Fear in the Media Moves Voters

Article in FAIR by Julie Hollar and Jim Naureckas, 11/7/24

Headline:  “Media Blame Left for Trump Victory—Rather Than Their Own Fear-Based Business Model”

“Corporate media may not have all the same goals as MAGA Republicans, but they share the same strategy: Fear works.

“Appeals to fear have an advantage over other kinds of messages in that they stimulate the deeper parts of our brains, those associated with fight-or-flight responses. Fear-based messages tend to circumvent our higher reasoning faculties and demand our attention, because evolution has taught our species to react strongly and quickly to things that are dangerous.

“. . . With refugees treated as a scourge in centrist and right-wing media alike, is it any wonder that Trump can harvest votes by promising to do something about this menace?  . . . ”

“. . .Kamala Harris did not run as a progressive, either in terms of economic policy or identity politics. But to a corporate media that largely complemented, rather than countered, Trump’s fear-based narratives on immigrants, trans people and crime, blaming the left is infinitely more appealing than recognizing their own culpability.”

https://fair.org/home/media-blame-left-for-trump-victory-rather-than-their-own-fear-based-business-model/

and in Common Dreams:

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/mainstream-media-trump-win