The Age of Alternative News in the Social Imagination...

Many Americans Get News on YouTube...Where News Organizations and Independent Producers Thrive Side by Side...

Americans are as likely to often turn to independent channels as they are to established news organization channels; videos from independent news producers are more likely to cover subjects negatively, discuss conspiracy theories

What is the attraction with youtube? Well, its not unlike any other attraction in the social imagination. The attraction is based on the desire to interact and through interaction to reach agreement. Our social reality is in agreement. That's why, we all want to be heard and we want others to hear and agree with us. That is why agreement reality in which we live is the only place where we strive to be heard, are heard and can agree or not agree about what we heard. What we agree on becomes our reality because in agreement we find out who we are and are not and in that, we find comfort and peace. 

Who creates these youtube channels? Those who want to be heard and reach out to others seeking agreement reality. Those who watch... (rather than create a channel) watch to find people that they can agree with and thus, in agreement, channels either grow or fall away. This is real and more real than mainstream news because the corporate news sells us what they want us to hear whereas youtube channels come and go based on their ability to provide information most people agree with. Their channel depends on agreement among people and that essentially is what makes them very real indeed.  

Is it a crime or breach of social justice to provide information on a youtube channel? No! And, its not dangerous or just as dangerous as any news source. Why? Because, the same principles of agreement in the social imagination apply to all news sources youtubers and all the corporately owned and directed news channels (mainstream) which push their made up agenda. You see, people seek information and agreement because its the human condition to do so ...agreement is the reality of the social imagination. 

When it comes to youtube and the mainstream, most people will find what they are looking for or accept what they are told/handed to them because its all they can find or all they have and so they accept it because their need for agreement is so great that they end up agreeing with the mainstream or even a youtuber because its become their source of information their source of agreement reality... its is always there like a good neighbor and that alone is comforting for them.  

Whether on mainstream or on youtube, most needful people look for charismatic personalities as they freely surf youtube and or some just want a person who thinks like them or looks like them, talks like them and agrees with their world view. In fact, its about agreement all the way around. 

No matter how you look at it... agreement reality is how people find out and connect with who they are and are not and there is comfort and peace in that. In saying that, such truths apply to those who watch mainstream media regularly and nothing else. However, I must tell you that there is a difference and that is this... Youtubers come and go but mainstream media is there whether you like it or not. 

For the sake of wider and fair illustration, a study was done and this is what they found. 

     A new Pew Research Center study explores these questions in two ways: through a survey, conducted Jan. 6-20, 2020, among 12,638 U.S. adults that asked YouTube news consumers about their experiences on the website; and through an analysis of the most popular YouTube news channels and the contents of the videos published by a subset of these channels in December 2019. 

    The study finds a news landscape on YouTube in which established news organizations and independent news creators thrive side by side – and consequently, one where established news organizations no longer have full control over the news Americans watch.

    Not only that, but when YouTube news consumers were asked to describe in their own words why YouTube is a unique place to get news, the most common responses relate to the content itself – including access to news sources outside the mainstream and the plethora of different opinions and views that are available on the platform. Indeed, YouTube news viewers are about as likely to say they are primarily looking for opinions and commentary on the website (51%) as they are to say they are mostly seeking information and facts (i.e., “straight” reporting; 48%). 

Indeed, watchers are seeking information and facts... ones that they agree with for the most part. They may be curious when they find information that they don't initially agree with or different than what they expected. Then what happens? They either keep watching and begin to agree or they stop watching. 

Their decision to continue to watch is based on the personality they watch (both on mainstream and alternative). They continue to watch because there is something about them, the viewer feels a connection or an attraction and this is important in respect of continued watching. Even if its just a voice, they watch/listen because the information sounds interesting, attractive, or convincing enough and that convincing comes via the person who is delivering the information. 

Whatever your opinion is in regards to alternative news or youtube channels in general, its the future and more channels will appear and more voices will be heard whether you agree with them or not, somebody will. 

The question on anyone or everyone's mind should be... whose news is the real news? Well, that depends on your 'real' comfort level... go figure.

 

*Online source ~ https://www.journalism.org/2020/09/28/many-americans-get-news-on-youtube-where-news-organizations-and-independent-producers-thrive-side-by-side/

The Desire for a Superhero in the Social Imagination...

 

     

 

If you recall, several months ago, the topic of the hero was put forward. It was recognized that people, social actors, create ideal-types, a sort of measuring stick that captures the most rational and most essential components of any social thing. Ideal-types are never found in their pure form in real life. But, make no mistake, they do serve us in real life. 

 

How? They appear in the form of the ‘hero’. This is an individual person who overcomes a situation either for the group or for themselves. They can become legendary, a myth but also a real entity as the savior, rescuer, the hope giver... because, he or she has risen above given circumstances as an demonstration for all to rise above.

Max Weber wrote intensively on ideal-types. They are necessary for any society as ideal types formulate the realized conception of what man could and or should be within their given social and socio-cultural landscape. 

  

Max Weber observed that, individuals living in a well- defined group in a place over time, there exists not just an idea of who I am and am not among those around me and also how those around me shape my identity as a being in a group but a type, an ideal type of who I am and am not. This expression of identity belongs to all individuals in the group.

 

This does not mean that any one individual in the group thinks of themselves as an ideal type or that anyone among them is it ... yet some do arise to the call of 'hero'. Its more about their mutual agreement that an ideal type of them exists. This is arrived at through being in a place over time, generations of social interactions (real applications and abstract) that produce both successes and failures.

Weber, ideal-types rose out of that observed social phenomenon. Weber took it to another level as he defined those ideal types expressed in three forms of domination and subordination in action. The first type is charismatic domination, or power based on the exceptional qualities of an individual, such as his or her heroism or sanctity. The second type of legitimate domination is traditional domination, or power that is justified by a belief in long-standing customs in a place that work positively for the group in that place. 

Generally speaking, the hero is the overcomer, the one who rises above and this is not because the hero is determined to be a hero. In fact, the greater hero is not known unto him/herself as a hero nor to others until they are in the act of being one. This type of hero is the hero of old had meaning for everyone in his/her group. The real hero or the true hero is always the one who makes it through not only for him/herself but for everyone in their group... Moreover, the greatest hero of old, of all time, had and still has meaning for all people everywhere. 

 

Today's hero is an exhibitionist, he/she is the one who seeks to survive a process as a learning experience. In this sense, the survivor hero is simply the one who makes it through. There is no greater or just cause; just look at me and what I stand for; hence, the virtual signaler.

 

Today's hero is the 'lone' survivor as if no one else ever struggles or suffers and this is usually seen in a person who survives a bully encounter, an illness or accident or some malady. Not that the heroes of old didn't struggle with overcoming this world as it is... they did; but, they did it not only for themselves but for others.

  

Essentially, we should consider how the hero is even contemplated whatsoever... Does this icon in the social imagination serve a larger purpose? Why do we desire a hero and even a super-hero? Sure, you can hear people say that they believe in humanity as if humanity by itself is a hero. But, at every turn, we can read in the papers that humanity fails. Maybe that is why Hollywood is still putting out hero and superhero films. Of course, they put out every day Joe hero; but, they really draw the crowds to the ticket box with superheroes. 

Who or what is the superhero? Most everyone knows superman and a host of others that have all kinds of super powers. Such an ideal type truly overrides the plain ole hero. This type is super extraordinary to the point that death escapes them for all time. Believing in something or someone greater than yourself, greater than man is extraordinary. Atheists believe in either the state in this way or themselves. 

Different cultures also have such a type even if he or the multitudes don't offer eternal life. Or perhaps the superhero is just the ability to harness nature, or overcome the constrains of this world even if it is just because they (this or the many superheroes) can or it pleases them; thus their human 'non-superhero' followers applaud this with offerings and or sacrifices. 

 

Whatever... it does appear that man no matter who or where he is, desires a greater image of himself to help, to guide, to rescue and to live forever. How did man come up with that idea? Did it evolve? If yes, what would the point of that be? Wouldn't it be better in the chain of evolution that man just become man and live as a man and die as a man?

 

Why would he think that man is either everything or nothing in the great scheme of things? There must be a greater reason for his being just a man and that a greater reason has a greater cause and purpose and reach...if we just seek Him. The desire of our heart and our soul! Isaiah 26:8 ~ " Your name and renown are the desire of our souls."

Is such a superhero only in our mind? Isn't all of social reality? Our social reality exists in the social imagination... an information reality that uploads and downloads information... houses it, stores it, shares it, disables it and reclaims it. And, in that reality, we desire and even need to imagine that there is but one key source of all information which supersedes all other information in truth and in light.

 

In the Social Imagination of Proponents of Critical Race Theory...

 

The basic tenets of CRT include that racism and disparate racial outcomes are the result of complex, changing and often subtle social and institutional dynamics rather than explicit and intentional prejudices on the part of individuals.

Commentary- Yes, that is true. But, who is asking who composes social and institutional dynamics? Individuals. You see, people are part of a group/society/culture in a given place and they are shaped by that existence 'being in a place over time' with similar social actors. That means that those raised in a group are shaped by that group and they are part of that group.

Human beings al over the world, in every society, culture and group/tribe know who they are and are not simply by being in a place over time the sharing information they have been given/used and at hand in the place where they are; largely, because it works for them in that place at least with enough successful that they continue that sharing as a 'practice' that works. 

As for anyone outside of that shared information as a 'practice', they are and will continue to be outside of it; unless, they themselves decide to leave what they are and integrate into another group... just like being in a gang. The newbie has to prove him or herself... that they have left the old behind and are ready to be made new.

It can be explained by an analogy of in group/out group. People who are tall do have a certain vantage point and most of the time they don’t look down. They live in the clouds so to speak; but that’s not bad or wrong. It’s just their reality. Because they live on a level that others don’t and have a different perspective. It's this way for people who are of one social status vs another. It's this way for people of one kind of culture or geography vs. another.

People live with  the information they have been given and or have at hand. It’s a normal operation. Now, if some find themselves outside of a certain information reality or within a majority of people who share in one kind of information over another… then those who do not share the same information reality can feel left out... if that is even really possible. But, you can’t force one reality over and or on top of another without being guilty of doing what ‘you’ are criticizing… not sharing an embedded information reality that was culminated over a period of time in a place.

Even in saying that, how on earth could anyone from one reality group even know or understand on any ‘real’ level what the group that they criticize is thinking or doing. That is like saying you know and understand aliens and you feel left out from their planet.

Anyone who is not raised or shaped by a group in a place over time cannot know in any concrete ‘clear’ unbiased way what the group they criticize is really like. Let alone that they are being excluded by it.

It would be like monkeys at the zoo complaining that the lions get more attention. How would the monkeys even be able to recognize or understand that is what is happening to them? And, how would they be able to exclusively discern why they think they are not getting the same attention and that the lions know very well that they are getting more attention?

CRT scholars also view race and white supremacy as an intersectional (crossing over and mixing) social construction which serves to uphold the interests of white people against those of marginalized communities at large. 

Commentary- Firstly, how could someone make the statement that they are not a racist and yet recognize someone as being ‘white’ and worse being a white supremacist? Labeling people is racist. Its not surprising that self-labeling or group recognition is not new. Its still about knowing and displaying who you are and are not. This is done by the in-group inasmuch as its done by the out-group... those who want to be in. Those on the inside are always maintaining who they are and are not through shared information in a place over time. Every society/culture, group/tribe does this. Its about sustainability.

 A key CRT concept is intersectionality (analytical framework for the concept of intersectional), which emphasizes that race can intersect with other identities (such as gender and class) to produce complex combinations of power and disadvantage.

Commentary- This is true. Its like the melting pot of America. Or, what was once the melting pot of the United States. If one is seeking to divert from its given group in order to become like another, then the group which is being sought obviously has advantages that are preferred over their own group. Isn't that why people from all over the world came to America?

You need to hang out with that group, learn the lingo, learn the steps, learn the means of transportation. Its not the other way around… why would it be, unless you apply the politics of accommodation wherein you become like them from a distance and they move toward your group.

Academic critics of CRT argue that it relies on social constructionism, elevates storytelling over evidence and reason, rejects the concepts of truth and merit, and opposes liberalism

Commentary- If there is anything to agree with its social constructionism (information shared by a group in a place over time) … which is true for all people everywhere, it’s because we are talking about the human condition and processing of shared information in a place over time. The reality of either in-groups or out-groups is shaped/formed due to the working out of social dynamics in the place they are. This is observed not only among diverse groups attempting to cohabitate in the same place ‘geographically’ but within like groups and within the in-group. This is true in political structures, and in corporate hierarchies.

The only truth we can say about CRT is that "there is always somebody who don't like somebody"... Ray Charles.