Media Markets and Marketing Games

The first instinct of both parties in the United States is to blame the other for the political problems of the present. Any political debate between them seems to descend into a game of creative name calling that has little purpose and even less potential for achieving real dialogue. It is always taken for granted that these two sides are lightyears apart.

The liberal side is content to point the finger at the former president. Despite his effective removal from the office, Democrats and the media that supports them consistently come up with more ways to discredit him. Nonstop articles continue to paint the legal drama of Donald Trump, accusing him of obstructing justice, hiding information, or committing treason.

At the same time, conservatives are content to play the same game of name-calling and finger-pointing as the Democrats. According to Fox News, Joe Biden is a corrupt politician with ties to the Chinese Communist Party, with a focus on the role of his son in international business.

Do either of these debates have any bearing on policy or political action?

No. The problem that confronts us here is that they were never meant to discuss policy. Media has become so sensationalized that it is designed to sell products, not to inspire meaningful change. Articles are designed for reaction.

Media is designed for consumption, meaning it is supposed to appeal to people with certain prejudices and dispositions. A Facebook post or a Tweet from a media company is meant to appeal to what it considers its audience.

Public debate uses the tools of media. Each side has an arsenal of interpretations to throw at one another, each with different information and priorities. The Democrats focus on Trump, and the Republicans on Hunter Biden.

Sensationalist media has led to tribal oppositions in politics.

A person's media consumption is driven by their identity with a certain group. Democrats and Republicans have opposed news sources, each exploiting a different market, reinforcing the differences between the two. This emphasis upon difference has a tendency to distract from the actual differences between the two political groups.

One commentator explained that "political tribalism is about identities, and thus is rooted deeply in emotions … people feel as if their identities are under attack when their politics are attacked." Tribalism is the reinforcing of an identity to the exclusion of others, so that it is in opposition to other groups. When our political opinions are tied to our very identities, politics becomes incredibly important, but the content of politics is no longer a major dimension of this. Instead, politics become a game of whose identity is more real, rather than what would actually benefit society.

The problem is much deeper than political name-calling and attention-grabbing.

Although specialists have studied the issue, a solution is elusive. Reaction-news has been around for a very long time. After the 1898 sinking of an American ship, the U.S.S. Maine, by an unknown explosion off the coast of Cuba (then owned by Spain), newspapers decried it as an act of Spanish aggression. Historians concluded more recently that the explosion that sank the Maine was more likely caused by an accident involving the ship's boilers.

William Randolph Hearst, a massive media mogul at the time of the incident, exploited the news for profit. Many Americans felt that the Spanish posed a threat to their country, which was becoming more and more a part of their personal identities. Hearst sold papers that appealed to the hatred of Spain, describing horrible atrocities they committed against the people of Cuba, who were struggling for independence.

It was no longer important whether the events had actually happened. Hearst chose those best suited to his needs: selling papers and building his personal brand. The United States invaded Spain in 1898 and seized the Philippines, where it fought a brutal war against the local population for over another decade. It also occupied Puerto Rico and other territories it had taken from Spain in the Pacific Ocean.

The problem is not with politics. It is with the capitalist media that pursues profit before all else.

Present day politics are less divisive than they have been in the past. From the earliest days of the United States, political conflicts have been resolved by gunfire and the mobilization of state militias more than civil discussion. There was a civil war where nearly half the states seceded from the country. Afterwards, Democrats in the south used terrorism and voter suppression to prevent the Republicans from breaking their hold on local politics.

Personal identities have become so tightly bound to media that it is unsurprising the world seems as though it is falling apart. Companies need it that way so they can exploit the emotions of their audiences to earn money.

If the division between the two parties were a small split in a beam of wood, media companies are a hammer that drives a wedge deep between them. Both are still part of the same board, mind you. Talking about politics is so hard because neither side is willing to examine the whole world around it. Both remain in echo chambers that are sometimes even isolated from members of the same group.

The problem remains.

Although we've gotten to the root of the problem, no immediate solution presents itself. Creating a national media company is rife with its own problems (for instance state-run media in China or Russia), but allowing capitalist media to continue as it has will solve nothing either.

I have no problem admitting this is a problem I cannot solve. But it will haunt us. It will drive wedges between other identities besides Republicans and Democrats, like those of race, gender, and sexuality. Hate crimes have already reached a ten-year high, partly the result of the current media climate.

These worrying trends may continue for decades if the underlying causes are not addressed. But what are we to do? It will take much more than just discussing the problem to actually solve it. Hopefully, with a better understanding of the situation as it stands, we can come to a reckoning. It will not be easy. But it will be necessary.