The days of Edward R. Murrow, Walter Chronkite, Chet
Huntley, David Brinkley, Frank McGee, Eric Sevareid, and Nancy Dickerson are
gone. Reporting the facts has been replaced with commentary, meant to evoke
emotion, entertain, and “sell”. We pay
attention only to those whose commentary support our already cemented opinions
and rally to the heightened emotion and rush to “buy”.
Does The Media Purposely Fan The
Flames Of Political Divisiveness? Anne
Kim, editor and co-founder of Republic 3.0 and The Hill
contributor provides the answer in her
March
12, 2015 The Hill column “When the political
press becomes the polarizer”.
“All of this is why political journalism might be
fanning the flames of the polarization that it both decries and eagerly covers.
And in fact, centrists and political moderates are among the first victims of
today's politics-as-reality-show political coverage. For one thing, the bias toward
conflict-focused coverage creates a reality distortion field where the context
for any proposal becomes a pitched battle between two opposing forces.
Differences in opinion are magnified into "rifts," and disagreements
morph into "feuds." And moderates — who are inherently inclined to
compromise — are almost inevitably cast as the villains.”
In her article, Kim notes research
by University of Pennsylvania political scientist Matthew Levendusky further
showing how partisan media may reinforce these divisions. “Through a variety of experiments aimed at measuring partisan media's
impacts, Levendusky found that exposure to polarizing media can make people
"a little more extreme, a little less positive toward the other side, more
unwilling to compromise, and more willing to ascribe negative traits to the
leaders of the other party." A final consequence of current trends in
political journalism is ironic, given the immense resources given over to
political coverage: Americans may end up even less informed than ever about the
policy choices the nation must make. And so long as serious policy efforts have
little chance of winning equally serious coverage from the press, politicians
have even less reason to offer solutions that make sense.”
Don’t believe the reality TV analogy? Check out my September
12, 2014 posting “New Reality TV Show Based On Congressional Gridlock” highlighting
the reality TV show Rival Survival. In
my opinion, we have become a society that wants to be entertained rather than
informed and at times confuse what we hear when being entertained with fact.
This is also a major part of the problem. The media, whether online,
broadcast, or print, is in the business of making money. Therefore, they
provide a product that is in demand. If the demand was for facts and unbiased
reporting of all sides of an issue that is what would be provided. Herein lays
the solution.
By allowing all
voters, regardless of party registration or registration as Non-Partisan to
vote for any candidate regardless of party affiliation or status as a
Non-Partisan in the primary election, the Nevada Election Modernization and Reform Act (NEMRA) could
bring the discussion of issues back towards the majority of voters who want
policy makers to collaborate and compromise rather than remain ideologically
pure to find and implement solutions. This in turn potentially raises the
demand for unbiased information. Enough to change the media demand? Only
implementation of NEMRA and time will provide the answer.
