Link to the Rolling Stone article: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/marjorie-taylor-greene-hurricane-helene-conspiracy-1235124836/
Link to the Rolling Stone article: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/marjorie-taylor-greene-hurricane-helene-conspiracy-1235124836/
I think of politicians in a way that has an analogy: the YouTube algorithm.
I’ve heard people say that whenever someone complains about the “algorithm,” they should replace the word “algorithm” with “audience.” For example, “The algorithm makes me upload every day” or “The algorithm favours videos with ridiculous thumbnails and clickbait titles.” In reality, the algorithm is simply delivering what the audience wants to watch.
Similarly, these bizarre politicians who say ridiculous things gain attention because it works. Somewhere, someone is changing their vote based on this kind of rhetoric. If it didn’t resonate, they wouldn’t say it, and their party wouldn’t give them a platform that ultimately makes them look bad. So in a way, don’t blame the politicians directly: blame the people who pay attention to them.
Makes sense. In this analogy as well as irl the platform is missing, I think. Youtube / Google wants to make money as well as news media so both let it happen willingly or push it even further. I think journalists should be better than this. Before the Internet no one (or at least no one beyond a very local level) did care about the maniac yapping some random nonsense at the town square. Now those maniacs are news all around the globe. I’m not even from NA but there’s so many news (and I might be biased because I often scroll through c/all) about US politics. Not that it would be much better here. People should really know when not to adapt something from the US.