NPR is in an unpleasant place where the left & left-center are annoyed at its incessant pandering to the right, and the right is annoyed because NPR hasn’t capitulated entirely to their culture war demands.
I still donate to my local public radio station, but sheesh, it’s hard to listen to their national shows anymore. And I think my conservative counterparts feel the same way about it, judging by the things said about NPR in conservative forums.
Either way, I doubt they can expect much federal funding in the future.
What do you think the problem is, do you think it’s just hard to create national news programming that both left and right can agree on? I don’t really listen to NPR anymore either, I guess a lot because I don’t drive as much but somewhat because the best shows have gone independent. I like the idea of NPR, but maybe it just doesn’t have a place in the modern media landscape?
Becoming satisfactorily "right" to avoid accusations of left-wing bias means embracing simply made-up stories, as a matter of daily routine. You also have to dial up the culture war stuff and make it far more prominent, not dial it down, while slanting it much farther right-wing. This will usually involve some significant overlap with the "made-up stories" thing.
You also don't get to follow reasonable lines for follow up like, "hey, if all that 'fraud' we covered was real and the evidence was as clear and widespread as you said... now that you're in power, where are the investigations? Where are the indictments?" and repeat for a ton of other similar things where accusations fly with confidence when there are no stakes, but as soon as they're asked to put up or shut up, they... well, they don't even shut up, they keep talking about them, they just never do anything because it's all made-up and can't survive contact with reality.
You know, the kind of thing a responsible right-wing (or any-wing!) source that was taking them seriously and cared about the alleged problem would do. You mustn't do that.
I'm sick of their "horse race" coverage of elections, which has gotten just awful. I suppose it's a combination of that being what "sells", being very easy (you don't need to do any actual journalism! You just have pundits Monday-morning quarterback campaign strategy instead!), and being "apolitical" so perceived as useful to support an attempt to avoid bias accusations, which accusations they seem very worried about but will never stop short of their becoming an outright right-wing mouthpiece.
This has gotten much worse as "election season" has expanded to be like three years out of every four. I cannot overemphasize the degree to which this single thing has gotten me to shift from "they're a decent centrist source" all the way over to "I actively dislike them". It's so fucking frustrating for them to waste time talking about this crap instead of going, you know, is any of this shit coming out of politicians mouths even true? But no, how will it perhaps affect polling? How might their opponent respond? That's the relevant question. JFC.
On top of this: the ads. They run so very many ads. Between the ads for "sponsors", the ads for their own programs and podcasts, and the pledge drives, they've got about as many ads as commercial radio. This did not used to be the case, and it sucks.
[EDIT] Oh and they continue to give David Brooks an outlet. What a complete hack. That's annoying when anyone does it.
Good. I used to be a daily NPR listener, but it lost the plot years ago. Now every time I accidentally switch to it it's either 5 minutes of Trump hate or some "current thing" I don't care about.
NPR is in an unpleasant place where the left & left-center are annoyed at its incessant pandering to the right, and the right is annoyed because NPR hasn’t capitulated entirely to their culture war demands.
I still donate to my local public radio station, but sheesh, it’s hard to listen to their national shows anymore. And I think my conservative counterparts feel the same way about it, judging by the things said about NPR in conservative forums.
Either way, I doubt they can expect much federal funding in the future.
What do you think the problem is, do you think it’s just hard to create national news programming that both left and right can agree on? I don’t really listen to NPR anymore either, I guess a lot because I don’t drive as much but somewhat because the best shows have gone independent. I like the idea of NPR, but maybe it just doesn’t have a place in the modern media landscape?
Either way, this feels like a phyrric victory.
Becoming satisfactorily "right" to avoid accusations of left-wing bias means embracing simply made-up stories, as a matter of daily routine. You also have to dial up the culture war stuff and make it far more prominent, not dial it down, while slanting it much farther right-wing. This will usually involve some significant overlap with the "made-up stories" thing.
You also don't get to follow reasonable lines for follow up like, "hey, if all that 'fraud' we covered was real and the evidence was as clear and widespread as you said... now that you're in power, where are the investigations? Where are the indictments?" and repeat for a ton of other similar things where accusations fly with confidence when there are no stakes, but as soon as they're asked to put up or shut up, they... well, they don't even shut up, they keep talking about them, they just never do anything because it's all made-up and can't survive contact with reality.
You know, the kind of thing a responsible right-wing (or any-wing!) source that was taking them seriously and cared about the alleged problem would do. You mustn't do that.
Yes, I think that’s the problem.
It’s not possible to, e.g., merely juxtapose a right wing opinion with a left wing opinion and then declare victory.
Even Wikipedia’s approach of searching for a neutral point of view has come under attack these past years, from multiple unhappy factions.
I don’t think there’s an obvious solution. It sucks.
Fox News found that to keep the right wing happy you have to say things you know to be untrue, which in most cases is a crime.
Lefty (mostly ex-) NPR listener here.
I'm sick of their "horse race" coverage of elections, which has gotten just awful. I suppose it's a combination of that being what "sells", being very easy (you don't need to do any actual journalism! You just have pundits Monday-morning quarterback campaign strategy instead!), and being "apolitical" so perceived as useful to support an attempt to avoid bias accusations, which accusations they seem very worried about but will never stop short of their becoming an outright right-wing mouthpiece.
This has gotten much worse as "election season" has expanded to be like three years out of every four. I cannot overemphasize the degree to which this single thing has gotten me to shift from "they're a decent centrist source" all the way over to "I actively dislike them". It's so fucking frustrating for them to waste time talking about this crap instead of going, you know, is any of this shit coming out of politicians mouths even true? But no, how will it perhaps affect polling? How might their opponent respond? That's the relevant question. JFC.
On top of this: the ads. They run so very many ads. Between the ads for "sponsors", the ads for their own programs and podcasts, and the pledge drives, they've got about as many ads as commercial radio. This did not used to be the case, and it sucks.
[EDIT] Oh and they continue to give David Brooks an outlet. What a complete hack. That's annoying when anyone does it.
Asking is seeming more like telling
Congressional Republicans all seem to be in lockstep (goose-step?) behind him so it doesn't really matter either way.
Good. I used to be a daily NPR listener, but it lost the plot years ago. Now every time I accidentally switch to it it's either 5 minutes of Trump hate or some "current thing" I don't care about.