
The woke revolution in American journalism has begun - eplanit
https://theweek.com/articles/918980/woke-revolution-american-journalism-begun
======
keenmaster
Is repeatedly criticizing the president usually a bad thing that inherently
lacks nuance? Yes. Key word _usually_. Sardonically call me "woke" or whatever
you want, I don't care. This president and his administration are
extraordinarily bad. Your usual middle-brow heuristics don't apply.

~~~
downerending
If the criticisms are valid and fact-based, they should be made. IMO, there's
been an awful lot of chaff around the wheat. That actually often works in
favor of the target, but more importantly, it's part of how we evaluate the
source. Credibility is easy to lose and takes a long time to get back.

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tenebrisalietum
It used to be that dissemination of information was expensive.

Thousands of years ago you had to travel to town squares or churches to get
updates on things. Then you had newspapers, radio, and television. These often
were pillars of a community.

So it was logical that the same devices that would report on news ("free-
press" activity) would be used for "free-speech" expressive activity like
commentary, editoral, op-ed, letters to the community, etc., because it was
media that a high percentage of the community was guaranteed to consume
regularly.

This is no longer true and also no longer needed. Free-press and free-speech
activity doesn't have to share the same platform anymore and can be separated.

Free-speech expressive activity can be done on websites, social media, etc. We
don't need journalism outlets to do anything but post reports on things
happening.

With the two separated there is less ethical quandary.

The idea of scheduled consumption of media is also breaking down. So we don't
need journalism outlets collecting stories and deciding what to put into
papers, because there shouldn't be a paper. There should be a website with
reports with easily searchable keywords.

------
yellowbuilding
False. It is no coincidence that as we enter an unprecedented period of
economic depression, all the liberal media wants to discuss is racial
disparities.

The ruling class is winning the class war, and as long as they can keep the
working class fighting the race ware instead, nothing will change.

These protests are being milked for every last drop by the liberal media, in
cooperation with liberal activist NGOs on behalf of the Democratic party.

~~~
jjeaff
Why isn't the republican party in on it as well then? Are you implying that
the republican party is the voice of the people?

~~~
rnd0
Please don't confuse 'liberal' with 'leftist'. In terms of economics liberals
can be almost every bit as conservative as republicans.

Neither democrats nor republicans represent the interests of the working class
at this point in time.

------
blackrock
Hypocrites. All of them. Everyone has an agenda. If something doesn’t go their
way, then, even the most outspoken, all of a sudden, just lost their voice.
There’s no need for them to put their necks out on the line.

------
mindslight
These events are better analyzed in terms of the Red Team, which let itself be
taken over by some egregiously moronic positions. Being for the rule of law
and against the plague should be _common sense American values_. The idea of
airing "both sides" doesn't work when one "side" has gone off the deep end and
is penning op eds about using the military to help rioting police attack
constitutionally-protected protests. There's nothing inherently "woke" about
ignoring anti-American tripe - if the Red Team wants to be taken seriously
again, it needs to develop some adult opinions to embody actual Conservative
values.

~~~
eesmith
I took it as a challenge to myself to think of "actual Conservative values" I
would support.

Here are some of Nixon's policies that I support: SALT I and The Anti-
Ballistic Missile Treaty, the EPA, OSHA, NEPA, Clean Air Act, starting the War
on Cancer, enforcing school desegregation, the Revised Philadelphia Plan,
endorsement of the Equal Rights Amendment, support for black capitalism, and
meeting with protesters in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

As a Senator: statehood for Alaska and Hawaii (which I would extend to Puerto
Rico and D.C.), voted in favor of civil rights for minorities, and supported
federal disaster relief for India and Yugoslavia.

Would you consider those to be actual Conservative values?

(I'm leaving out a whole slew of things I don't like about Nixon. I assume
secret wars are not part of actual Conservative values.)

------
mancerayder
"A serious news organization cannot exclude views championed by one of the
country's two major political parties and held by more than 40 percent of the
country's voters."

I don't wear a "red tie" but this resonates with me, as someone who speaks
daily with friends from both extremes of the spectrum. In truth, I most seek
out people who think issue-by-issue, because as an adult, and not a 20 year-
old revolutionary, I don't believe that reality is to be explained with glued-
together social theory with axiomatic truths that the believers don't
recognize are even there and can be qustioned; as an adult, I find it hard to
fathom the downward spiral of the idea of truth into a weaponized all-or-
nothing nihilistic battle.

In the past few weeks, the Washington Post and the NY Times, both of which I
have subscriptions and I read daily, declared war. They've made that pretty
clear and they've also admitted it. Gone are the days where we want unbiased
reporting.

Sunday and Monday of the week prior, Manhattan had hundreds of stores looted
and the streets became fully lawless as cars could drive up to broken
storefronts, send organized groups in and retrieve thousands of dollars of
goods. Those two days, the NYT, the home town paper, ran front page stories
about Trump's (reprehensible, do I need to say it) actions. And around the
front page they had commentary about the Trump actions. In short, focus on the
Enemy. No focus on the rioting, and the story is even worse with Chicago,
which has experienced the most murders in 60 years. Surely a story worth a
visible lede.

This reminds me of the Two Minutes Hate in 1984 when the Party watches films
of Goldstein, mortal enemy of the party (a Trotsky-like fellow) speaking, and
everyone must scream and shout and curse and stand out of their chairs in
demonstrations of fury.

"But, but, we're on the side of good" a.k.a. The End Justifies the Means has
never lead to any great outcome.

I'm legitimately nervous about the state of journalism in this country. But
I'm about ten times more nervous when I read comments below that say, "Well,
of course the press does this. Did you see what the Red Ties did this time?"

------
throwawayjourno
The Cotton op-ed was essentially advocating fascism. He was positively
tumescent about the thought of using the army to kill American civilians.
Regardless that it was published in bad faith (see: Cotton laughing on Twitter
about it), the NYT op-ed was published without context, for an audience where
over half are incapable of telling the difference between news and opinion
(source:
[https://www.americanpressinstitute.org/publications/confusio...](https://www.americanpressinstitute.org/publications/confusion-
about-whats-news-and-whats-opinion-is-a-big-problem-but-journalists-can-help-
solve-it/)). It was irresponsible and dangerous to publish it in the way it
was published. The NYT admits it was a mistake to publish it and there were
editorial failings in the process.

The old detached civil-libertarian 1000ft view, where "all opinions, however
vile, deserve a platform from which they can be debated" is for an older time
when these arguments were held in good faith.

Far from "a woke revolution suppressing speech", if we wish to keep free
speech intact we each must work to deny a platform to fascist ideas (and the
right in America _is_ hurtling towards fascism if it is not there already) or
there will not be free platforms for much longer.

Karl Popper's Paradox of Tolerance states that if a society is tolerant
without limit, its ability to be tolerant is eventually seized or destroyed by
the intolerant. We are at that point with the American far right.

~~~
wait_a_minute
Why no mention of the far left descending into its own brand of
authoritarianism? It makes it hard to take your criticisms of the right
seriously if you are not willing to acknowledge what the far left is becoming
and encouraging.

~~~
non-entity
The far left is a fringe group in America and has next to no political power.

~~~
wait_a_minute
That is not true at all, considering the recent chaos caused by people who are
far left (and far right pretending to be far left, to be clear). BLM has been
co-opted by far left people. Not hard to find leaders in that movement who are
using it as a means for that. Left anarchists have taken over a section of
Seattle and are calling it the "autonomous zone." And mainstream media
supports all of this and more.

The entire Democrat party has taken a massive step to the left and shows no
signs of stopping that shift. If you don't see the authoritarian tones there
then you can't really be looking.

~~~
anoncake
Anarchists are descending into authoritarianism? Certainly not.

~~~
wait_a_minute
I was giving examples of far left people not being a fringe, not saying that
the specific flavor of leftism at play there is authoritarian. Although it can
be construed as authoritarian if you look at the actions of the so-called
anarchists there. IDs required to get in/out, checkpoints where armed
hooligans demand to know where you are going and why, forceful seizure of
private property...not really anarchy.

