A Case Study in the “Fake News” Feedback Loop
You can learn a lot by being an audio engineer editing things…
Background
I follow politics closely and identify as an Independent. There currently is no established Party or Platform that I find shares my Values, Vision, or Approach to Governance that meets my standards. In a way, during a time when US Political Party Partisanship is at an all time high, it is the only rational thing to do. I’m an active Local, State, and National voter — and, strangely enough — optimistic about the future of US National Politics.
How? For years I was the only person in the room who actually seemed to care about the Political Sphere. The only person my age who ascribed to the Universal Political Skepticism of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson and Mark Twain. US Politics is the ultimate Social Experiment, and there are a lot more interested participants now than 2012.
We are just starting out with the Growing Pains. Most of the people who are now suddenly very concerned on a day-to-day basis with US Politics are pretty damn ignorant. Not just about US Politics, mind you, but I mean basic shit like “We landed on the Moon, the Earth is Round, and Evolution is Proven.”
If you take offense to any one of those three (3) subjects as insulting to your Beliefs, guess what — your Beliefs are intellectually inferior, or “dumb” as you might be more inclined to call it, so the problem in this situation is YOU.
Discover the Barren Wasteland Where the Soul of Sean Hannity Should Reside: A Case Study
I know Ted Koppel was a punchline for Saturday Night Live years ago, with the “Jacko on his Back-o” bit still echoing in my brain. It’s kind of a letdown legacy wise, to me, when Mr. Koppel produced countless high-quality Journalism reports and contributed an extreme amount of useful intelligence to the US Populace. He doesn’t deserve to be a punchline, that is for sure.
Step 1: Invite Respected Smart Person to Chat, Then Talk Over Them
Watching Sean Hannity squirm in his chair while Koppel took him down was really hard. Sean was unable to shut up longer than a sugar-drenched three year old who wants another handful of gummy bears. Now we know why, because Ted Koppel summarized a significant problem in a very concise, accurate, and damning fashion:
…you have attracted people who are determined that ideology is more important than facts.
Step 2: Wait for Legitimate Journalism Piece to Show Up
It doesn’t take long to unravel the sloppy hack work that Sean Hannity seems to need in order to survive — like some kind of genetic accident that doesn’t need oxygen to breathe, just a constant audio stream of his own version of reality played in an earpiece 24/7, mixed in with the screams of Napalm victims for a change of pace during commercial breaks. It’s plausible.
CBS dared to interrupt the normal signal being piped into the earpiece with something actually true, and it sent Sean Hannity into overdrive. As though that one moment of Truth slipping into his feed almost killed him. He went ballistic, and after closing his eyes to see the words he had tattooed on the inside of his eyelids one afternoon in February 2017, was ready to respond.
“FAKE NEWS!”
Step 3: Get Impressionable & Mentally Unsound People to Watch
I suppose where you can see me going with Step 3, but that’s too obvious because you know it’s true. And, if you’re an ideological light-weight like Sean Hannity, it’ll probably insult you with how obvious it is to sketch out.
Conclusion
I’m not going to make a lot of friends by talking down to the kinds of people who are not intellectually prepared enough to even know they’re being played. So, in the grand scheme of things, the first step will be to use Sean Hannity in the next Space X rocket test, because until we excise his brand of intellectual cancer, as a Nation, we will not be able to have good discussions with one another.
It’s just so sad that as a nation the US turns to cowards like Sean Hannity who hide behind Beliefs and use them as Weapons and doesn’t immediately come to the conclusion that the fucking huckster should be tarred and feathered.
