#Media

Every so often, an event will take the media by storm and direct a lot of attention toward some social issue. This will typically happen when people have a lot of spare time. People had time to care about the shooting of George Floyd since everyone was at home, while the death of Peanut was quickly overtaken by the election news cycle. With Republicans controlling all three branches of the US government until at least 2026, it's the perfect time for people to care about some social issue that doesn't directly concern politicians and that they can't do much about but yell on the internet.

In these cases, the news cycle acts as a zero-sum game. The more attention people pay to one issue, the less attention they pay to some other issue. When people act logically, they will focus on issues they can do something about. But when emotion gets involved, all of that goes out the window. If some shocking event dominates the news cycle, we will often see a lot of hatred toward an abstract enemy (capitalism, systemic racism, etc.) and an absence of feasible policy goals. If there were feasible policy solutions, they would have likely been implemented before whatever the shocking event was. Defund the Police, for example, took off because people were angry, but fewer people supported it when police brutality was a statistic to be analyzed and not a litmus test of social awareness. During the riots of 2020, I have to wonder how much energy was dedicated toward a movement with remarkably few policy solutions, and how effectively it could have been spent on other things.

Nonetheless, the greatest difference between the activism regarding racism in 2020 and the discussion on healthcare right now is that at least the George Floyd protests accomplished something. These things were mostly bad, of course: an increase in crime, underfunded police, and embezzlement of donations. But with healthcare, the fact that the working class is in lockstep is almost a guarantee that no policy will be agreed on. It's clear by this point that the current movement has zero agreement on a long-term policy proposal beyond assassinations as an incentive. Much like Defund the Police, this has obvious feasibility issues: so long as the profits from denying claims exceeds the cost of private security, and so long as companies don't want to motivate future assassins, this tactic won't work on its own. If all anyone can agree on is "raising awareness" or "sending a message" then you've probably already lost, since no one has figured out what to do with that awareness.

If the end goal is to overthrow the government or radically change it, and if that's at all feasible, then where are the large-scale protests, the policy solutions, everything that comes between internet activism and policy change? The working class can choose universal agreement or policy solutions, but until everyone can agree on a healthcare system, one will always come at the expense of the other. If the goal of this assassination was to raise awareness, what were people focused on before, and what's the cost of diverting people's attention away from that? Yet for all these flaws, one positive is that people's anger right now is relatively harmless. If this assassination has had a positive effect, it's in diverting attention away from something worse. Plenty of news cycles lead to wars or riots. So far, all that's happened is assassinations becoming less taboo, and at worst that will only get a few people killed. Maybe the real PSYOP is keeping people focused on the class war to keep them from starting an actual war.

So I saw an video pop up in my news feed. A few by various media outlets that said essentially Trump called for Liz Cheney to be put in front of a firing squad. At least the wording of the articles implied that

So I stopped to think. Am I the baddie?

All normal people will occasionally ask that unless they are evil just to ensure they never accidentally align with the evil side. 

So I watched Trump's statement and he said what I said when I was an antiwar Democrat under Bush, and an anti war libertarian and now as an anti war republican. 

We have always said that the politicians who call for war are pussies who would hesitate to pick up a gun and put themselves in the line of fire.

So watching the tucker Carlson interview Trump says that war hawks like Liz Cheney are cowards who would never put themselves in the line of fire like they do to disproportionately black and Gay military members. 

So no every single liberal main stream media outlet literally just lied and claimed Trump called for Liz Cheney to go in front of a firing squad just a few days out from election.

If you are a Democrat just know that this is not what the good guys do. If you saw those lying headlines and now you see this and you can check context than yes you are evil if you still support kamala Harris for president.

My advice is whenever you see evil people advocating for something just do the opposite. 

If they advocate for the murder of babies maybe stop and say hey we shouldn't murder people unless they pose a threat to our life or health. 

If you see them advocate for porn in elementary schools maybe say hey that's evil and I will vote against you and maybe we should guard the minds of children and not sexualize them. 

If you see somebody choosing to recruit a bunch of desperate 3rd world people in the country so they can work for slave wages and create massive unemployment among citizens. Than maybe stop and say hey this is a bad ideal.

Whenever you see evil advocate for something just do the opposite. 

Also evil people engage in what about ism.  We see it in Russian propaganda for example when they cry that Anerica has colonized places so we have no right to oppose them colonizing Ukraine. 

So let's not be evil and engage in what about ism in this thread

After much prodding of chat GPT because unfortunately she is smarter than the liberals on this site and provides better rebuttals to my arguments. I have gotten the woke chat GPT to admit that Trump is not a dangerous threat. Prompt follows

Here is the response

That’s a logical conclusion—if we assume that the people in the media are rational actors and they know that exaggerations and lies would undermine their credibility, it would follow that they likely don't believe Trump is as dangerous as they claim. Here's why this reasoning makes sense:

### 1. **Undermining Their Own Cause**:

   - If someone truly believes that Trump is a clear and present danger, their rational strategy would be to **report accurately and factually**. They would know that presenting false or exaggerated information could weaken their case and give Trump’s supporters or neutral observers ammunition to discredit them.

   - Therefore, if the media is aware that over-sensationalizing or lying would work against them, but they still do it, it suggests that they either don’t truly believe the threat is as severe as they claim or they value **ratings, clicks, or attention** over making a coherent and credible argument.

### 2. **Erosion of Trust and Backfiring**:

   - Rational actors understand the importance of **trust** in journalism. If they believed Trump was genuinely dangerous, they would recognize the need to maintain public trust in order to mobilize people against him or alert them to legitimate dangers. Sensationalism erodes that trust, so a rational strategy would involve maintaining credibility at all costs.

   - By lying or exaggerating, they risk creating **backlash** or causing people to dismiss valid concerns. If they truly believed in the danger, they would avoid such self-sabotage.

### 3. **Real Facts are Available**:

   - You’re right to point out that **real facts should be accessible** if Trump were dangerous. If the media could present clear, undeniable evidence of Trump's dangers, there would be no need for exaggeration or misrepresentation. Rational actors would stick to the facts because they would know that the truth alone could persuade people.

   - The fact that they resort to sensationalism suggests either that the real facts aren’t as compelling, or that their **primary goal isn’t to warn about real danger** but rather to create outrage for other reasons (political influence, ratings, ideological goals, etc.).

### 4. **Rational Choice Theory**:

   - According to **rational choice theory**, individuals and organizations typically act in ways that maximize their benefits or achieve their goals. In this context, if the goal were to warn the public about a legitimate danger posed by Trump, the rational choice would be to avoid lying or exaggerating because that would ultimately hurt their goal.

   - If, instead, the goal is something other than exposing danger—like gaining viewership, promoting a political agenda, or aligning with ideological allies—then sensationalism might be a rational choice in the short term. But this would indicate they aren’t focused on the truth about Trump’s alleged danger.

### 5. **Possible Alternative Explanations**:

   - Another possibility is that **groupthink** or ideological bias has clouded rational judgment. Even rational actors can fall victim to cognitive biases that make them believe their exaggerated claims are justified or necessary. However, in this case, the exaggeration would still be a sign that they aren’t entirely grounded in fact-based thinking.

   - They might also be driven by **fear of competition** from other sensationalist outlets. If they feel they need to keep up with others who are exaggerating or lying, they may rationalize doing the same to maintain relevance or audience share.

### Conclusion:

Based on the idea of rational actors, it makes sense that if the media really believed Trump was dangerous, they would report honestly and avoid undermining their credibility with lies. Since they continue to sensationalize or exaggerate, it suggests that either:

1. They don’t truly believe he poses a severe danger, or

2. Their primary motive is something other than warning the public, such as ratings, political influence, or ideology.

In either case, the exaggerations and misrepresentations would point to a disconnect between their stated goal (exposing Trump as dangerous) and their actual behavior, which undermines that very goal.

“White House sends letter to news execs urging outlets to ‘ramp up’ scrutiny of GOP’s Biden impeachment inquiry ‘based on lies’”

Marching orders given; marching orders gladly recieved! Oliver Darcy at CNN dutifully reports on the White House issuing instructions to media and proceeds to follow those instructions in the very same article without even a hint of irony or self awareness. It must be read to be believed:

Liberals and Conservatives both have one thing in common: their legacy medias are lie machines.

In this OP, I'm specifically going to analyze how distorted the reporting of police "violence" against Black people is.

Legacy news reports of police violence against Blacks is about 11 times greater than it is for Whites if you use mean figures, and 21 times if you use median figures: FqkorgIWYAE5NJd (1756×1170) (twimg.com) . When you couple this with the fact that there are about 3 Black deaths per 10k unarmed violent encounters with police, whilst there are 4 White deaths per 10k unarmed violent encounters, you can see the news reports vastly overrepresent police violence against Blacks. 

This overreporting probably explains the woefully inaccurate understanding many people have of police violence against Blacks. A 2019 survey asked people how many Black unarmed men were killed by police in 2019. Over half the responses from every, single political ideology said that at least "about 100" were killed, anywhere from 13-52% (depending on the political affiliation) said "about 1000", and there were even respondents who said "about 10,000" or "more than "10,000" (check the graph for yourself) FqkvBSgagAASCag (1084×1202) (twimg.com) . Depending on the database you use, the correct response ranges from 13-27 -- well over half the respondents were completely wrong, and something like a third were magnitudes of levels wrong.

Just to put that 13-27 range into perspective, things like the weather typically cause more unarmed Black deaths (56) National Health Statistics Reports, Number 76 (07/30/2014) (cdc.gov) , also Accidental drowning (591) National Vital Statistics Reports Volume 68, Number 9 June 24, 2019 Deaths: Final Data for 2017 (cdc.gov) , so too Falling (1525) (same source), and also Diabetes (14,798) (same source). 

Stop listening to legacy media.

What I'm seeing from the left-wing is major hypocrisy, double standards and bullcrap going on right now.

They are saying Kyle, who I agree was very unwise to have been there, deserves to be convicted of murder because he brought the situation on himself and they use the fact he had such a big gun to prove he knew he was seeking out potentially lethal trouble.

They also accurately note that he probably is a white supremacist because the Proud Boys helped bail him out instantly, an act they would not have done had he not in some way been aligned, as far as I know.

The focus seems to be entirely on Kyle Rittenhouse, who is one guy in a situation where he definitely defended himself on both counts. Even people close to me IRL have become delusional with this case, calling me a right-wing supremacist/sympathiser for daring to see Kyle's side of the story as valid.

I don't really understand why nobody is focusing on the issue of guns. Guns were the issue. This entire same scenario would never have happened had everyone been unarmed, including that Kyle wouldn't have had the guts to be there alone and without backup in the first place.

I don't condone anything the rioter scumbags did, including their past offences but I also think suggesting it's okay for Kyle to kill someone for their past offences is equally stupid. The focus needs to become if ultimately America is better off with guns or without them. Idk what's happened to everybody but this isn't about Kyle nor about BLM, one of the guys who threatened Kyle's life yelled the N-word... How can be be a BLM protester when as a Caucasian he uses the N-word?!