He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion… Nor is it enough that he should hear the opinions of adversaries from his own teachers, presented as they state them, and accompanied by what they offer as refutations. He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them…he must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form.
- John Stuart Mill
I don’t generally follow news I disagree with because it stresses me out pointing out how everything they think is wrong… BUT… I do poke my nose in on “beforeitsnews.com” every now and then to see what the batshit crazy fringe is up to.
because it stresses me out pointing out how everything they think is wrong…
Honestly, that sounds fairly healthy. I have a weird obsession with being well informed and being able to articulate arguments from all sides (which has occasionally made me very unpopular both in real life and online) and while it’s a fine intellectual exercise, it’s probably not the most conducive to feeling great.
I don’t really follow right-wing news sources, as much as I follow right-wing commentators. I already know what the news on the right says, but what I’m interested in is how the people on the right actually interpret that news; which points they choose to regurgitate, and which points the average person on the right will latch onto. FOX News can say 30 different things about one particular news story, but generally the audience will only focus on one or two.
Breaking Points. I disagree with the conservatives on there, but respect them. They are smart and rational, and often make good points.
Ooooooh, thank you! That sounds exactly like what I was hoping for!
Glad I helped, hope you find it engaging!
Where I live the commercial TV evening news shows are completely Murdoc level conservative trash. I still watch them I guess.
My day one bottom bitch, as Butters would call it, for news source I don’t always agree with but love: Jon Stewart. I lean right, especially back when The Daily Show was airing with Jon Stewart. Never mattered tho, always loved his perspective and wish I could list the amount of shit he’s brought to my attention or changed my stance on.
I follow a lot of podcasts that are either center-left sources or Democratic party cheerleaders: NPR and the NPR Politics Podcast, Ezra Klein (God he’s an insufferable twat), the Daily, Pod Save America…some of these I listen to because I want to know what the, “mainstream American left,” believes, some of them just have good information; NPR’s Up First is a great 15 minute morning news wrap, and the Daily does good in depth reporting (even better when Michael Barbaro is on vacation).
I don’t listen to right-wing pundits like Ben Shapiro or Matt Walsh very often. They’re mostly culture war crap, and there’s usually very little information to be gained from them. I do regularly read conservative reporting though, mostly WSJ and the Economist.
I can’t help but agree with you, most conservative media is so smug and smarmy, it’s insufferable. “Don’t Walk, Run!” is an example, same with Piers Morgan. Like, can’t these guys say their piece without acting like fucking Ben Shapiro? It’s rare you find a regular, lucid guy just talking about political news or having discussions with the other side.
I’m fascinated by Anna Kasparian’s political evolution over the past year, and I’m almost tempted to see what TYT are up to these days.
Yeah, I fell off of TYT in 2017 or 2018 for a lot of the same reasons I can’t stand listening to right-wing pundits; a lot of smug and little information (mostly from Cenk). I hadn’t heard anything about Ana Kasperian. What happened with her?
There are some leftist podcasts that I like, but they are kinda just angry and unproductive, like The Insurgents; I only listen to them when I’m deeply angry or they have a good guest. The Lever is probably the best new left-wing podcast I’m listening to right now, and the Majority Report is always great.
Ana seems to have become a lot less radical/“everyone I disagree with is a Nazi” than she used to be. Not to say she still isn’t far-left, but that she’s now more willing to talk to and be friends with, say, Trump voters. She has been going on more moderate and right-leaning podcasts etc and having healthy debates and not just screeching like she was famous for doing in 2016.
That’s why like Emma Vigeland. She’s calm, cool, and pretty open minded, and when things do get confrontational, it’s Tim Pool that’s screeching, not her.
She went on some rants about taking offense to the term ‘birthing person’ and got expressly angry that Cenk’s nephew got rich off Twitch so she kinda put out there she’s willing to grift for money. Which sucks.
lemmy
I don’t follow any news sources, and I’m still over-informed.
I live in Northern New York so newzjunky.com, they’re a right wing rag but one of the few local news sources so I still follow them.
I follow russian official media and look for trend in z-bloggers spaces via a compilatory channel at https://t.me/s/ve4niyvoy In one way or another they prove whatever breakthrough is announced in western media, like killing of generals or using new munition or attacking X place. But I don’t dive into these too much because my mental health can take only a brief amount of that. Russian media are too fucking dense, intense, and it’s no wonder people who casually watch them without a stellar opinion on stuff got zombified and soothed into z-thoughts.
What is this z- prefix you’re using?
Z is painted on much of the Russian war kit. It’s their equivalent of a swastika.
Yep, it’s officially promoted as a symbol of being involved in that war that then generalized as a sign of being patriotic. I mostly described military bloggers, but regular idiots too started to change their and their communities names to include english Z and also S V O into their nicknames on the web. The right hand rule is if you see an avatar with Z or a person who has uppercase english letters you just block them for they are long lost.
The only news site I follow is my country’s equivalent of the BBC, which leans left. Lemmy also skews heavily to the left, but the podcasts I listen to tend to be more centrist or center-right from my perspective - though some might argue that someone like Joe Rogan is far-right, which I disagree with.
I don’t align myself with any particular side. I form my opinions on an issue-by-issue basis rather than adopting the beliefs of “my side” - whatever that may be - as a package deal. I’ve been on the right, and I’ve been on the left, but I’ve since settled somewhere in the middle. I feel like I have a fairly accurate understanding of both perspectives and can often argue for most hot topics from either side’s point of view.
I don’t align myself with any particular side. I form my opinions on an issue-by-issue basis rather than adopting the beliefs of “my side” - whatever that may be - as a package deal.
I’d like to think that most people do this, but unfortunately I know better. I would like to say, however, that it’s possible to make your own independent decisions about each issue, have them align with one party more than the other, and then identify with the party that your views align with. As long as your views define your party, rather than your party defining your views, there is nothing wrong with identifying with the party that you’re closest to.
The Economist
Ha, fair. I generally go about 60/40 on the agree disagree ratio with them but I really respect the way they articulate their views.
I’m on Lemmy obviously, and generally I agree with all the leftist takes here, but sometimes I think they stray too far from reality. Not in their extremism (I’m fine with that) but literally just that they’re based off of unreal facts or logic (insert Ben Shapiro joke here).
I don’t follow any right-wing news sources directly, but whenever I see articles posted around, there are topics that I generally take issue with the coverage of by “normal” newspapers, especially the Israel situation (horribly misrepresented in Israel’s favor by most western media).
Since I try to align my beliefs with reality, and I don’t tend to follow news sources that don’t accurately portray reality, ideally I wouldn’t follow any news source that I regularly disagree with. Opinion articles are fair game though.
Since I try to align my beliefs with reality, and I don’t tend to follow news sources that don’t accurately portray reality, ideally I wouldn’t follow any news source that I regularly disagree with.
Said every dogmatic, orthodox zealot since the beginning of time.
Skill issue tbh, just don’t warp your own view of reality to conform to a preexisting narrative
(UK) I read the Daily Mail and the Guardian and have issues with both of them. Daily Mail because of language used around immigrants and benefit recipients. The Guardian I find panders to its audience presenting news from Palestinian a certain way. But I want to read both these points of view as there’s always elements of truth in what’s being said that opposite news sources leave out for their own reasons.
Oh interesting. I always thought the Daily Mail was more of a tabloid with like topless girls on page three or whatever. Am I confusing it with something else? Or is it both?
And fully agree with you on the Guardian.
It is a tabloid. And although I don’t agree with some of their stances, I find the criticism it’ll get from UK sections of Lemmy or Reddit are quite knee jerk and over the top. I don’t think any of the main UK tabloids do page 3 topless anymore. The sports ones maybe?
Typically they report stories with a simplified language style, and tend to sensationalise some language. Though this seems to be far from as bad as how it’s sometimes made out. Not to set the bar too low or anything, but here are a few articles grabbed at random from their frontpage:
Personal story of women paralysed by hit by a teen driver who was texting / videoing / driving dangerously. The article focuses on her family and her suffering. The conviction of the perpetrator is handled quite matter of factly. Nothing is generalised, young drivers arent made out to be villains in any way.
Piece on continued allegations against Gregg Wallace. All allegations are attributed to specific unnamed sources. All are taken credibly. Defence of Wallace / brushing things away appears entirely absent. There’s one quote of a friend saying it’s not like him, everything else in the article explains how he made lots of people uncomfortable / assaulted / or was a creep. It quotes specifically what was said / done with respect to racism allegations without taking any particular delight in including that information.
American 14 year old girl shoots self because of cyber bullying, culprits not caught. Despite the girl being a cheerleader, gymnast and surfer amongst other things the article is tasteful, celebrates her accomplishments and there are no what you might call ‘creepy’ shots of her doing these activities.
That’s just a few. It’s all just…I don’t know… pretty uninteresting to me. But I read it to see what slice of the world that their readers are getting. I think when certain groups trounce the DM as worthless trash (which it may well be in some cases) that doesn’t ring at all true with people reading the likes of the above and it only serves to deepen the divides present in this country.
In the US and I read mountains of business and economic news,much of most of it assumes the reader supports and agrees with the underlying premises of cronie capitalism. It’s a really helpful way to understand how businesses operate, think and where economy and society will be driven.
