Placing Extreme Television Media in Their Historical and Economic Context
Extreme media are a normal and predictable outcome of the media marketplace in the United States. Using historical and market-based explanations for the development of extreme television media, Taylor places extreme media in their proper context. Taylor s
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Placing Extreme Television Media in Their Historical and Economic Context
Every day, millions of Americans watch television news on broadcast networks and cable channels. What viewers see can be radically different depending on the channel they select and the specific host of their show. Viewers of broadcast network nightly news (CBS, NBC, ABC, and PBS) generally see even-handedness and objectivity. In fact, it can be difficult to discern real differences in the way broadcast news reports stories and topics due to the objective nature of the reporting and similar topics. Conversely, on cable, there are clearly identifiable partisan networks and a mainstream alternative. The conservative network is Fox News, the liberal network in MSNBC, and the mainstream option is straight-laced, objective CNN. Beyond the network-level agenda-setting and differences in editorial choices, there are real differences in the way individual hosts cover the news even within the cable networks themselves. What do these differences mean for American politics and should we be worried about the future of television media in the twenty-first century? Are modern mass media—specifically cable television shows—bad for American democracy? These are the questions that animate this book. The potential problems with media fragmentation have been constant sources of discussion and interest to scholars, journalists, policymakers, and citizens (McChesney 2015; Pickard 2014). In the current saturated media environment, the influence of mass media is as important as ever due to the creation of the Internet as a multimedia platform, increased corporate ownership, and the rise of social media (e.g., see Iyengar 2015; McChesney 2008).
© The Author(s) 2017 J.B. Taylor, Extreme Media and American Politics, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-41183-5_1
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J.B. TAYLOR
Media effects research has always been crucial given the necessity for citizens in a democracy to access information about their government (e.g., see Graber 2004; Pickard 2014). Add to this greater levels of sophistication in measuring and studying media effects, and we have the conditions for important social science research.
WHY STUDY EXTREME MEDIA? There are three basic models of media effects. To consider the first model, it is instructive to start with the debate between Lippmann (1922) and Dewey (1927). Lippmann and Dewey debated the role and capacity of citizens in democracy, which hinged on the extent to which electronic and print mass media could play the role of information facilitator for the mass public. Lippmann claimed that media support the power structure with propaganda, while Dewey argued that media and technology have an educative capacity over time. The basis of the Lippmann-Dewey argument was a basic assumption that, either for good or ill, media affect the people who consume their messages. This argument made its way into policy discussions during the Hutchins Commission dealing with media regulations in the post-war era given the fear propaganda could be too easily distributed
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