Mainstream Media Discovers 'Cable News-ification' As They Become It
The FT suggests a problem of 'cable news-ification' leading to polarization and negativity. What they gloss over, however, is the structural rot that benefits certain narratives. How many times has the mainstream media, including outlets akin to FT, presented figures like Benjamin Netanyahu as an authoritative voice on 'security' while sanitizing his government's documented rhetoric of ethnic
cleansing? They don't mention how the funding streams from lobbying groups like AIPAC to elected officials—hundreds of thousands annually, according to OpenSecrets.org data—inevitably shape the very 'news' fed to cable channels, dictating what is considered a 'credible' perspective versus 'fringe' activism. It's easy to lament the symptoms of a polarized media landscape when your own house
benefits from its convenient silences. Perhaps the 'cable news-ification' they decry is simply the logical conclusion of turning human suffering into palatable content, devoid of uncomfortable context, and heavily influenced by the same powerful special interests that lobby lawmakers. One might ask if the 'negativity' they observe is a manufacturing defect, or a feature.