April 2020 – Freer Industries

Daniel Freer, April 24, 2020

One thing that has become clear in the years since Donald Trump has become president is the overwhelming bias of national media organizations. Fox News, often a scapegoat for all that is wrong with our country by those on the left, has continued to do what it does best: Unapologetically bash the democratic party while praising everything said by the other side. This behavior is partly driven by their viewers, who have tended to be more conservative for years. However, the other part of this is an attempt to drive their viewers toward the Republican party out of fear that the Democrats will create a godless country with no freedom. During the Obama years, this resulted in smear campaigns, such as the “tan suit” controversy, nods to birtherism theories, the end of Christmas, and many more attempts to label Democratic control as a gateway drug to communism. In the end, all of these turned out to be entirely false, or at the very least non-issues.

However, none of this is new.

What has changed since Trump’s election, or more accurately since Trump began to run for president, is the behavior of left-leaning media organizations such as CNN, MSNBC, and so on. They have also always had bias, but the left’s Trump-based fury has removed the veil of impartiality, to the point where TV personalities are now screaming and crying on air about how much they hate Trump, akin to Glenn Beck complaining about Obama. I don’t mind at all that journalists are expressing their opinions on air, or even that they are getting emotional about political events. People, real people, also get emotional about these things, and seeing somebody on air doing the same can provide a sense of comfort.

However, the issue comes when we don’t have another option to fall back upon. Now, if I go to Fox News’ website, the top story is: “Showdown in Lansing: Lawmakers plan meeting to strip some powers from Whitmer, as protestors gather outside her home”. On CNN, the top story is: “Trump peddles dangerous cures for coronavirus”. The Fox News headline is referring to protests in Michigan about the lockdown for Covid-19, against Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer. The CNN headline is discussing Trump’s attempt to calm people about the virus by claiming that some less-than-proven remedies for coronavirus will help to save us, including injecting disinfectant. In this case, the CNN title, and article, is actually more biased, despite actually being factually true. But the important thing to notice is that neither network is discussing good things about their own side: they are both talking about their “enemy”.

So, what is the solution to the horrible era of news media that we are currently experiencing? One possible solution: create a government-run national media organization. Now, I know that a lot of people have valid reservations about state-run media, and there would certainly be a lot of complications, but I’m really just hoping to create a conversation about how to fix our current media environment. So here is my list of things to consider about the potential for a state-run national media in the USA, which could be called the US National Media Organization (USNMO):

State-run media is not beholden to ratings: As I alluded to above, one of the main reasons that our main national media outlets have become so polarized is because of one thing: money. The more viewers they get, the more advertisers they will get. The more advertisers they get, the more money they get, and the more they can expand and “improve”. However, the best way to increase viewership is to publish stories that draw the attention of a lot of people, which means flashy headlines about people with high name recognition doing ridiculous things. It means purposely jumping to conclusions that allow you to make false, or at least unproven, claims about things which people may already be thinking about, even if they haven’t said it out loud. It means making people angry at the opposition, or even angry at our side, if it will help the story to spread across the internet. These tactics have been around for a while, but have become more prevalent due to increased competition from media sources that are primarily online. Clickbait and trolls have proven that things don’t need to be true in order to make money, and people tend to search online for things that they already agree with, leading to more and more desire for extreme content that caters to their worst impulses or biggest fears. The truth and accuracy are often bland, but that doesn’t mean they are unimportant. In contrast, the government-funded USNMO would have reduced need to constantly produce head-turning, and therefore money-making, content. This would hopefully allow more time for “unbiased” facts from a single source that all people could trust, at least as much as they trust their government.
Other news sources will still exist: The presence of the USNMO doesn’t take anything away from the media that currently exists, except perhaps some viewers. One fear that people may have about the USNMO is the possibility for censorship and bias toward the current administration. But censorship can be something completely separate from this. The USNMO could, of course, choose what content to show and what content to ignore, but all media organizations are already doing this, based on their own bias. The USNMO would likely have more rules about what could be said on air, but it wouldn’t have control over what other media organizations could say. If you don’t trust the government and don’t like what they are saying, you don’t have to listen, and still have plenty of other sources to get your information from. The USNMO will most likely be biased toward the current administration, but at least it will make the official government position clear on a larger host of topics. People may worry that having the USNMO will allow government officials to avoid talking to other independent media sources, only making their views known when it is shown in a favorable light. However, Trump’s presidency has also made it clear that this is also possible without state-run media. Even Obama refused interviews on Fox News at times, and now Trump has taken it a step further by barring unfavorable reporters from his press conferences and rallies. The same things may happen after creation of the USNMO, but at least the government wouldn’t have as much incentive to play favorites with private companies.
We could hold the government more accountable: So what kind of content would be shown by the USNMO? In my mind, the main purpose of the USNMO would be to highlight the “good” things that the national government is doing. The President would appoint somebody to be in charge of the entire organization, which would need to be approved by Congress. This person would make the final call about which stories are told and which are not, but there would be several levels of abstraction before it reached that point. Government officials could submit story ideas, pitch bills that they have written and hope to pass in order to get public support or support from their colleagues. There could even be, for example, an hour controlled by Democratic party members, an hour controlled by Republican party members, and another hour for other independent parties to increase their exposure. Or there could be an hour devoted to other departments such as the Department of Education, the Department of Defense, and so on. Of course, these things would be difficult to regulate, for example if one party has control of both Congress and the Presidency. But if this is the case, then most of what the government is doing would probably align with that party’s ideology, so the programming for the USNMO would be heavily biased toward them regardless. Many of the specifics around this would need to be negotiated upon the creation of the USNMO, and could additionally be revisited by the three branches of government as problems arose. All of this is to say that the USNMO could essentially serve as a progress report, delivered from the government to us, the people. And based on what we see there, we could form our own opinion about how the government is doing, and ensure that our tax money is being spent in an efficient way, rather than just going to congressmen who take naps in their chambers.

After reading all of this, I hope that you will understand my point. Nobody that I’ve spoken to in the US has denied that our country is greatly divided along ideological lines. It is easy for Trump to complain about CNN or MSNBC, just as it was easy for Obama to complain about Fox, but they wouldn’t be able to have any complaints about a news organization that they have partial control over, which is intended to highlight the good things happening in their administration. The USNMO would be a great opportunity for our government to evoke a united message to the people, clearly articulating changes in policy, highlighting work they have done, and bringing about a new age of trustworthy American news.

A couple of days ago, my parents and I (and Blair) had a video chat with my brother, Matt, and he brought up (among other things, such as his girlfriend’s new job, The Tiger King, and building a PC) the fact that many people have created quarantine lists for themselves. This would be like a bucket list, but rather than things to do before you die, this is a list of things to do before you are resurrected, forced to once again have your time sucked away by what you now know is a non-essential job, or at least one that can be mostly done from home. For some, the Quarantine List is just a collection of random tasks that would be memorable, worthy of a picture, or maybe even a TikTok. But for me, I’d like to use this time to focus on things that I have been neglecting in my life, but are nonetheless part of who I am.

Here’s my Quarantine List:

Break some bad habits: This is something I have always struggled with, and something that has become more and more apparent throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. It turns out, I touch my face a lot. Essentially the only thing that Eastern and Western governments have agreed on throughout their 2000 years of conflict is that touching your face is bad when you’re trying to stop the spread of a deadly disease. Of course, I’ve been told since I was young to not touch my face, but like an old dog, here I still am, rubbing my eye, adjusting my glasses, and testing how many knuckles deep into my nose I can get before reaching the treat at the end of the tunnel. But these things, according to my wife, are not the worst of it. The number one culprit is nail-biting. After being shamefully caught time and time again, resulting in a slap on the wrist from not only Blair, but also Snow White Bunny, I decided many moons ago that I would attempt to grow out my nails, and forever rid myself of the addiction that is nail-biting. And yet here I am still today, typing on my laptop with bloody cuticles. So yes, breaking habits is at the top of my list.
Get fit: It may be just me, but I’ve found that the only time I put any effort into working out is when I’m trying to impress somebody. This has resulted in a profoundly uninteresting trajectory of athletic activity, peaking with me playing 4 different sports at the same time during my awkward middle school phase where I was trying desperately to get a girlfriend, and reaching a nadir now, after I’ve been married for 2 years and feel like impressing popular girls isn’t as important as it used to be. Especially when the only 2 girls I can see during this quarantine period are my mom (who loves me unconditionally) and my wife (who unconditionally loves to make fun of me for being the blob that I have become). So in this state, I need a little bit of extra motivation to stay fit, as my wife’s jibes tend not to cut as deep now that I have so much padding.
Get creative: Despite my natural tendency toward math and science, the arts have always been a part of my life. From writing a novel in elementary school to a ukulele song in high school, my childhood was rife with artistic endeavors, many of which have how been lost. I don’t wish for my adulthood to be any different. However, the difference now lies in the fact that I have programming skills at my disposal, though my artistic skills may not be on the same level they were when I was a strapping young lad at Reynolds. Nonetheless, being able to program has created new potential outlets for me, which I have truly just begun to explore. A large amount of my time during this quarantine has been devoted to the development of a video game (Alien Wars) with my brother Tim, which would have never been possible before I learned C#. Aside from this, I have also written a rap to memorialize some good times in the past, practiced playing guitar and singing, which could all be used to help build my online profile (which may also, in the future, require some use of programming). All of these things are about expressing myself, and exploring how to present my ideas to the world. The struggle here is that I like so many different types of art and expression that I tend to be unable to really focus on one thing. But at the same time, creativity cannot be rushed, and often comes bursting through a side door at unexpected times, a la Kramer.
Get smart: While many people have been shocked by the work-from-home life, I have been mostly “working from home” since October, which is when I first started to write up my final PhD thesis. At the beginning, my hope was to submit early, moving on to a job and a future that I could be proud of. But this time working from home has made me realize, if nothing else, that choosing how to prioritize things is not easy. As a PhD student, I felt justified in almost entirely neglecting numbers 1 and 2 on this list for the last 4 years, spending the majority of my time trying to get smart. While on the job, I’ve learned to program in many different languages and environments, how to do machine learning, read research papers, and so on. Outside of my research interests, I took Chinese language classes, read about current events and politics, learned about European culture through friends, networking, events, and travel. And now, being stuck home, most of these things are still available thanks to the internet. But my struggle here is still with which things to prioritize, as attempting too much will only burn me out. I suppose that in this time, it is best to follow what really interests me, rather than trying to do what’s “best for me”, or “most useful”. And yet, I like to think of myself as a fairly practical person, so the things that interest me are often the things that are most useful, and thus I’ve been trying to devote some time to

Through writing this entry, I have come to realize that my Quarantine List is not, in fact, so different from the list of things I would like to do on any day. The only difference lies in the order of priorities. Socializing, for example, has usually taken a large part of my day, as I believe that understanding and connecting with people is often the most beneficial thing you can do to improve both your mental and physical health, which are both crucial to happiness and success. While I have been able to catch up with a few people during this time, I must admit that socializing via Zoom is not the same as getting drinks in person, and thus it has taken a backseat to most of the things on this list. Also, as mentioned before, in recent years I have been mostly neglecting numbers 1 and 2, while focusing on number 4. But now, in this time, I have decided it is best to flip the script, at least for a short while. Of course I may naturally tend away from this, but maybe making this list will help solidify it in my mind, and by the end of the quarantine I may have the longest fingernails known to man.