Yes, but why?
Within minutes we know what’s happening, but can we ever agree on the cause?
Just 100 years ago news arrived in New Zealand from the rest of the world 3 weeks after it happened. Headlines were transmitted by morse code, but newspapers and letters came by sea. Before the introduction of steam ships, news took up to 3 months to arrive.
The morse code came via undersea cables (hence “cable news”) so was necessarily short and to the point owing to cost and cable capacity. This might suggest that news, therefore, was unbiased, being restricted solely to the facts of the matter; but it was not free of attitude, because the news agency reflected the culture of the country in which it was based.
Americans often refer to the golden age of radio news by highlighting Edward R Murrow’s famous World War 2 reporting from London. To determine whether or not it was biased we need to remember that it represented only the view from London, not also the view from Berlin or Moscow, and every wartime public utterance was shaped by Allied propaganda and censorship.
By today’s standard, Murrow was a paragon of journalistic balance and integrity, but he proved to be a bellwether for the slide into corporate news control when, back in the US with his groundbreaking TV news program “See it Now” on CBS, he eventually clashed in 1958 with management who wanted to direct and control content.
Media critics today disdainfully denounce the so-called ‘Legacy Media’ as if it were a relatively recent phenomenon. In fact it was a feature of news and opinion publishing for the entire 20th Century. In the USA, William Randolph Hearst and Henry Luce — and in the UK, Lords Northcliffe, Rothermere and Beaverbrook — overtly promoted their political causes, which were predominantly isolationism, fascism and imperialism. They boasted of their power to shape public opinion and sway elections. Lord Beaverbrook claimed he ran his papers “purely for the purpose of making propaganda.” Rupert Murdoch inherited their legacy.
What changed in the last 30 years was that the bias and political opinion-shaping moved sharply to the left within the Legacy Media: The New York Times, The Guardian, The Washington Post, the BBC, CNN et al now predominantly promote globalism, anti-conservatism and identitarianism, and slant their facts and opinions accordingly.
To access real facts and a range of opinions we now turn to digital media. Substack is a platform for both, but it is also a platform (like all digital media) for non-facts, outright lies and extremely prejudiced opinions. Using an open mind and critical thinking, a reader may get a full clear picture of what is happening in the world. Unfortunately most readers look for a place where they can take their ignorance and prejudices and feel at home, having their views echoed and endorsed by slanted facts and biased opinions.
So, are we any better off, I wonder?
Some commentators view it as a golden age, rejoicing in the comparative decline of the legacy media. I think what they are actually celebrating is their new-found ability to express themselves free from the shackles of a proprietor. The irony is, however, that to gain an audience they need to appeal to the predilections (call it prejudices) of their readers. That’s what politicians do when searching for votes. That’s the trap of social media.
On the positive side we can probably acknowledge that the discerning reader — willing to spend time and apply skeptical judgment — can arrive at the actual facts of a matter. We know what is happening, but we’re no closer to knowing why things are happening, except at the most superficial level. We use labels. Students and unemployed graduates who violently rail against their country are variously described as nihilist, terrorist, anarchist, anarcho-terrorist, Antifa, anti-Semitic, spoiled middle-class Islamo-apologists engaging in luxury beliefs. Adults who created them are variously described as colonialist, racist, capitalist, gender-denying fascists.
It seems that the label is as far as we can get when searching for the why. Medicine and psychology do the same thing. (“Doctor, doctor, I have no appetite for food, I’m too tired to work and I feel like I don’t know who I am.” “Don’t worry. It sounds like you have Anorexia Nervosa and Body Dysmorphic Disorder, or BDD for short.”)
There are literally millions of books attempting to analyze the why of social behavior, with thousands more being published every week, but we seem no closer to being confident as to the why when describing extreme behaviors. Is it because it is too complex? Or could it be because it is too simple to accept?
… we seem no closer … to the why when explaining extreme behaviors.
When I trace my own path from Marxism to Socialism and Anarchism to Libertarianism, finally arriving at Anti-Establishment Skepticism, I recognize points along the way that could well have coincided with any one of the political stances I now hold in such disdain. These days you can throw an accusation at me of racism, sexism, elitism, Islamophobia or any other hate label you wish, and it will melt like snow on my back. They’re just labels.
Depending on your point of view, people’s politics either evolve or devolve in line with their changing emotional and mental development, and the influence of their surrounding social environments. Why do the young do and think the way they do? Why are young women disproportionately engaged? Perhaps the question is best put to an evolutionary biologist. The answer, the evolutionary biologist will say, is too simple for us to accept. It’s in our DNA.
In which case, relax. All things pass with time.
A.I. Fabler
March 5, 2026