A Theory On Why Fox News Grips Our Parents in Its Evil Clutches

A theory.

Our parents grew up in a world where there were a few sources of news. Those news sources were considered trusted and set the stage for how we felt about the issues. They also typically had high journalistic standards.

Enter Fox News. A network telling you it is a) news, and b) fair and balanced. It hits an audience of people used to trusting their news with a message that all the evils in the world are the fault of people who don’t look, think, act or worship like you, and that things aren’t how they used to be. It provides an alternative to the thoughtful and sometimes uncomfortable journalism that came before it. It makes you feel better about your world view and then amplifies it. And they couldn’t call it “news” if it wasn’t true. After all, Walter Cronkite wouldn’t have lied back in his day, would he?

And as you watch, Fox begins to talk about how things used to be and they attack the media sources you used to rely on as “biased”. Fox News is the news you need, and everyone else is lying.

And so the information sources that helped shape your view of the world and sometimes even changed it for the better, are replaced by those that reinforce your existing view and play upon your worst tendencies. And sadly, the sources that may have once helped challenge that mindset have shrunk, diminished in influence, been absorbed into the entertainment division of their parent companies, and/or adapted a Fox News mentality to survive.

People who once had a well informed view have now become parrots of talking points assembled to sell an ideology to the world. And it’s one that was on display last week at the RNC, and in the commentary on the DNC. A thoughtful president, decent father, and accomplished leader, in spite of all that’s been thrown at him is tarred and feathered with questions of his heritage, sexuality, faith, patriotism, and more. His successor to the nomination has seen a 20+ year string of attacks that accuse her of murder, corruption, treason, and more. And we have a large population of people in this country who repeat, almost verbatim, dozens of allegations, attacks, and criticisms of any Democratic leader without basis in fact, context, or historical comparison.

The end result is that we have a large people who are ill-informed and don’t seem to know it. They’ve never done the research or legwork to question sources or challenge information because the organizations they watched in the past were trustworthy and had editorial standards. They assume by virtue of their existence and branding as a news organization, Fox News is just as accurate as the network news and newspapers of the 60s, 70s, and 80s were for them. They have little knowledge of how deregulation and consolidation of media, and the elimination of rules that govern political coverage have changed what they once watched to what we have now. They watch and trust what they see is true, fair, and accurate, because it historically had usually been so.

As a consequence, we have a country that’s divided in bitter and angry ways, often arguing as though there are two sets of facts in this world, because in their world view, there now are.