Friday, August 17, 2018

What you should read








I am not going to name             .

I know you want to read about      . I am the same way.                is compelling, hateable, important! And though we cannot blame the Internet for pulling our once mediocre democracy into a terrifying feudalism, or our culture into attention starved bait, there are correlations. But we, right here and right now, are the feeders, the oxygen. The spectacle of someone like              cannot live on its own. We make the dream, or the nightmare, real.

But I know that it is not enough for me to simply not name             , because with this figure, we are still dealing at the level of symptom. We must work at the root. Reducing the billions of mentions of             , even by half, would do little for us, like killing half of a locust invasion. In the end all the crops will be eaten anyway. No, our very reference must change, the world we operate in, and the kind of venues we trust. 

Usually, at about this point in any discussion of this nature, the author (me in this instance, but I'm not normal) trots out the old canards of moderation, prudence, and vetting what you read. I am not here to do that. In fact I reject that so far as to suggest those professional editorialists are disingenuous. Sitting on their giant media platforms  they are inherently interested in cooling the discussion, controlling it, evening it out. But what they really want is to be the discussion. And to be the discussion they must attract people. And to attract people you need bait. And               is perfect bait.        makes money for everyone.

Well, everyone except you and me.

The media has been unable to counter this American devolution precisely because of the rising news model they sometimes decry. If Capitalism and its siren call of popularity drives News media, then truth and accuracy become more and more unsustainable not only because on the one hand they are less eye-catching and entertaining than more inflammatory material, but also because, in a polarized ideological environment in which one side (the Right) has lost touch with any consistent reality, logic, or morality, these large media voices must constantly shave the hard, largely leftist seeming truth in order to appear even-handed and unbiased.  

These media empires cannot defeat this paradigm while still chasing popularity, even if they want to. And they are no longer able to operate effectively in a neutral seeming space.

But who cares about them? And who really cares about                 .

The real question is what will you do to stay informed?

Luckily, I have the answer.

You should only read clerkmanifesto.

You can get all the news you need on clerkmanifesto.

You can gather all the news you need from clerkmanifesto. That's this, here, where you're reading right now, which makes it especially convenient.

And what, you wonder, makes clerkmanifesto exempt from all the intractable issues I've outlined above?

I am immune to popularity.

But if popularity should, against all possibility, come my way, I'll let you know.

Though I wouldn't trust me at that point, as only then will I have become unreliable.








      






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If you were wondering, yes, you should comment. Not only does it remind me that I must write in intelligible English because someone is actually reading what I write, but it is also a pleasure for me since I am interested in anything you have to say.

I respond to pretty much every comment. It's like a free personalized blog post!

One last detail: If you are commenting on a post more than two weeks old I have to go in and approve it. It's sort of a spam protection device. Also, rarely, a comment will go to spam on its own. Give either of those a day or two and your comment will show up on the blog.