Taibbi: The News Media Is Destroying Itself

The News Media Is Destroying Itself


The media in the last four years has devolved into a succession of moral manias. We are told the Most Important Thing Ever is happening for days or weeks at a time, until subjects are abruptly dropped and forgotten, but the tone of warlike emergency remains: from James Comey’s firing, to the deification of Robert Mueller, to the Brett Kavanaugh nomination, to the democracy-imperiling threat to intelligence “whistleblowers,” all those interminable months of Ukrainegate hearings (while Covid-19 advanced), to fury at the death wish of lockdown violators, to the sudden reversal on that same issue, etc.

It’s been learned in these episodes we may freely misreport reality, so long as the political goal is righteous. It was okay to publish the now-discredited Steele dossier, because Trump is scum. MSNBC could put Michael Avenatti on live TV to air a gang rape allegation without vetting, because who cared about Brett Kavanaugh – except press airing of that wild story ended up being a crucial factor in convincing key swing voter Maine Senator Susan Collins the anti-Kavanaugh campaign was a political hit job (the allegation illustrated, “why the presumption of innocence is so important,” she said). Reporters who were anxious to prevent Kavanaugh’s appointment, in other words, ended up helping it happen through overzealousness.

There were no press calls for self-audits after those episodes, just as there won’t be a few weeks from now if Covid-19 cases spike, or a few months from now if Donald Trump wins re-election successfully painting the Democrats as supporters of violent protest who want to abolish police. No: press activism is limited to denouncing and shaming colleagues for insufficient fealty to the cheap knockoff of bullying campus Marxism that passes for leftist thought these days.

 

Don't agree with it, but that's a pretty entertaining read.

 

I liked Taibbi better when he was a reporter, not a scold offering the sociopoliticial equivalent of hot takes

Hundreds of news outlets are still reporting on COVID-19. I can't scroll through Twitter without seeing a new chart offering analysis of hot spots.

Maybe Taibbi should follow his own advice and look outside his echo chamber.

 

That piece is really not about the coronavirus. At all.

Further, Taibbi is reporting. On the media. He’s appalled at what he sees.

 

This is not reporting. This is an op-ed.

 

That's not to say there aren't problems in the media's collective approach to journalism. There are. But Taibbi's hyperbole and his disdain for just about everyone who doesn't do pure investigative journalism obscures whatever salient points he might be trying to make.

 

Did you just out alma?

 

Nah. But birds of a feather...

 

Taibbi is absolutely right. But he misses one major point. He fails to address the fact that for the last 60 years people have been believing that objective truth does not exist. All truth is supposed to be relative, which means personal. Truth, therefore, deteriorates into narrative. In highly politicized times and contexts, narrative deteriorates into ideology. In a nation with no protections for individual freedom, ideology deteriorates into totalitarianism. This is why so many people buy into "woke" narratives. They really have nothing to gauge those narratives against. Consequently, narrative means everything. Those opposing a narrative, especially a highly-charged one, fall victim to cancel culture. It doesn't matter if their opposition is thoughtful or intelligent. Just ask Drew Brees and Vic fangio.

If we are going to solve serious racial problems in this country, we have to destroy cancel culture. It's nothing but totalitarianism with a hip nickname. To destroy cancel culture, we have to demand truth instead of self-serving narrative. That means recognizing objective standards of Truth rather than constant subjective manipulation.

 

Well, if the American left lost its mind on Twitter, then the American right already lost its mind on AM talk radio.

Taibbi can articulate all he wants. Any discussion that blames one side over the other has no merit anymore for me. The two-party system is the problem.

 

I don’t disagree, but truth is ALWAYS relative. You simply can’t and will never get around that.