How Can we Achieve Proportionality?
Marc Snyderman
Business Attorney | Disruptive Entrepreneur | Content Creator | Amazon Best Selling Author
I was listening to a podcast from James Fallows from The Atlantic this past week. He said that we need more “proportionality” in the media. He cited that there is a small group of people who think that COVID-19 is a hoax and won’t wear face masks, but it’s a small group. Fallows went on to say that while they are a “cinematic…and…dramatic group, [they] shouldn’t be all over cable news all the time”.
The polarization of the media started years ago when the news became less about news and more about a place for political grandstanding then delivering “just the facts.” I stopped watching thinking I could read online and would pull instant feeds from social media to find my proportionality.
I was wrong.
Social media takes this all to levels that were unimaginable to date. Stories are blown up and clips are edited – slants are put on without any knowledge of who created it and what their slant even is. At least on TV, I am confident which slant Fox News will put on and which spin CNN will take. We’ve created this digital universe where everyone has a voice while at the same time no one does because the videos and pictures of single incidents can consume the voices of everyone.
Let’s take a few examples:
· How many videos of people looting and throwing Molotov cocktails (which I saw referred to on a newscast as a Mazel Tov cocktail) have you seen vs. the number of videos of peaceful protesting?
· How many videos of police offers beating protesters or shooting them with rubber bullets have you seen vs. videos of cops marching hand in hand and kneeling on courthouse steps all over this country?
· How many videos of body bags and awful stories of COVID19 killing people have you seen vs the 1000s of patients that beat the virus despite all odds?
So, how do we actually find more proportionality to make objective and rational decisions? Some thoughts:
· Be sure to watch both sides of arguments to obtain your news – e.g. CNN and Fox News
· Monitor and limit social media usage
· Don’t accept every posting you receive from the internet as true, do your due diligence before re-posting or distributing
Never has it been more important in history to educate yourself and find the truth among the disproportionate media we get.
There’s an election in 6 months – get smart and get out and vote.
AVP Strategic Initiatives & Global Operations at World Wide Technology
4 年Thank you for this! Through all of this, I have found that Reuters and AP News tend to err on the side of stating facts. Not always, but more often than not. Even if the facts don't promote the current CNN or FoxNews media slant.
Materials Engineering Consultant at R. A. Miller Materials Engineering
4 年Critical thinking skills need to be taught at all levels instead of the opposite. Without these, sorting out truth from lies is difficult.
Founder, Inventor, Girl Dad, Coach, Leader, and former Skunk ??
4 年And by the way, this is a current topic in my house as my teenager becomes aware of surroundings. We are having to point out the ugliness of bots, half truths, proportion and necessity to check sources etc. You can imagine the dinner prep conversation between me and her: "And so where was this reported? Did you check their facts? How often does this occur? is it increasing or decreasing?" MAJOR eye rolls!
Helping companies leverage information technologies for competitive advantage and better security.
4 年Great thoughts, Marc. Personally, I gave up mainstream media a couple of years back and found that finding raw sources of news to be best.... I much prefer facts to opinions which is what main stream media has become.
Founder, Inventor, Girl Dad, Coach, Leader, and former Skunk ??
4 年This is so true. It's like the old saying, you either are buying the product or you are the product.