Do People Still Believe The MSM?

[RubyWinehouse]

Just that really, I haven't watched the news on ITV, BBC etc for years, I follow New Media and citizen journalism as I can see what is happening for myself.

I only watch BBC and ITV news why would I watch anything else.

Yes I absolutely follow MSM - I have friends who peddle this shit about MSM and the bullshit they believe from their “alternative sources” is dangerous and batshit most of the time. They blindly share it on their socials, smugly patting themselves on the back for not being “fooled” by MSM. It would be laughable if it wasn’t so fucking terrifying.

This nonsense running down of legitimate media is what has allowed dangerous men like Trump and Farage to spread their lies and misinformation. The lack of critical thinking is desperate.

Yes, mostly. I also think experts are a good thing.

Indeed, MSM has biases and they do sometimes get it wrong. It's good to read/watch content from a range of sources. I do follow blogs etc but am selective and do try and find out a bit about the authors.

What is odd is that those people who abjure MSM and find things for themselves ("do their own research") all come up with the same dubious stuff. Vaccines are a plot by Bill Gates to implant nano control gadgets, 5 masts cause birds to drop from the sky, chemtrails, etc etc and so forth. Used to have a friend like that. Had "friends" with access to secrets who confirmed stuff. It gave a feeling of superiority over sheeple with science degrees who weren't in the enchanted circle.
Now they could be coming up with the same stories because they have actually plugged in to the Truth, but I doubt it. According to that friend, we should be dead by now from the infection carried in the jabs. Not dead. Yet.

The MSM here in Ireland during Covid was absolutely insane. I haven’t taken it seriously since.

You lost me at MSM, a term whose use has been championed by people like Nigel Farage, Andrew Tate, Tommy Robinson and Russell Brand. Hardly anyone whose opinion counts and all cite MSM has trying to smear them...

While it is fair to say all traditional media platforms do have some kind of bias, it is up to the individual to read a variety and form an opinion. Listening to an unqualified crank with their own Youtube change/substack/Twitter account etc. etc. is not news I have time for because it is not use, it's a narrative they are choosing to tell for a purpose that best suits them (and often to alienate others and cause discord).

As an aside, I stopped reading the Guardian well over a decade because it cannot be trusted to report accurately, particularly with regards to women's sex-based rights and the simple fact humans cannot change sex.

I see the op hasn’t come back to tell everyone why they are wrong.

Yes, it's the smugness that gets me. My brother is into all this nonsense because he knows better than everyone else, and we had a big falling out during COVID. You can probably guess why...

Isn’t the point of an AMA that the OP comes back to answer some questions?

Yep, that’s when my friends batshittery started - I mean Lockdown wasn’t great for my mental health but at least it didn’t turn me into a conspiracy theorist nut job. As a PP mentioned above, the “alternative sources” are ones espoused by the likes of Tate and Brand, hardly bastions of the truth 🙄.

"Alternative facts". I.e. not facts.