Andrew Cunningham
Annalee Newitz 🍜I asked my media studies students to look at the New York Times' op-ed page to determine what the paper's Overton Window is. Most thought it was fairly liberal, but others thought it was just kind of silly. One commented simply, "These are really absurd topics for articles."
Doctor Historianess@annaleen Were they taking explicit exception to Ross Douchehat, or to some other columnists?
@historianess they were responding to coverage of things like whether college students have too much sex
@annaleen lord I must have missed those...as I have no interest whatsoever in college students' sex lives
Tom@annaleen how does one determine an Overton window for something that's totally alien, yet still relevant to a culture?
Like reading the Telegraph, but finding out it's widely read by policy makers
FeralRobots@annaleen
I think the 'it's absurd' takes have a point. Conventional right/left doesn't really seem to work for NYT. I'd say one needs intersectional coordinates to define their Overton window.
I think the 'it's absurd' takes have a point. Conventional right/left doesn't really seem to work for NYT. I'd say one needs intersectional coordinates to define their Overton window.
The Devil’s Avocado@FeralRobots @annaleen What Would David Brooks Do?
Phredd Groves@annaleen So, which definition of 'liberal' is in play here?
• The USian version of 'generally to the left'?
• The (to my mind) actual meaning of the term, which is to say, far more interested in property rights and the status quo than human rights?
Carolannie@carolannie @phredd @annaleen
yeh, was the point that self-identified liberals don't believe what they profess to, or was it a reference to the "classical liberal" trope deployed by wannabe-edgy young white libertarian-coded conservative men?
yeh, was the point that self-identified liberals don't believe what they profess to, or was it a reference to the "classical liberal" trope deployed by wannabe-edgy young white libertarian-coded conservative men?
@phredd these are undergrads, so they definitely mean "generally to the left," which I thought was hilarious for many reasons.
Wendy M. Grossman@annaleen I have read that there are studies that show that he influence over what we think *about* is far more significant than promulgating specific opinions.
@wendyg I don't doubt it. Changing what we think about can also change our opinions, of course.
Arthur Copeland