I know I’m not saying anything you don’t already know about National Public Radio. The outlet’s Independence Day thread about how the Declaration of Independence and the birth of our nation was problematic because the text wasn’t inclusive, or something is just the latest in liberal media hysterics. No considering of the norms at the time. It was ‘wokness’ being retroactively applied because perpetual outrage is something liberal America has become addicted to like Hunter Biden and crack cocaine. Yet even NPR is becoming an increasingly grating experience for the progressive Left.
Writer Matt Taibbi wrote that many of this political persuasion are saying that the outlet has become an experiment in mass torture, with many wanting to drive their cars off cliffs to ease the pain of the endless segments about things no real person cares about. It all centers on NPR’s piece about Ben Shapiro and the success he’s had with The Daily Wire. In short, they’re mad that conservative outlets perform well on social media, better than the left-leaning publications, like The New York Times, and wonder if this is contributing to America’s polarization. Yeah, it’s comedy hour. Taibbi noted that the piece did not attack Shapiro’s publication for peddling misinformation or for being a die-hard Trumpist publication. It’s because—get this—they peddle the conservative agenda well:
By only covering specific stories that bolster the conservative agenda (such as… polarizing ones about race and sexuality issues)… readers still come away from The Daily Wire's content with the impression that Republican politicians can do little wrong and cancel culture is among the nation's greatest threats.
NPR complaining about the Daily Wire furthering polarization while promoting Lebanon-style race politics every single day is a bit like Colonel Sanders campaigning against heart disease https://t.co/AypM4xIfvK
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) July 20, 2021
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NPR’s monomaniacal focus on “race and sexuality issues” has become an industry in-joke. For at least a year, listening has been like being pinned in wrestling beyond the three-count. Everything is about race or gender, and you can’t make it stop. https://t.co/9gfwbicyKI
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) July 20, 2021
This piece is a master class in how the establishment media (in this case, publicly funded!) seek to label everything they don't like "misinformation," and then suppress it. They're coming for freedom of the press. And they're not hiding the ball. https://t.co/42LHHw6aAL
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) July 19, 2021
And this is where Taibbi goes to town, noting that the reason why these outlets, like NPR, aren’t doing well is that their content sucks, and people are going elsewhere. That’s just the nature of the business. By going after Shapiro and conservative media for…bolstering the conservative agenda, it sets up what this former Rolling Stone reporter aptly called a hilarious self-own (via Taibbi):
NPR has not run a piece critical of Democrats since Christ was a boy. Moreover, much like the New York Times editorial page (but somehow worse), the public news leader’s monomaniacal focus on “race and sexuality issues” has become an industry in-joke. For at least a year especially, listening to NPR has been like being pinned in wrestling beyond the three-count. Everything is about race or gender, and you can’t make it stop.
Conservatives have always hated NPR, but in the last year I hear more and more politically progressive people, in the media, talking about the station as a kind of mass torture experiment, one that makes the most patient and sensible people want to drive off the road in anguish.
[…]
“National” Public Radio in the last year has committed itself to a sliver of a sliver of a sliver of the most moralizing, tendentious, humor-deprived, jargon-obsessed segment of American society. Yet without any irony, yesterday’s piece still made deadpan complaint about Shapiro’s habit of “telling [people] what their opinions should be” and speaking in “buzzwords.”
This was functionally the same piece as the recent New York Times article, “Is the Rise of the Substack Economy Bad for Democracy?” which similarly blamed Substack for hurting “traditional news” — and, as the headline suggests, democracy itself — by being a) popular and b) financially successful, which in media terms means not losing money hand over fist. There, too, the reasons for the rise of an alternative media outlet were presented by critics as a frightening, unsolvable Scooby-Doo mystery.
It’s not. NPR sucks and is unlistenable, so people are going elsewhere. People like Shapiro are running their strategy in reverse and making fortunes doing it. One of these professional analysts has to figure this one out eventually, right?
Oh, and he lists the evidence of NPR’s insufferable coverage as of late:
“Broadway Is Reopening This Fall, And Every New Play Is By A Black Writer.” All seven new plays being written by black writers is “a step toward progress,” but critics “will be watching Broadway's next moves” to make sure “momentum” continues.
“She Struggled To Reclaim Her Indigenous Name. She Hopes Others Have It Easier.” It took Cold Lake First Nations member Danita Bilozaze nine whole months to change her name to reflect her Indigenous identity.
“Tom Hanks Is A Non-Racist. It's Time For Him To Be Anti-Racist.” Tom Hanks pushing for more widespread teaching of the Tulsa massacre doesn’t change the fact that he’s built a career playing “white men ‘doing the right thing,’” NPR complains.
It shows that even non-conservative writers can see clearly the unhinged appetites of the urban-based professional Left and how their problems…aren’t real. It’s driving their own side to insanity as well. It’s not just conservative America. Normal people do not care about what the ‘woke’ Left wants because it’s usually insane, like being pro-crime. And if Democrats want to continue to cater to these privileged white, college-educated liberals who would rather insult instead of persuading people with whom they disagree—enjoy being a permanent minority.
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