A good friend who has been active for years in politics told me recently her mental health was much better after turning off the news app on her phone. Two of my neighbors have cut back on watching the news. “Maybe I should be ashamed but I am overwhelmed by all the events I can’t do anything about,” one said.
I overheard the clerk in the liquor store tell a friend she was planning on buying a tv set but had decided to postpone the purchase until after the election.
This year I have watched less news and more sports. I scan the headlines of an online newspaper choosing however little or much I want to read.
Is it politics, the media or both that we are tuning out?
It is complicated. Most of what we know about politics is what the media chooses -- out of everything that happens – to tell us. We don’t have direct knowledge. What the media is attracted to, what the media finds significant, is all that we know.
In a recent PEW survey of political attitudes, almost all the respondents, 86 percent, said, “Democrats and Republicans are more focused on fighting each other than solving problems.”
How do we know that? Because it is the fighting and controversy the media tells us about. The extreme statements are what get attention.
The headline in the New York Times before one of the Republican presidential debates was, “Who Can Seize the Spotlight From Trump?” The headline after the debate, “Ramaswamy Seizes Spotlight as DeSantis Hangs Back.” How did he seize the spotlight? “He stirred controversy to soak up screen time, and lobbed some of the evening’s most strikingly personal slights.”
Notice how the media puts it. News happens. They just report it. The actors seize the spotlight. No hint the media owns the spotlight and decides where to shine it. The spotlight is just there. There is no ownership, no director. Events and people move in an out of the spotlight.
“Attention drifts to Manchin and No Labels,” “Newsom Raises His Profile With Hardball Tactics.” “Cawthorn has emerged as one of the most visible figures.” “How Old Is Too Old to Be President? An Uncomfortable Question Arises Again.”
The media chooses to spotlight conflict. There is a lot of conflict. Is there cause and effect?
There is a symbiotic relationship. The media wants stories that capture attention. Controversy gets attention. Politicians want coverage. The squirrel and the acorn find each other. Reporters know who to ask to get a provocative quote. Politicians know what to say or do to get included in the story.
The president of the New York Young Republican Club said, “We’ve embraced controversy as a good marketing tool … controversy sells … I was outrageous as much as I could possibly be to get people’s attention.”
A climate activist, after working in traditional climate advocacy for years, shifted to disruptive direct action. “It just gets so, so, so, so, so much more attention.”
How did the outrageous and disruptive actions get the “people’s” attention? That is where the spotlight shone.
There are 435 members of the House of Representatives. How many, outside of leadership can you name? Who come to mind? The most outspoken. The most controversial. Matt Gaetz. Marjorie Taylor Greene. AOC. The Squad. Can you name the two women who run the House Ways and Means Committee and decide how $6 trillion dollars will be spent this year?
When the extent of George Santos’ fictional re-creation of himself became clear, a longtime member of Congress predicted, “Every time he speaks, every time he asks a question, the media spotlight will be on him.”
In an interview after he was expelled from the House, Santos was asked, “What can we do to get you to go away?” His answer was simple and profound. “Stop inviting me to your gigs … But you can’t.”
Madison Cawthorn was elected to Congress from North Carolina in 2020 and was defeated in the Republican primary less than two years later. Variously described as a “conservative firebrand” and one who “courted controversy” he was called a “rising star” by among others, Time Magazine, CBS, New York Times, The Guardian, Washington Post, New York Post, Seattle Times, U.S. News, Spectrum, Salon and Bloomberg.
After his defeat, one columnist wrote, “The Madison Cawthorn Show Is Over, and We All Deserve Refunds.” There was no recognition that the media built the stage, turned on the klieg lights and sold the tickets.
A recent headline, “Biden goes positive. Can voters handle it?” should have been, “Biden goes positive. Can the media handle it?”
The media’s difficulty with writing about positive showed up in a national story on the recent mayoral election in Houston. “In contrast to the roiling divides and bitter clashes that characterized recent municipal elections in Los Angeles and Chicago, the race to lead the nation’s fourth-largest city has produced scant fireworks or fanfare … The two Democrats have struggled to draw bright lines between each other on issues.”
It was the reporter, however, who struggled to find controversy. The candidates sounded quite content not to be attacking each other. The reporter did find a professor to say how boring it all was. “What if we held a mayor election and nobody came?”
Why the focus on controversy when 57 percent of the respondents in the PEW survey said “disagreements get too much attention”, 78 percent “important issues get too little attention” and 65 percent “always or often feel exhausted when thinking about politics”?
Conflict grabs attention. A political scientist at John Hopkins University explains. “We’re evolutionarily predisposed to pay attention to conflict, because we might be in danger. We don’t turn our head really quickly to look at a beautiful flower. We turn our heads quickly to look at something that may be dangerous.” For the media, attention pays the bills.
Even though conflict grabs our attention, we prefer calm. We are not happy when we are agitated.
In a story about voters in Door County, here in Wisconsin, a woman recalled with some nostalgia she felt calmer when Barack Obama was president. The owner of a local establishment said, “We’re giving people the ability to come and laugh and forget about all the bullshit.”
The preference for calm is universal. The stories resonate. An Algerian writer lamented the choice young Algerians face to embrace either the martyrs of the independence war or the paradise promised by Islamists when what they really want is “to live, kiss, drink a beer.”
In Ireland where the Troubles are still in the background there is the same sentiment. “We just want to have a few laughs and good craic (a lively chat, often with a drink at hand).”
And in Italy, looking back at a rare interlude of relative political calm, “We just forgot about (politics) while Draghi was in power.”
I came to understand that feeling one June 30th lying on the deck of a small sailboat watching a few puffy white clouds floating in the sky above the blue-green waters of the Caribbean. I realized suddenly it was June 30th. Back in Illinois under the Capitol rotunda, where for the previous 15 years I had spent the last day of June, the legislative session would be ending.
Memories crowded in. Leaders and members intent on passing what they wanted before the midnight deadline. Parties vying with each other to claim credit or assign blame. Meetings. More meetings. Amendments. Surprises. The hustle, the bustle, the intensity. Invigorating. Addictive. Everything important.
Almost as an epiphany it came to me that during all those years, for most people June 30 was just another day. The sun, the breeze, the gentle lapping of the waves reclaimed my senses.
Why so much conflict when there is widespread recognition that is not what the public wants?
In addition to grabbing our attention, there is a second reason. It is easier to tear down than to build. For the politicians, the consultants and the pundits it is easier to point out what is wrong than to craft a workable solution. Easier to attack than to agree. For the media, it is easier to cover controversy than to tell a story in a way that makes complex policy interesting.
Reporters readily acknowledge the louder and more frightening, the more space. “The political media loves a good fight. And any fight featuring the former president promises to be tacky, unhinged and entertaining.”
Louder, more frightening, tacky, unhinged, yes. Entertaining? Mostly for those who participate or benefit. The rest of us are exhausted or tune out.
Two stories from different times illustrate the point.
Extreme words was the “hot topic” last month at the 103rd meeting of the American Meteorological Society. Do “bomb cyclone” and “atmospheric river,” contribute to public safety and climate-change awareness or just leave the public numb? Those words evolved “to get people’s attention” but weather scientists are now asking how people actually respond. “Do they take the proper precautions? Or do they tune it out?”
The second story is Aesop’s fable of “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”. Reading it again for the first time in years, it was the boy’s motive that caught my attention. He got a kick from watching the villagers run up the hill to protect their sheep. When he cried “wolf”, they responded. He had power. The villagers could be manipulated for his amusement.
There are many today who cry “wolf” to grab our attention. For their amusement. For their profit. For their power. We take shelter or run up the hill. Only so many times, however, before we decide there are better things to do than respond to every contrived crisis.
Tuning out the continuous clamor while still staying engaged is a balancing act. Many seem to have figured out how. Despite our exhaustion, as a people in recent elections we have voted in record numbers. Those I know who have turned off their apps and tuned out the noise all plan to go to the polls on election day. In the meantime, they feel much better.
Some in the media recognize there is an alternative to “endless manufactured arguments”. In a Sunday magazine story about sports broadcasting and sports personalities, the writer points to the success of Scott Van Pelt, anchor of ESPN’s Sports Center, who spurns outrage and embraces what is seen by most in the trade as “subversive”.
“You don’t have to be loud or combative or provocative to hold your audience’s attention — intelligence, charm and humor still resonate.”
What is most disturbing is the short term memory of so many people, who are prone to accept and repeat false statements and become so susceptible to the disinformation campaigns. The continuing question is how many people, especially the younger voters, even pay attention to the national media (TV, Newspapers), and are so vulnerable to the disinformation from other sources. Some commentators on CNN and MSNBC recently wondered if they were just speaking to the "beltway" crowd. I regularly read or hear the headline about the strategic error of the Administration not spreading the word about its accomplishments, but then there is no report of that information in any detail.