In keeping with the intent of this thread, it is not lamented enough the death of journalistic integrity. I agree that there is far too much attempt… dare I say even blatant intention… to create a narrative in “reporting,” today.
It is getting worse.
I know if I stumble on a HuffPost article, I need to get out my salt cellar, no different than if I stumble on RealClearPolitics. But even on CNN, you can still find some honest journalism… along with a large amount of not-journalism.
Frankly, I see this as an extension of the growing idiocracy and the demise of our collective intellect. Everything now is available in a sound bite or YT video and being spoon fed to us by algorithms, all with the intent to keep us “entertained.”
I just had a conversation with this guy I know who brought up inflation and was solely blaming Biden even though this upward trend started in the previous administration. When I brought that up, he simply stated that he had “heard that,” yet wouldn’t be swayed to consider it because it was outside of the narrative he had accepted.
Gone are the days where a quote like WK Clifford’s from
The Ethics of Belief had any meaning:
…it is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything on insufficient evidence.
It is ultimately sad to see the demise of rational and intelligent discourse from our collective whole. Traits like integrity, mutual respect, intelligence and the ability to think for oneself are denigrated at best, if not outright vilified.
I don’t think these are necessarily gone, yet to find sign of them, one has to dig under the surface because the façade has been remade into a disguise, and that disguise is slowly replacing what we used to be; taking over and becoming our nature.
Perhaps one hypothesis is that in the face of globalism, we are reverting to more base and tribal instincts.
I continue to hope for some semblance of unity and purpose to bring us back to a functioning whole rather than this disparate us-vs.-them mentality.
