I'm so old, I remember the REAL corporate media.
When I was a kid, there were three corporations that owned all of the broadcast media in the United States: ABC, CBS, and NBC. Local print media, in my hometown, consisted of two newspapers - both owned by one huge corporation: Cox Newspapers. There were only a handful of film studios: MGM, UA, Fox and RKO.
It was de rigueur for the right-wing to incessantly complain about coverage and representation in the media, despite their ownership by conservative multi-millionaires. I remember (though perhaps somewhat incorrectly) Spiro Agnew kicking over a Washington Post newspaper stand and (explicitly) calling out the media as "nattering nabobs of negativism". And it was not inappropriate on behalf of the media, because the right-wing were, as they are now, thieves, scoundrels and liars. They were also the "comfortable" and it was incumbent to make them feel afflicted.
It's more than a bit frustrating, therefore, to witness the modern left's adoption of formerly fringe-right epithets aimed at the media - most specifically the ill-contrived "mainstream" moniker, meant as an insult. As a J-school student I was directed to always represent the mainstream in reportage. The mainstream, per The Cambridge Dictionary is "considered normal, and having or using ideas, beliefs, etc. that are accepted by most people". Reportage is the status quo, which is the unbiased norm.
The reactionary left's visceral hatred of the media is especially maddening in the 21st century, where alternative sources of information are nearly countless. It even has a modern moniker: "The Fifth Estate". This contingent's contempt of the Fourth Estate is de-evolutionary. There's plenty of affront to be shared, as it should be. It's simply a shame that those who should be the more enlightened among us have gradually ceded to a perspective that really is the exclusive province of the terminally-aggrieved reactionary right.
I do wish people would stop the wholesale derision. Yes, you will be angered by some of what you read and hear. That's human nature. No, you shouldn't pronounce a targeted conspiracy. Let the wingnuts own that. It's the natural order of things.
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