What kinds of media messages should we choose to receive, and how
seriously should we take them? These questions are much more urgent now
than they were in the pre-digital era, when we had far less control over the
information we consumed. Back then, nearly all our media options came from
the major TV networks, movie studios, book publishers, radio broadcasters
and local news monopolies. Today, anyone can add to our inexhaustible menu
of media choices, which continue to expand without pause. With so many
choices at our fingertips, filtering becomes a top priority to arrive at any
coherent understanding of the world beyond our direct experience. But what
principles ought to drive our filtering and interpretive criteria?
The standard answer to this question starts from the assumption that
many of us don’t always make the best choices about what information to
consume. As with food, what appeals to us most immediately is not always
the healthiest or most useful — for example, soft news and infotainment
are sometimes blamed for emphasizing the most salacious and least
consequential aspects of public affairs. But even worse is factually untrue
content designed to look authentic (what is sometimes called “fake news”),
which usually targets those who agree with the false message. Extreme
opinions can be equally harmful, as when they advocate for the systematic
injury, oppression, or extermination of entire ethnicities, sexual orientations,
or religious groups. I argue that, generally, people are well justified in
avoiding such content
