Video summary
The podcast explores a significant shift in journalism known as "post-journalism," arguing that the press lost its monopoly on news when the internet democratized information distribution. Historically, major media organizations like The New York Times held immense power and money due to their exclusive access to news, allowing them to report with less bias because factual reporting was a valuable commodity in itself. However, the rise of the internet allowed local individuals to report events faster than big press organizations, stripping away that monopoly. Consequently, traditional outlets were forced to pivot from informing readers to confirming what audiences already believed, transforming their business model into one driven by tribalism rather than objective truth. A key example provided is The New York Times, which in the 1980s and early 1990s produced articles that were notably more factual, even within opinion pieces. In contrast, modern news coverage often leans heavily toward specific angles to construct compelling narratives using rhetorical skills rather than just presenting facts. This shift turned major newspapers into "TV serials," where events are personified—such as depicting Donald Trump as a recurring villain in an ongoing Saturday morning cartoon style—to maintain reader engagement. The transcript suggests that this narrative approach, similar to reality TV or drama series, allows writers to use literary devices like twists, irony, and poetic justice, effectively turning news stories into fiction masquerading as fact because such dramatic structures sell better than plain truth. The discussion highlights a paradox where the only way for journalists to be read is to dress up the truth in engaging story forms, even if it means slightly sensationalizing titles or relying on gossip-like dynamics about who is "in" and who is "out." The speakers note that while this makes information easier to retain and more accessible—comparing complex ideas like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu tournaments to simple dramas of prestige versus money—it risks reducing serious political discourse, such as the Trump vs. Biden dynamic or intellectual debates involving figures like Jordan Peterson, into mere entertainment for a specific generation. This focus on personification removes stories from the realm of first principles and foundations, replacing them with simplistic binaries of good versus bad that appeal to human nature but obscure deeper realities. Despite these criticisms, the speakers do not wish to completely demean the press or dismiss it as entirely biased, acknowledging that many journalists still work hard to break important stories. The consensus is that while every human being possesses bias and media outlets are certainly slanted now, readers should remain vigilant by asking what specific narratives they are trying to convince them of. Ideally, truth can be told in story form if the author explicitly draws attention to the fictional aspects of their packaging, allowing the audience to "rip off" the dramatic layer to access the core message. Ultimately, the episode concludes that while we need to read critically and understand the motivations behind these constructed narratives, dismissing all media as fake ignores its continued value as an important voice in society.
Read the full video transcript
post journalism the Press lost its
Monopoly on news when the internet
democratized info to save its business
model it pivoted from journalism into
tribalism the new role of the press is
not to inform its readers but to confirm
what they already
believe yeah so you know I originally
was unsure whether the media used to be
less biased um but I I stumbled across
this really great YouTube video by a guy
called Ryan Chapman who actually
analyzed whether the media used to be
less biased uh or whether you know it
was just a sort of cherry uh Cherry sort
cherry picking Rose tinted glasses sort
of thing but like um yeah it actually
turns out that the media were less
biased back in the day and this was
prior to the internet this was when the
media essentially had a lot of power and
they had a lot of money uh because
nobody else could provide the news and
so they didn't have to be uh partisan as
partisan as they are now they actually
could have for to just tell the news
because the news was actually a valuable
thing back then but that changed with
the internet uh what happened with the
internet was suddenly anybody could tell
the news and in fact some people could
tell the news faster than the big press
organizations because there would be
local people reporting on things going
on in their in their facility um and
this obviously took a lot of the wind
out of the sales of the media uh they no
longer had this Monopoly and so they had
to find a new new way to sort of a new
business model basically
and that really ended up
becoming less about telling the news and
more about uh confirming what people
wanted to
believe and we see it with the New York
Times the New York Times if you look at
some of the New York Times articles
prior to the Internet so in the 19 early
1990s 1980s you see that it's actually a
lot more factual and there's even the
opinion pieces tend to be a lot more
fact factual in there sort of
presentation um whereas now even not
just the opinion columns but also the
actual news itself is it slanted towards
a certain angle and that's
because since people can get news
anywhere they have to do something
different they have to do something new
and a lot of these people who are
supposed journalists and commentators
one thing that they're very skilled at
is again rhetoric and so they use their
rhetorical skills to essentially tell
stories um you know very powerful and
interesting stories construct narratives
with
Persona yeah and it's Al it's almost
like a kind of TV serial I mean we saw
this a lot during the Trump years um you
know after 2016 we saw the ways that
this changed the New York Times the New
York Times became like a kind of a a TV
serial in which um Trump was like this
kind of Saturday morning cartoon villain
and it was like you you know every
article should have it may as well have
just at the end of the article it may
have may well may have well just said um
you know tune in next week to see what
you know Donald Trump is gonna do you
know so it was like an ongoing narrative
about like Donald Trump and what is he
gonna do next you know find out in the
next issue of the New York Times um yeah
and so you know
it's it's why I I don't really read the
the sort of press too much I mean I
don't want to demean it too much because
I do feel that the Press is a little bit
probably over demeaned um I think that
pretty much everybody hates the Press
you know and I think that yeah they are
they are of course they're biased every
you know every every human being is
biased and yes I think you know if you
look at if you do read the the New York
Times for news then God help you but I
think it's valuable anyway because it it
allows you to see what they're doing it
allows you to see what they're trying to
convince people of and that's why I do
still read the New York Times and look I
don't want to be completely unfair to
the New York Times it still does break
important stories and it does still um
it does still matter it's still an
important voice you know it's very easy
to just dismiss it and just say oh
they're all just biased you know and
they're just trying to uh you know
convince you of things that are not true
I don't think that's that's the case I
think there are some good journalists
working at the New York Times so I don't
want to I don't want to demean it too
much but I think yeah we need to be
careful when we um we need to ask
ourselves what they're trying to
convince us of I think the sort of
narrative
element and this um constructing of
personification of both events of
countries of regimes of
ideologies that kind of
takes stories out of the realm of fact
and into the realm of fiction it means
that people that are reading it don't
need to uh they don't need to actually
understand the first principles or the
foundations of what's going on it's an
easy story between good and bad between
fair and unfair between plight and
Justice and uh there's this guy Craig
Jones who I had on the show a couple of
weeks ago talking about he's created
this new grappling tournament which is
um going head-to-head with essentially
the Olympics of Brazilian jiu-jitsu and
I mentioned to him I was like look dude
I don't the sport of BJJ is kind of
confusing if you don't really know
what's going on and you don't understand
the intricacies of his foot position and
what this side control means and all of
this I tell you what I can get on board
with
a huge amount of drama between two big
organizations and athletes having to
make the decision between Prestige
that's old and money that's new like I
anybody can understand that anybody can
and I have this thing in my house
talking to the guys by the pool
yesterday I was like
uh much of the time I want to talk about
ideas and like your um decision-making
heuristic a conversational heuristic
that I try to catch myself on is is if I
start talking too much about people
their motivations what they're like I'm
like ah I'm creating this sort of
personified narrative thing and I'm like
look dude the Trump versus Biden is just
or or Jordan Peterson versus some Lefty
person it's
just the Kardashians for people with
three figure IQs like that's all it is
it's just it's reality TV for the
substack gener ation and you're you're
trying to you're still doing the same
thing don't yeah maybe the ideas are a
little bit more high for luttin maybe
the people that are involved are a
little bit smarter or intellectual or
academic or something but the the
fundamental Foundation of this is gossip
you're gossiping about people and
that's that idea of of of Craig and also
sort of what's going on here with this
post journalism idea um it brings news
stories into a realm everybody can
understand which is the most fundamental
human human which is who's hot who's not
who's playing Fair who isn't who's in
who's out that's what it's focused on at
the moment yeah I mean I've actually
noticed this in the ways in which the
sort of stories sort of press stories
are constructed like they actually often
use a lot of the same uh devices as
actual literature so a lot of these you
know these news stories they will
actually have have fictional tropes
they'll have twists they'll have uh
Poetic Justice they'll have Irony like
dramatic irony um and all of this stuff
you know uh and so
it's it shows that the writers are are
not telling you the facts but they're
presenting a narrative which they're
basically probably what's happened is it
might be that they've just watched too
many Netflix shows and that they're
unconsciously projecting this onto the
world when they report but it does seem
that you know a lot of the time if if a
news story does have some of these
literary devices you know where you have
like a dramatic uh reversal of events
and you know then there's a happy ending
or something you're not you're not
reading the news you're reading the
story um but unfortunately those kinds
of stories sell so much better they get
a lot more attention and so easier to
read as well even look at what
non-fiction great nonfiction we're both
uh big fans of Morgan howel as a good
example yeah right Morgan howel
nonfiction writer read one of his books
it's a story book it's a it's a a
storybook masquerading as a finance book
and yeah the philosophical underpinnings
of this might very well inform your
investing strategy or how you think
about wealth or how you think about
stuff that never changes but when you
read it it's just a sequence of stories
from history or stories from politics or
from space or from sport or from
whatever it's story because it's so much
easier for us to retain that kind of
information yeah yeah it's it's one of
the kinds of paradoxes which is that you
can't really uh you won't get read if
you just tell the truth like you have to
dress it up in the story uh and so you
have to kind of the only way you're
going to actually be able to tell this
truth is by making it a little bit fake
you know um and so you know gotta ham it
up a little bit yeah yeah and I'll
confess I have to do this when I publish
substack articles I try to be as honest
as I can I don't I don't deliberately
lie but I know that for instance with
with the titles that I use you know I do
slightly use Sensational titles because
I know that if I don't I'm not going to
get as many readers and so um it's it's
sort of unfortunate necessity but I
think it's possible to tell the truth um
in in story form I do think that's it's
possible it's hard but it's possible and
I think the best way to do it is to is
to draw attention to the fact that
you're telling a story I think that's as
long as you do that then you can
actually you can negate the fictional
aspects of it sort of thing so it's like
a kind of it's like a beautiful
packaging that you tell them to rip off
you know um and and then they can
actually get to the actual meat of what
you're trying to say this episode is
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