"You don't want to listen to the right and the left -- the extremes," he said. "You don't want to listen to Keith Olbermann and Rush Babe [Limbaugh] and Rachel Minnow [sic] or whatever that is, and Glenn Beck. They're entertainers. They couldn't govern their way out of a paper sack -- from the right or the left. But they get paid a lot of money from you and advertisers -- thirty, fifty million a year -- to work you over and get you juiced up with emotion, fear, guilt, and racism. Emotion, fear, guilt, and racism."
And you have to love what Mr. Simpson says in those last lines of the article: "Everybody's entitled to their own opinions, but nobody's entitled to their own facts."
Sound familiar?
That's the same thought echoed by Michael Specter. As a culture, we are so polarized that we stopped accepting facts in favor of what we want to believe. This is easy to do when we can - thanks to our digital culture - simply surround us in whatever we want. If we don't want to watch something, or read something, or listen to something, we don't have to.
Years ago, if you sat through the news, you had to see different sides of an issue - whether you believe it or not. At least you were exposed to it, though.
Today, you can choose whichever network caters to your tastes. And don't forget how they cater the 'facts' to your opinions too.
Today, you can use rss to send you just the stories in just the subjects you are interested in. Now, in many ways this is wonderful, but it also neglects to include anything that challenges you.
Today, you can read just the blogs or news sources you want that cater to just your tastes.
We are more selective than ever. But that takes its toll on us too.
No comments:
Post a Comment