Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Our kind of truth

Populist demagogues in politics and the mass media are doing everything they can to discredit the quality press as propaganda organs for left-wing elites who sneer at the views of ordinary Americans. Santorum pretends to speak for these people – that is, for a minority of Americans who are mostly white, provincial, highly religious, deeply conservative on cultural and social issues, and convinced that Obama and all Europeans are dangerous godless socialists.
The point is not whether Santorum is right or wrong factually. What he says “feels” right to his followers, because it conforms to their prejudices. And the Internet, having swamped the quality press, feeds and reinforces those prejudices, making it more difficult to distinguish the truth from lies.
The public is increasingly segmented into groups of likeminded people who see their views echoed back to them in blogs, comments, and tweets. There is no need to be exposed to different opinions, which are, in any case, considered to be propaganda.

Our Kind of Truth, by Ian Buruma on Project Syndicate

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