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Opinion | Does demise of BuzzFeed News and fall of Tucker Carlson and Don Lemon signal a return to US media civility?
- The closing of BuzzFeed News and the dismissals of Tucker Carlson and Don Lemon are good news for those tired of divisiveness in US media
- Even so, reviving civility requires leaders who set a constructive example for a society worn out by constant polarising rhetoric
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The past two weeks have been good for anyone worn out by the divisiveness stoked by the US news media. On April 20, BuzzFeed announced it was winding down BuzzFeed News, one of the leading contributors to the shift away from the centre by many American news organisations. Most used to play it fairly straight in their reporting, even if they tended to lean slightly one way or the other.
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In Jill Abramson’s 2019 book Merchants of Truth, the former New York Times executive editor cited the success of BuzzFeed and the like as one of the drivers of the Times’ shift towards injecting bias into news to keep readers happy. For example: “there was an implicit financial reward for the Times in running lots of Trump stories, almost all of them negative: they drove big traffic numbers”.
Then, on April 24, Fox News announced the surprise departure of conservative commentator Tucker Carlson and CNN parted ways with long-time host Don Lemon. Both are high-profile, divisive figures in the US media. For people who loathe those who sow division in the United States, you would have to watch President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump keel over simultaneously from heart attacks on the debate stage to top that.
Go around picking quarrels and provoking trouble in Asia and you are likely to end up in hot water. It is the same with inciting racial tensions in Malaysia or insulting political leaders in Singapore or the royal family in Thailand. However, the likes of Carlson and Lemon did all this and more in the US media every day. This behaviour is protected by the US Constitution, and it pays well.
There is an entire industry built on being as disrespectful and insulting as possible about the people you don’t like to attract eyeballs who don’t like them either, all to sell advertisements. Discerning the benefit to society of this is beyond difficult; discerning the danger is not.
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The US has largely kept the world from a war between its great powers since 1945. However, it is clear today that the democratic world’s adversaries have doubts about the resolve of the US. The country’s divisions and the media’s trashing of America’s leaders probably reinforces those doubts.
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