The GOP hold on most of American radio seems pretty unshakable, but Democrats must get into the talk-radio game before ever more damage is done.
Didn’t we try this once with “Air America”?
The writer of the article, Thom Hartmann, was deeply involved in that. Sounds like he can’t let go of a bad idea.
We’ve tried this for a long time, to varying degrees of success, with public radio. I don’t mean NPR although that will usually be a decent portion of local public radio.
I travel all the time. All over the US, although lately it’s been limited to the middle/north east coast and Midwest. It’s pretty fun to tune into the local public radio if you’re close enough to get a signal. They can be really insightful like WAMU in DC about local stories.
They can be terrible like my local station that can only afford to run 1A (which is a good show) and a few localish music shows. The rest of the time is literally filled with fucking classical music. It’s painful to listen to. Sorry to all the Bacchists and Mozartists out there but this shit sucks.
Anyway, check out the low end of the FM dial when you’re traveling, you might collect some stations you like that you can stream later.
I’ve listened to public radio quite a bit. Right wing talk radio is fundamentally different. Hannity, Limbaugh, Alex Jones and their ilk are actively radicalizing listeners and intentional ideologues. Public radio is news, informational/educational content, and political debate. They’re different in almost every other respect except that you use your ears for both.
Yes I am painfully aware.
How a little bit of Russian money can shape the retards in the south
Yeah let’s definitely require AM radio in all new vehicles
No one who wants to hear what the left-of-right has to say listens to talk radio, but everyone who needs to hear it listens to talk radio.
The GOP excels at informing the uninformed and giving false hope to downtrodden.
informing the uninformed
*MISinforming
Making losers feel special is basically the whole point of MAGA
Is an NPR program like 1A talk radio? I listen to that and many people who are traveling often do. It’s not leftist, but it’s decidedly anti-fascist simply by reporting the truth and bringing on experts to explain things. Two co-workers of mine have told me that they used to listen to NPR before “it got all political”- meaning they heard things they didn’t want to be true. That’s a bit of a tangent but these two people wouldn’t listen to Rush Limbaugh or whoever took his toilet throne.
I assume since podcasts aren’t on the radio they don’t count as talk radio right? But discussion podcasts have blown talk radio away and there are so many flavors to choose from.
They tried with air America and it was ok but not really all that compelling. Truth and facts just don’t sell like toxic divisive fantasies.
Isn’t that how we got the national treasure that is Rachel Maddow?
It needed better talent. Thom Hartmann was the sole survivor because he’s actually listenable. Randi Rhodes and Ron Reagan were just shit. But progressive talk can be done well. Stephanie Miller is hilarious when she has the right crew, but she has a penchant for self-owning. She gave us John Fugelsang, who is just brilliant.
Love Thom Hartmann; listen to his podcast these days. I remember trying to listen to Randi Rhodes way back when, and…I just remember it being kind of headache-inducing. I also listen to Fugelsang’s podcast now too…
Talk radio is essentially a person telling you what to think and feel. It can’t even be classified as learning because it’s being done to you when you listen. It’s a confirmation bias circle jerk. Democrats tend to be educated and educated people usually are repelled by the format.
I think NPR does a good job providing talk radio type material that isn’t repellant to people with critical thinking skills.
Do you consider their offerings substantially different than talk radio?
I was forced to endure Rush Limbaugh (I think) while riding with my Dad. That show was just Rush ranting to himself, constructing straw men, then tearing them down over and over again. No real facts, sources, or guests. Just Rush yelling into the mic the entire time spewing garbage.
So ya, it can be a lot different.
Same, and I’m sorry. It was Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage for me. I remember realizing my father was an idiot at an earlier age than I might have otherwise because the arguments those two morons made were obviously so, so bad yet he just ate it all up.
NPR usually has a diversity of views and the dialogue isn’t as 24/7 emotional.
I think the big thing with conservative talk radio is that it’s the verbal equivalent of Micheal Bay - 24/7 PAY ATTENTION RIGHT NOW. Think Alex Jones’s incoherent screaming rants as he plays air raid sirens. He does have guests/callers, but any views that he doesn’t agree with will get shouted down. (He has the illusion of disagreement with more explicitly racist guests - he won’t boot you off if you start talking about the Jews, but will pretend he’s a little uncomfortable). But it’s lots of yelling, and THEY ARE TRYING TO CUT YOUR SONS PENIS OFF! Pretty sure that format goes back through Rush to Hicks.
NPR doesn’t really tell you what to think. It comes across as left leaning because the Overton window in the US has been pushed so far to the right that our Democrats have the positions that Republicans did 20 years ago, while our Republican Party is fantasizing about purges. But NPR has calm, reasoned discussions between folks of all political persuasions. You can even hear it in the voices - it’s a common punchline how calm the reporters are.
It’s not the talk format - it’s the content and presentation.
I live in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas. Everything is really spread out here and it’s one of the places in the US where you just need a car. Lots of people here commute and a lot of them get their news from radio while driving. People who have the radio on at work will often have it on a talk station.
We had an NPR affiliate, but that went away in 2019. The only people on terrestrial radio in this area talking about current events now are right wing grievance screaming. I’ve watched this region become more conservative during that time.
Go to the top podcast lists and you’ll see that one is also dominated by right-wing personalities too.
There should be regulation around use of the word “news”. Many of these stations call themselves “News Radio” as if they only reported verifiable facts, but well over 50% is opinion.
Anything presented as news should be kept separate from opinion. If it’s news, you should be able to defend it like it was said under oath.
Personally, I would love it if news channels had to distinguish opinion content from news by removing the word news from the screen and replacing it with the word opinion. That or some other clear and unmistakable signal to the audience should be there to establish whether the station is going on record and asserting facts or whether this is some talking head spewing bullshit.
It’s crazy that news papers have been doing this forever. You have your news section and opinion and editorial section. TV and radio should definitely follow the format and be clear about what they are presenting.
I mean News Corp lawyers testified in court that what is presented on Fox News is purely for entertainment and should not be considered news.
How many of the Fox Faithful know about that? And would anything change if they did?
The milk and meat industry lost their shit when soy milk companies started calling their product “milk.” The same outrage should be spent on these “news” organizations.
Speaking of regulation, their hateful opinions getting such a far reach is a direct result of the telocommunications act of '96
Whilst the act for which you speak definitely accelerated the bullshit, it wasn’t peaches and cream back in the day. Just look at the film Citizen Kane a fictitious (and lawsuit resistant) depiction of William Randolph Hearst. In it an exceptionally wealthy business man uses the media to promote his political aims. And to skew narratives outside of strict politics. A man who craves love and adoration but can’t reciprocate. Remind you of anyone? I would say Musk’s purchase of Twitter fills at least one of those molds, Trump the rest.
True and by way of conversation, Chinatown (1973) might as well have been made yesterday.
Those that talk the most are usually the ones you should listen to the least.
FOX News also.
Common Dreams - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for Common Dreams:
MBFC: Left - Credibility: High - Factual Reporting: High - United States of America
Wikipedia about this sourceSearch topics on Ground.News
Honestly radio is dying much like television.
Podcasting is the better space to get going.
Also tictoc.
We need to get the young folks of the incel pipeline .
Agreed
Podcasting is the better space to get going.
Joe Rogan and other right-wing cranks.
Also tictoc.
A significant part of the rise of fascism in Europe among young people.
Anyway I do like podcasts, and it’s full of good content (and so is tiktok presumably) but neither are lacking right-wing content.
It’s better in my opinion to meet people where they’re at. Radio isn’t where they’re at. That was my point.
The Majority Report on YouTube is fantastic.
The Daily Beans.
Beau of the Fifth Column.
I’ve Had it Podcast.
Vaush.
Pod Save America.
Bad Hasbara.
There are many more, but it’s a matter of putting ears and eyes on where they need to be.
Getting young folks off the incel pipeline is going to be really tough in today’s environment.
Incel is the new fat. Most of society immediately treats them like scum that did it to themselves. In a lot of cases both fat people and incels are at fault, but trashing them isn’t going to fix the issues.
Your need to understand them and how they got there to try and change them or at least reduce new ones from being created. Not just hate them.
Most of the podcasts I listed represent counter arguments that may help. There’s no simple way to change thought, but exposure to counter messaging, might bring about change.
The time to stop this fascist talk before it became a problem was 69 years ago
