Aram Zucker-Scharff

The 3 Key Types of BuzzFeed Lists To Learn Before You Die: The title that should have been: BuzzFeed makes lists WITH SCIENCE!

shortformblog:

This is undoubtedly an amusing headline, but it actually touches on a serious issue in democracies: How can policymakers sell and implement necessarily policy when the general public is almost comedically misinformed about what policy is needed? The poll cited showed that Britons believe that 24% of jobless benefits are fraudulently claimed (the actual number is .7%); that violent crime is rising (it’s falling); that immigrants comprise 1/3 of the population (more like 13%); and that teen pregnancy is roughly 26 times higher than it actually is. “Politicians need to be better at talking about the real state of affairs of the country, rather than spinning the numbers,” said one of the pollsters involved. In addition, “the media has to try and genuinely illuminate issues, rather than use statistics to sensationalise.” So, in other words, the incentives structure of politics and the media needs to do a complete 180 from where they are now. Awesome, that should be a quick fix. source

Very true. 

msnbc:

NBC’s Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel reports live on MSNBC from Taksim Square as riot police fire tear gas canisters at protesters.

I didn’t care about Amanda Knox then, I don’t care about her now. The Mainstream Media should never have covered that case on that scale, they should never have done that coverage in the way they did, and they sure as hell shouldn’t have been passing judgement. 

Now we have to have even more valuable air time wasted as they try to make up for being assholes by covering what assholes they were, ALL WITHOUT TAKING ANY BLAME ON THEMSELVES. 

Take Nancy Grace and put her into some local access channel. Ban cameras from court rooms. Open up libel cases on any reporter who strongly implies that someone is guilty before they are actually found guilty. 

Seriously, screw these assholes who have made a name off of accusing random people on air, calling for their heads, and facing no real punishment when they are found innocent.