Media Ignorance Is Becoming A Serious Problem

[Valin]

The Federalist

Mollie Hemingway
July 9, 2014

Last week, conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt interviewed Zach Carter, who is The Huffington Post‘s senior political economy reporter. The interview’s purpose was to discuss Carter’s negative response to Hewitt’s previous interview of former Vice President Dick Cheney. The interview was lively and interesting but it did not go well for Carter, who was forced to admit his ignorance of the historical context of the situation in Iraq.

(Snip)

I don’t mean to pick on Carter, who was a good sport. If anything, I give him credit for sticking through the entire interview. But it speaks to a larger problem we face with our media, which is that they frequently are not well read and, more importantly, they do not realize it.

(Snip)

No liberal education

The real problem is the arrogance that goes with the ignorance. Take Kate Zernike’s 2010 attempt at an expose of the ideas that motivate tea party activists that ran in the New York Times. She wrote:

But when it comes to ideology, it has reached back to dusty bookshelves for long-dormant ideas. It has resurrected once-obscure texts by dead writers — in some cases elevating them to best-seller status — to form a kind of Tea Party canon.

Who are these obscure authors of long-dormant ideas? She points to Friedrich Hayek, for one. Yes, the same Hayek who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1974 and died way, way back in … 1992. Whose Road To Serfdom was so obscure that it has never been out of print and was excerpted in Reader’s Digest, that obscure publication with only 17 million readers. The article doesn’t get around to actually providing any insight into these activists’ philosophy and it’s probably a good thing considering that this is what she has to say about “the rule of law”:

(Snip)

[Valin]

Media Ignorance Is Worse When It’s Intentional
Ben Domenech
July 11, 2014

 

I hope you all took time to read Mollie Hemingway’s piece this week concerning the problem of media ignorance. The really troublesome aspect of it, as I see it, is not when people are unintentionally ignorant of the matters they cover, which is of course excusable. No one is expected to be an expert on everything they write about, and in practice, it just serves to foster the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect, which you have surely experienced regularly if you are an expert in something and a consumer of media. Yes, it’s a problem when those youngsters in media who got promoted because they are really good at the Instagram don’t know about something because it’s on the second page of the Google results. But leaving something you didn’t know out of a story is more excusable than asserting something inaccurate out of ignorance, which is still more excusable than purposefully putting on blinders and ignoring anything that conflicts with your thesis because you’d rather not engage it. It’s one thing to not know another perspective exists – it’s another to purposefully pretend it doesn’t exist.

 

I know this is a minor complaint in the scheme of things, but if you want an example of this in practice, I’d draw your attention to the recent staff changes at the Washington Post’s Wonkbook, which has been dramatically reduced in usefulness since Ezra Klein pulled a great deal of their talent into Vox. To his credit, Klein has always understood that even media in pursuit of an ideological agenda gets boring very quickly if it’s entirely one-sided. Good political media requires conflict – it needs someone to take the other position in a debate, which is why his criticisms of Paul Ryan would be followed with an interview with the subject and the like. The overall effect was to provide people with a fairly consistent look at what the major Washington think tanks were doing, and while the reporters obviously leaned in a direction, I’d argue they rarely pretended conservative views didn’t exist or lacked legitimacy.

 

(Snip)

 

To pick one recent example: On the day the reform conservatives released their Room to Grow agenda at AEI (a development of significance whatever you think of the actual agenda), Wonkbook didn’t link a single thing about it – not one oped or post in favor of it or any of the source materials. Over the course of the next few days, they gave a few scant nods to pieces in favor of it, while linking a litany of pieces from liberals reacting to the proposals, criticizing something that they hadn’t even acknowledged existed.

 

A purposefully cloistered attitude, where the only good conservative is the one making the case for lefty ideas, is a real disservice to debate. If most of your links are to a conservative making the case for a universal wage subsidy or a carbon tax or immigration reform, it’s simply not an accurate depiction of where the other side is. And it leads to your site and email sounding less like a fair-minded left-leaning traditional media outlet and more like, well, ThinkProgress.

The impression you get is of a place with an ideological perspective that overwhelms its ability to fairly depict policy debates..........(Snip)

[Geee]

These articles point out the simple facts the reporters and newscasters are ignorant of history which I see on a weekly basis, but it is also the mis-pronunciation of simple words or cities or countries that they should know that blows my mind. Visual proof of todays educations 'dumbing down' as Pat Moynihan would say.

[Valin]

These articles point out the simple facts the reporters and newscasters are ignorant of history which I see on a weekly basis, but it is also the mis-pronunciation of simple words or cities or countries that they should know that blows my mind. Visual proof of todays educations 'dumbing down' as Pat Moynihan would say.

 

 

Was this always the case and we just never really noticed it?

[Geee]

 

These articles point out the simple facts the reporters and newscasters are ignorant of history which I see on a weekly basis, but it is also the mis-pronunciation of simple words or cities or countries that they should know that blows my mind. Visual proof of todays educations 'dumbing down' as Pat Moynihan would say.

 

 

Was this always the case and we just never really noticed it?

 

I don't think so. I don't know about the history part, but I would remember about the word mispronunciation cause it grates on me. Not so much from just ordinary people, but I figure news people should know. It is their job to interface with the public and I assume english and grammar should be a part of their education. I am also taken back sometimes in conversations with my grandchildren. I will say something and they'll say what's that or what does that mean or give me a blank stare. I am amazed at the things they don't know or words they never heard of.

[Valin]

 

 

These articles point out the simple facts the reporters and newscasters are ignorant of history which I see on a weekly basis, but it is also the mis-pronunciation of simple words or cities or countries that they should know that blows my mind. Visual proof of todays educations 'dumbing down' as Pat Moynihan would say.

 

 

Was this always the case and we just never really noticed it?

 

I am amazed at the things they don't know or words they never heard of.

 

 

 

You and I both. There are something like 900,000 words in the english language and (last time I checked) it didn't cost anything to learn them and use them....and don't get me started on the talking head shows!!!

[Valin]

@Geee

 

 

H/T K-Lo