These written words and/or thoughts reflect my contemporary contemplations. I offer them not to persuade or influence, but as a discussion of topics that you can research and define for yourself.
Expressing multiple views on how to live is as American as apple pie, but my preference for cherry pie doesn’t mean apple pie should no longer exist. Canceling someone’s preference is a personal assault that will arouse strong resistance.
Reliable research is getting more difficult because media reports are littered with sensitized opinions obscuring the facts. Data and information that is not adequately vetted, intentionally manipulated or misrepresented makes the resulting product propaganda, not journalism.
HB234 shines the light on the collective failures of the news business by requiring schools to teach students a media literacy course. “Media literacy” will be automatically prejudiced by the positive and negative examples discussed in the classroom. Media bias and censorship needs to be fixed at its source, not passed forward for government intervention. It is a deflection for media to endorse HB234.
Systemic media narrative is a professional malady that needs internal cleansing. Responsible journalists and editors should confirm the facts and shake out the emotions from their product before releasing it to the public. “Due diligence” is the first duty of the news-media to serve the truth to students/customers. HB234 would encourage, not correct, media distortions.
A media cleansing debate should be transparently, not anonymously, undertaken. Anonymous media opinion and speculation often provides a heaping dose of fabricated misinformation. The media honestly self-assessing itself could be a journalism lesson for students to observe.
Final observation. Blue leadership denies their decades of mismanagement contributing to the economic and social failure of major cities and, soon, states. Derogatory name-calling and blame shifting might ease their psychosis, but it doesn’t change their pathetic performance.
