Social media panic is barely disguised mainstream media self-defense.
Social media often receives blame for spreading social ills, which is ironic given that the biggest social contagion today is the belief that social media itself is harmful. Even individuals spending 14 hours daily online feel compelled to apologize, as if confessing to an addiction.
Recently, the New York Times published an opinion piece titled, “The Way to Get Kids Off Screens,” which completely avoided questioning why we should reduce screen time. Their readers, hardly known for independent thinking, fully supported this stance. Comments included: “Mom and Dad: get off your screens”; “Give the kids flip phones only. No surfing ability and no internet, period”; “Take the phone from your child. Dispose of it responsibly.”
These days, criticizing children’s social media use is the trendy norm. Alongside telling kids to ditch social platforms, other fashionable admonitions include avoiding white at weddings and wearing masks to protect vulnerable elders from COVID.
Nearly every official message on COVID issued by major outlets—from CNN and MSNBC to the Times and NPR—was false. The authorized narrative demanded shutting down the nation, mask-wearing, social distancing, school closures, and vaccinations (since “natural immunity” was dismissed) to combat a virus destined to spread regardless.
If you learned the truth, it was most likely through social media—not the Times.
Long before the first presidential debate, social media mostly dismantled the mainstream media’s portrayal of President Joe Biden’s mental sharpness. While official voices insisted he was mentally sound, online videos revealed him wandering aimlessly, drooling, appearing disoriented, and shaking hands with people only he saw.
On that note, the very foundation for Biden’s candidacy rested on the accusation that Donald Trump called white nationalists “very fine people.” This falsehood was widely propagated by mainstream outlets, though five years later Snopes finally admitted it was untrue. Social media users didn’t have to wait for Snopes—they had already seen the footage or heard about it from sources more truthful than the mainstream media.
However, within hours, conservatives on Twitter had debunked the story. Posts that day included:
- “So some racist MAGA rednecks (from Chicago)…recognized this dude from an AA-centric TV show? Mmm.”
- “Yeah in Chicago there are a lot of white people wearing MAGA hats.”
- “I was jumped by 4 black dudes who pummeled me with crow bars and said, ‘That’s for Kamala, you c*cksucking queer!’ Just kidding. I meant to say I bumped my shin on the coffee table.”
Recently, a 23-year-old YouTuber named Nick Shirley released a video titled “I Investigated Minnesota’s Billion Dollar Fraud Scandal,” revealing that supposed Somali “daycare” centers were empty buildings used to fraudulently collect millions in government child care subsidies. His video went viral, garnering millions of views.
Mainstream media’s only response was to disparage Shirley’s work, dismissing him as “right-wing.” NPR called his findings “unsubstantiated,” while the New York Times derided it as “slopulism” rooted in “absence of evidence.” They further mocked him as part of a “feedback loop” of “mutual back-scratching” where “content need not be new, or even particularly revelatory, to succeed.”
Perhaps Times journalists should get up from their desks and undertake genuine investigative work instead of criticizing those who do.
Speaking of which, the op-ed urging kids to reduce screen time was penned by Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein. Back in 2001, while Matt Drudge infuriated mainstream media by exposing their hidden stories, Sunstein authored “Republic.com,” warning that the internet threatened “a well-functioning system of democratic deliberation” by letting people choose “what they want to read, see, and hear.”
Apparently, a “well-functioning” democracy demands censorship on par with the Soviet Union.
The exact Drudge Report post that enraged liberals arrived on Jan. 17, 1998, opening with:
NEWSWEEK KILLS STORY ON WHITE HOUSE INTERN
BLOCKBUSTER REPORT: 23-YEAR OLD, FORMER WHITE HOUSE INTERN, SEX RELATIONSHIP WITH PRESIDENT
World Exclusive Must Credit the DRUDGE REPORTAt the last minute, at 6 p.m. on Saturday evening, NEWSWEEK magazine killed a story that was destined to shake official Washington to its foundation: A White House intern carried on a sexual affair with the President of the United States! The DRUDGE REPORT has learned that reporter Michael Isikoff developed the story of his career, only to have it spiked by top NEWSWEEK suits hours before publication.
Ah, now the reason behind urging children to stay off screens becomes clear.
Original article: www.theamericanconservative.com
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