The walls are closing in

Also there's this [1], which just boggles my mind. I can't make sense of this level of centralized message control and dissemination. It's straight out of 1984.

It's hard to believe "the media" (whoever "they" are) has an agenda... it's tinfoil hat stuff.. Usually I write it off as emergent behavior of collective groups of humans trying to make $$$ from clicks, standard selfish behavior + time, leading to a race towards the bottom that looks like this.

But watching those clip segments it's pretty clear there's a story/narrative being pitched by someone with the leverage to do so. Is this propaganda? What is propaganda? How can I recognize it? Is everything propaganda? Has "the media" been captured and become a tool of whatever "system" is controlling things? This is the kind of stuff Jean Baudrillard was writing about.

Sometimes we get journalism other times we get whatever that this stuff is. I don't have a problem with journalists sticking to the facts, SBF hasn't been charged, so lets not lynch him just yet. But hopefully he's being investigated (they usually don't announce when they are investigating someone, as it puts them on notice).

Overall I think this is a direct result the 1996 Telecommunications Act which eliminated the rules on the number of radio stations a company could own (which also was one of the most lobbied bills in history). In hindsight this was a big mistake, and set things up for the kind of centralized messaging we see. There was hope that internet "streams" would help reset things, but with FAANG we're back to a small group of companies controlling what you see and hear.

Distrust of the media is at an all time high because of this kind of stuff. It's hard to put your finger on, but your gut says something is very wrong. No wonder so many people go down the tinfoil hat rabbit hole. They're simply trying to make sense of the world they're now living in.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksb3KD6DfSI

“Why is it so hard to believe the media has an agenda?”

Why wouldn’t it? See Agenda Setting Theory.

All mass media can be propaganda. It’s always a political tool.

Yeah, they were farming for clicks, but to get you to read, not to make money.

You’re not supposed to notice that it’s propaganda tho. Otherwise it loses its power. That’s why you’re getting that gut feeling.

So there is something to be said about a decline in the quality of American propaganda

I think the trick is that when ppl think “propaganda” they think external, to/from another country. But internal propaganda is taboo

The word has a bad connotation for historical reasons but it’s actually a neutral term.