Source: (Official White House Photo by D. Myles Cullen)
Posted on 06/06/2021 3:55:35 AM PDT by Kaslin
Source: (Official White House Photo by D. Myles Cullen)
The year of the pandemic was the best thing to happen to cable news – a captive audience stuck at home with a reason to tune in regularly. They really hate to see it end. CNN’s ratings have cratered even greater than their credibility, which didn’t seem humanly possible considering they employ Chris Cuomo. The other networks and print outlets haven’t suffered the same fate, at least not yet. But whatever media emerges from this year of failure, mis- and disinformation should be viewed with the same skepticism and contempt CNN rightly finds itself in the center of.
Everyone got something wrong in the last year, just as everyone gets something wrong every year. We’re human, screwing up and getting things wrong is what we do. But we’re different from the animals because we can learn from those mistakes. We’re supposed to, it’s a key part of growing up.
Yet, the media not only doesn’t appear to have learned anything from the past year, they’ve doubled down on their failures. The soothsayers they employ predicted pretty much every possible outcome, at one point or another. That’s a lot of things, but it’s not news or even insight. It’s the equivalent of putting a dollar on every number on a roulette table – sure, you’ll “win” and be able to brag about your winning streak, but you’ll lose money each time.
Anyone with an MD was on TV talking like they knew what they were saying, like they were an “expert.” They weren’t, and some weren’t even close. And so were people without MDs.
In fairness, it’s hard to be an expert on something no one knows anything about, and when this started no one knew anyone about COVID-19, it was brand new. That never stopped any TV doctor or paid contributor from speaking like they’d just published THE paper on the subject. It’s not their fault, ultimately, it’s the fault of the news outlets. If you’re reached for a quote by a newspaper or asked to go on cable TV to discuss a story, it’s the kiss of death to say, “I honestly have no idea, and no one does,” even when it’s true. You won’t be quoted again, and you’ll never get back on TV. And being a media doctor/pundit is the pathway to a lot of money.
Even local TV stations couldn’t escape screwing up. I remember watching one local station interviewing a doctor at the start of the pandemic who, it turns out, was a dermatologist but the audience wasn’t told this. I know this because I looked her up – she was someone I’d never heard of and wasn’t really saying anything I couldn’t have said if I’d read a couple AP articles. She was fine, said pretty much what everyone else was saying at the time, but still…
But that’s what the “news” business has become – people who have zero firsthand knowledge of a story/bill/law/situation/pandemic speaking as though they are the authority on the subject.
Cable news, in particular, is bad. Each network has about 12 people they talk to about everything. I know many of those people, they aren’t experts. They can string together a coherent sentence for a 5 minute “debate” on any subject with about 10 minutes to prepare, but nothing about their thoughts is newsworthy. If they didn’t call themselves “news” networks, I wouldn’t have a problem with it, and if the country hadn’t been pushed into a panic it wouldn’t much matter.
At a time when we needed level heads and factual information, the media delivered bomb-throwers and partisan hacks. To this day, it is not rare to tune into a cable news show to see one host interviewing another host or panel of hosts and employees of whatever network. That’s not news, that’s a conversation you’d ask to be moved away from if it were happening in a restaurant at the table next to you.
But it sells, and that’s all that matters. I asked one of these hosts why they had someone on multiple times per week to talk about subjects they knew very little about and was told, bluntly, the audience loves them. There is no news value in that, no one learns anything when Chris Cuomo and Don Lemon banter between their shows, but then there’s no news value in talking to anyone they talk to when they aren’t directly involved in the story. It’s just someone with an opinion talking to someone else with an opinion. The “experts,” insofar as they exist, aren’t experts in anything but BSing.
Sadly, there’s not much we can do about it. It sells. Even CNN is making money, mostly because of the screwed-up way ad buyers value their small audience more highly than larger audiences. So don’t expect anything to change because there’s enough money either way.
In the meantime, “experts” will continue to get everything wrong with no repercussions and audiences seeking information will go away with a belly full of empty calories and very little, if anything, useful in their heads. Who would’ve thought “experts” could do so much damage in the name of “news”?
Sounds like FR's Religion Forum every day!
LOL
The so called experts on MSM, are political hacks.
The author fails to conclude correctly his own thoughts. It does not sell per say since they target a smaller audience they value more. What is that they value more? The people of free money, who support the federal loans that make car and home sales go up. It is fascism.
I rarely watch the news, all you get are arguments, and sound bytes, I read multiple sources of news, including medical, left-right and form my own opinions. Most have gotten it wrong, the few who did peg it did so early on. Sure pegged Facuet correctly.
I’ve believed for a long time that CNN is being subsidized by some kind of backdoor deal by the govt. If yrue that explains a lot. In particular it explains why they could care less what anyone else thinks.
Frankly, if only voters on the right suddenly boycotted coca cola and all these car loans business for a bit. Then maybe these jerks would figure who butters their bread.
Liberal Demonrats are experts on STUPIDITY!!!
FACT!
They are so diverse, just 1 product is not enough. We need to bust these Monoplies up. Coke owns Fairlife milk, Juices, Danisi water and many other products.
I’ve not bought soda in a decade. Stopped buying Nike, Body Armour, Gillette, Kelloggs, Nabisco. Not made any difference, they make the store brands too. I’m not going back, but it’s not helped.
It’s a 2 hr round trip drive into Crime Riddle Memphis to go to Crime Riddled NO GUNS ALLOWED mall. At nearly 73, they have nothing I want or need. Freaking Navy base has only foreign made over priced slave labor produced clothing, shoes, purses, etc. Try finding a Made in USA product there. In Millington,TN 30 miles from Memphis. My little berg of 7,000 in next county has no real shopping, Kroger’s biggest employer is doing a $5 Million give-away to enter a contsest for COVID vaccine.
I had a 2nd Meniere’s attack triggered by the loud music, screaming over it about Masks, out of frequency mic, now have a 3rd hole in L eardrum, and even less hearing. ENT wants to do a Cochlear Implant, You have $80 K to spare? Tricare Life DOESN’T COVER SPOUSES. Only covers Military service injuries. Hubby has bad Glucoma going blind, and I get hard of hearing added to my DL. Vertigo has made life rougher. 1 of us has to be able to drive, we have no one to depend on but ourselves. NOR WOULD I TRUST THE 3RD RATE DOCS IN MEMPHIS, BEEN THEIR VICTIM TO OFTEN. Hospitals are horror places as bad as the VA hospitals. Nashville not much better.
A more accurate word is diva. Self-appointed experts. Primarily because they are in the public eye. Given expert status by public acclaim, not authority by peers. Like the head of a mob.
This article is right. There is huge and very profitable industry going on now, on the left and right, of a bunch of people who make a living out of interviewing each other. There are at least a couple of people on FR who participate in this business. I say more power to them, but the fact is it’s just a lot of people giving their opinion on what the have read or heard about an issue. I don’t really pay much attention to it anymore. There seems to be no truth anymore. When one doctor says this virus will kill us all, and one doctor says it’s the flu and there’s nothing to be concerned about, who do you believe?
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