this post was submitted on 05 Sep 2023
859 points (97.6% liked)

politics

19090 readers
5913 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

Will Bunch expresses what I've been thinking since Trump was elected. American democracy is under attack from within. The fascists who yearn for an authoritarian government in the media are promoting it, and the media who supposedly don't support it fail to recognize it. They are busy trying to follow the political playbook of the 20th century.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Corporations have done a fantastic job keeping 50% of the population dumber than a bag of bricks and voting against their own interest.

A lot of people vote against their own interests, but I don't think you can really blame the corporations for that.

Voting against their interests tends to be culture war nonsense, and corporations don't really want to get involved in that because they never want to take sides, because that could cost them customers. See the recent Bud Lite nonsense for example.

Instead, what they tend to do is use their money to seed out candidates who hold views they don't like (basically ensuring that the DNC and RNC only run candidates that the companies approve of) or doing things after elections to get loopholes and carve-outs in laws that benefit them. When you effectively have both the democrats and republicans on your payroll, you don't really care which side people vote for, you just ensure that whoever's elected is beholden to you.

As for keeping people dumb, again, not something most corporations work for. Some of them, like tech companies, even want an intelligent workforce. The more people in their hiring pool, the less they have to pay. Having said that, they're happy if the government cuts funding to schools if it means tax breaks that benefit them.

But yeah, I think fundamentally you're right. The only team that can beat the fascists includes a lot of corporate democrats. And with corporate democrats in the "big tent", there are lots of reforms that are never going to be on the table. And, when people see corporate-owned politicians in power and refusing to even consider common-sense reforms, they get frustrated. Some stop voting entirely. Others give up and vote for the fascists because they hope that will at least disrupt the system.

Bringing it back to journalism, it seems to me like what we need is good journalism that exposes both the stranglehold the corporations have on a lot of politicians, and how much bribery and influence peddling there is, but also how the other side is outright fascist and what the consequences might be. Instead we get horse race journalism, and talking points, and both-sides he-said-she-said bullshit.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

As for keeping people dumb, again, not something most corporations work for. Some of them, like tech companies...

Yes and no...

to a large company, more legbor skilled in doing the thing you want them to do is excelant to drive wages down, everything else a person can learn is not their priority.

For their customers, adiction makes people unable to think no matter how smart they are. To force someone to keep buying, make them an adict. Super common in amarica, things like processed shugar, high fructose corn syrup, loot boxes and gambling come to mind.