40 Comments

I can see how this kind of writing plays into the tribalism dynamics, but these specific examples seem to me to be more of an ongoing problem with journalism itself. It's cognitive bias, but journalists are meant to be trained to push all sides of a question really deeply and to continually check their own biases. I get what you're saying, but a long time ago, when I was a Not-Good Journalist, my first boss taught me what was gospel at the time, which was, when you're interviewing someone, to always ask "Why is this m-- fu-- lying to me?" It sounds confrontational but the point is to not accept what you're being told at face value. Like many other outlets, the NYT has succumbed to access journalism on many fronts, and protecting access at all costs means sacrificing the actual journalism. Whatever role these examples play in tribalism, I don't think you can fix that without shaking up journalism itself.

That said, I gave this a lot of thought and one thing that occurred to me is that, while I am obviously a left-wing person, I don't think of NYT as part of my tribe. They've gotten enough things flat-out wrong over the years that I don't trust their reporting in general (part of the problem being the aforementioned access journalism), but I also find their characterizations of regions like mine -- conservative, rural, intermountain West -- to be so off-base that it makes me question how they portray everywhere and everyone else.

Which is only to say that I wonder if better cognition can be found in probing the kinds of disconnects between what is considered one's tribe or not. It seems a generative area to work in. No matter how much I don't consider NYT or Rachel Maddow part of my "tribe," the conservative people around me certainly do so I have to contend with that anyway. The kinds of articles you're describing actually do a lot of damage. But I can't change the NYT's journalism, so put my energies in building relationships that can somewhat mitigate the effects of this kind of "reporting." It gets harder all the time.

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I've been thinking some about this lately. Whenever "our side" says, "I wish the red-staters would get their information from some source other than Fox News," I reflexively agree. But then, I step back and realize there's NO WAY we, in our household, are ever going to watch Fox News. Ever. If we won't watch Fox News, how can we ask Fox Newsers to watch CNN or MSNBC?

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May 11, 2021Liked by Robert Wright

I used to love watching "The Daily Show with John Stewart." For 20 years, I would laugh at those idiots who made fools of themselves interviewed in correspondent pieces, and shake my head at the ridiculousness of Fox News and its gullible audience.

Now, of course, I see my part in getting Trump elected. Nobody likes to be bullied or made fun of or be the constant butt of jokes but that IS what my Blue tribe did to the Red tribe for lo those many years, mocking their way of life and their values.

Of course, someone won't be able to help themselves and will declare "They deserved it!" but I am fairly convinced we are getting our comeuppance for holding so many of our fellow citizens "in contempt" for so many years. Was it any wonder the Red Tribe's number one priority was "owning the libs" when voting for Trump?

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I agree with your much-needed comments. Though I feel you are perhaps a bit over-solicitous of the Times' contemporary slant.

Just because Trump had a difficult relationship with the truth, and a number of right-wing media sources seemingly deliver nonstop dishonest propaganda, is no reason for progressives to do the same. But they do, to an infuriating degree.

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May 11, 2021Liked by Robert Wright

You should take a look at Arnold Kling's "Fantasy Intellectual Teams," which is a similar project from the libertarian (if not fully red) tribe.

http://www.arnoldkling.com/blog/reflections-on-fits-so-far/

Bob is on one of the rosters and is scoring a ton of points . . .

http://www.arnoldkling.com/fits/p5teams.html

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Bob, how do you get your news? Do you read a lot of different newspapers' versions of the same story and try to get at the truth by comparing/contrasting them or is there a newspaper that you feel consistently does a great job of combatting these biases and providing as factual an account as possible? If it's the former, is there a news outlet you'd recommended for one-stop-shopping?

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Thanks for writing this piece, Bob, and I'm sort of struck by how much some of the commenters can't help themselves in calling you out. Even after including your thorough disclaimers, some people still refuse to give an intellectually honest inch if it means the Other Tribe will get some credit for anything. This is so disheartening and makes me even more pessimistic that we can overcome any of our tribalism even out of the boxing ring of social media.

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Kinda sad that the NYT is considered center left. It shows how far right our left is. After years of examining the content published, overall i find a neoliberal slant and business as usual attitude. And sorry, anything touched by bezos is tainted.

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Bob, I agree with your dissection of cognitive bias in center-left outlets like the Times. It's something that I've been increasingly trying to look out for. But I wonder how much this is just more "both sides-ism" that consistently bedevils journalism school writers. Re: your Charlottesville example, you are probably correct that the Times slightly mischaracterized Trump's statements. But on the other hand, there is no doubt at all, based upon dozens of examples over the last 6 (or more) years that Trump sends overt messages to his tribe that he sympathizes with their racist feelings. So perhaps the Times accurately captured the truth of Trump's feelings about the events in Charlottesville.

Bob, do you actually believe, after 6+ years of evidence, going back to the "birther" issue, that Donald Trump doesn't explicitly, overtly, and intentionally appeal to the most racist fringes of the "red tribe"? I think in this case you are attempting, for high-minded and noble reasons, to "both-sides" here, even though there is absolutely no equating the red tribe's outright lies and propoganda with the much more nuanced cognitive bias of the center-left press.

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Since Fisher published this article, he's published The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our minds and Our World (Little, Brown, September 2022). I'm looking forward to hearing what you think of the many ways Fisher uses evolutionary psychology there in analyzing the causes of the nation's current hyper-partisanship -- or maybe to an interview with Max Fisher on the subject!

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If exposing a secret meeting between the trump campaign and a Russian spy who had dirt on Hillary 2 weeks prior to wikileaks isn't a smoking gun, I don't know what is.

Also, I think you'd be hard pressed to find a single white supremacist who thought Trump condemned them.

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Excellent analysis.

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Bob, you are comparing apples and oranges. The misstatements of the paper of record are not comparable to the “vibe” in the red tribe. If you were going to compare the Times accurately, a comparable benchmark would have been a “respected” organ of the right-the National Review, etc.

I’m not sure in the post-9/11 world that there has been the same overt misinformation out of this sector (I’m completely holding right wing-neocon-media accountable for misinformation surrounding 9/11) as has been recently evident in the leftist, legacy media.

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Is it only possible to like and comment here ? That doesn't seem to allow for much dissent.

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