topic isn't of national interest, they have some excellent story tellers and reporters. Their digital remixes are great too (e.g. Snowfall and its intellectual children).
Nonetheless, as my perspective evolved, I realized I can't countenance supporting them when they endorsed actual evil like the Iraq War and perpetuate so many things wrong in society. They'll always let you down when it counts, so I don't see a reason to be there for them when it doesn't.
