Modern Mainstream Media... How Words Manipulate Ones Reality.

In the modern world of technology, many more people become more and more critical of the media.  The level of critique has gotten so bad with the dawn of the internet that it is almost a joke in some cases.

Just adding four words makes all of the difference.

In the chart above it shows how adding just four measly words to a phrase and suddenly the whole meaning is flipped to some people.  The best example is Republicans view of is the media moral as in the "the news media" the percent of people that agree with the statement is only 14% while when the words "you use most often" are added suddenly the percentage jumps to 57%, a drastic 43% increase just from adding four words.  However, this same trend can be said for Democrats as well.  Even though the jumps are not as drastic when asked if "the news media cared about the people they reported on", Democrats went from 33% to 46% with the same four words that were asked to cause Republicans to have a similar increase.  Based on the statistics alone, there is a direct correlation between the increase of people who trust the media that they use from the ominous "news media"  because logically people are likely to trust others that have similar ideas to them.  This trend is called a confirmation bias, which consists of the idea that only people that think in a similar way are right.

Chart by PewResearch

The chart above shows how this confirmation bias really affects one's perseption of what is correct.  The chart was created based on answers on a survey by Pew Research that placed the media sites based on the average response to the survey.  The chart also shows that the average respondent was slightly left which could cause the distribution to be off from where the media sites actually fall on the political spectrum.  Based on the subjective evidence in the chart as the data is placed based on the ideology of those used in the study, we can see that Fox News, a news outlet considered to be extreme right and full of fake news, is no more right than MSNBC is left.  In fact, news outlets that are considered to be factual like the New York Times and PBS are farther left than Fox is right but because the average respondant answered more left it only is logical that Fox would be considered far right.  Through this, one can infer that as a whole one's trust in the media is solely based on a confirmation bias as many people only want to surround themselves with people and ideas that have the same view as themselves thus causing this frankly concerning trend revolving around the peoples trust in the media.

Political Parties... Who to Trust With Your Money.

A political party is a group of individuals that have grouped together and believe in similar political ideology on the political spectrum.  They, for the most part, hold semi-similar ideologies and tend to hang out with people in similar political parties. The role of a political party is to bring forward political policies that the party wants to pass to the attention of the everyday citizen.  In modern politics, many people identify with some sort of political party, however, many people don't know the origin of the two-party system that the United States has adopted.  The modern political parties that are present today originally looked a lot different with the ideologies being almost completely flipped during the Civil War with Democrats residing primarily in the south and were concerned about economic policies while Republicans resided primarily in the north and were focused on social policies.  As shown in the map below, it shows how in 1960 the colors were completely flipped from what we are used to in the political map of today.

1860 Presidential Election

In modern America, with Trump pushing for more economic legislation, many people are asking if the Republican party is the better party to pass laws on economic policies.  According to GOP.com, Republicans are focused on reviving American jobs, tax reductions and encouraging American innovators.  In contrast, Democrats focus on higher taxes mainly on the rich, what is better for the whole is good for the individual, and investing in small businesses.

The average growth of individual income of the average citizen

As the graph above shows, the Democratic party's economic policy is better for the average citizen while the Republican party's policy is only really good for big businesses and corporations. The chart shows that in the 44 years that a Democratic president has been in power, the average individual income has risen by 271% while in the 40 years that a Republican has been president the individual income has only risen by 44% on average.

Average economic growth under each party

As the arrows above show, the economic growth has grown by an average of 4.4% a year under Democrats while under Republicans, the economy has only grown by 2.5% since World War 2.  When tying these arrows to the graph above, we can infer that the individual income under Democrats also benefitted the top 10% as well as the rest of the country.  Because of this, the Democratic party is better at creating a good economy based on the statics alone.

Interest Groups... the Shadows Influencing Politics.

          In the United States, there are roughly 329 million people (Census), each having a differing political view and opinion.  Due to this, many interest groups have formed to help the US government understand the issues that are pressing the nation.  An interest group is a community or organization in which every person in the group has a collective view on one matter in particular.  One such interest group is the NRA or National Rifle Association (nra.org).

          The NRA is an interest group founded in 1871 dedicated to advocating for the gun rights of Americans under the 2nd Amendment (guidestar.org) with more than 6 million members nationwide (America's 1st freedom).  The NRA is the leading monetary donor towards prohibiting the expansion of gun regulation as in 2013, the NRA's budget was estimated to be around $350 million (CNN).  In recent years the NRA has become one of the most outspoken Conservative interest groups to the point of considering anyone left of center as an enemy.

          One page on the NRA website that shows the NRA's POV is as such:

Current top trending post on NRA.org

          In this web post, the political view is immediately apparent to the reader as the title of the article states "What Happens if our Opponents Take the U.S. House?" and the article is headed with a photo of Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.   This indicated the absolute political ideology as a Core Conservative interest group because of the post clearly singles out the Democratic party as "our Opponents".  Due to this bias against Democrats and for Republicans, the NRA only posts about stories that make the Republican party look appealing and that paints the Democratic party as a ravaging animal that only wants to take away peoples rights.  Through this lens, the readers only see one side of the conversation so they are forced to make their own conclusions which can cause the rift between the two parties to break further apart.  As a result of this lens, there is a very prominent cultural impact in mainly the south part of the country with people in states like Texas and New Mexico believing that Democrats want to take away the right to "keep and bear arms" altogether.  

About the Author

What do I believe in?

          I currently hold the political ideology commonly related to New Era Enterprises according to the 23 Question Political Typology Quiz from the Pew Research Center. I believe that I got New Era Enterprises because I believe in social values like the equality, immigration, and gay marriage but at the same time holds economic values like lower taxes and less regulation of industries. A New Era Enterprises is defined as generally young, economically driven group that is relatively neutral towards immigration and sees the US's involvement in the global economy as a good thing. They, however, do not believe that racial discrimination as the main reason why minorities can't get ahead.

I do, however, attempts to also see different views from other political ideologies to understand the entire political debate. One such political ideology is Core Conservative.

What's the difference?

A Core Conservative believes that the government should be small and that there should be lower taxes. They are also more religious than other groups. Core Conservatives are like New Era Enterprises when it comes to economic values. Both Core Conservatives and New Era Enterprises believe in lower taxes and that the economic system is generally fair to most Americans. In the Washington state 2018 mid-terms, Washington State initiative 1631 (taxing carbon dioxide emissions) both Core Conservatives and New Era Enterprises would vote against the initiative because I-1631 was not only a tax, but it also impinged industry. However, Core Conservatives believe that government regulation does more harm than good while New Era Enterprises generally think that government regulation is okay. One example of this is the issue of gun rights. In the Washington state 2018 mid-terms, Washington State initiative 1639 (regulating firearms), Core conservatives would most likely vote against the initiative while New Era Enterprises would generally vote in favor of the initiative. Through this, the differences become ever apparent to the fact that New Era Enterprises hold a more conservative view in economic issues while holding a more liberal view on social issues, making the ideology generally right of center on the political spectrum while Core Conservatives are the farthest right of center.

Why do I hold these views?

I believe that I developed this ideology through my family because I dislike my family and thus has a mostly opposite view of politic than my family. I also believe that my political through social media like many teens in today's world.