Local TV News: Politically Correct and Feminized

A recent article in Tucker Carlson's new site, Dailycaller.com, sheds light on why LOCAL TV news is so politically correct: it is aimed exclusively at women. Hotair.com discusses the issue here. From a "well known news anchor from a Top 10 Local station" comes the unsurprising news that local news broadcasts are infested with perky twenty and thirtysomethings that know nothing but terminal political correctness, and practice it, both in hiring and producing newscasts. A near total reliance on women (almost exclusively White) ages 18-49 by local news as well as national broadcast and print media has been driving culture inexorably leftward and towards terminal PC stupidity. As a result, the media is ill-prepared for the backlash by men, and older women, who as the economy falls deeper into recession, become more important economically and politically. The stage is being set for a titanic political-cultural struggle between women ages 18-49, and everyone else, over the direction of the nation and its future.


The writer of the article, notes that:

For the better part of my adult life, I’ve worked as an anchor and reporter at CBS, NBC and ABC affiliated newsrooms across the country — often complaining about the nanny-state liberalism that infects so much of news coverage. Arguably, local news is a more insidious and destructive force than the widely accepted liberal bias of networks and other national components of mainstream media. After all, study after study has demonstrated that local news is more widely watched — and, more importantly, more trusted than other forms of mainstream media. There is a case to be made that the steady drumbeat of hyped-up threats — SUV’s that roll over, kitchen-counter bacteria, road rage, swine flu, amber alerts and the stations’ willingness to enlist governments and institutions to solve those “perceived” problems, actually drives a lot of bad and unnecessary public policy.

But it’s a formula that has worked as a cash cow for your local TV station. It is no accident that most local TV stations market themselves with nanny-state slogans: “Channel 2: Working for you!” or “ABC 6: On your side!” You might say those slogans are a subtler version of, “NBC 5: Making your boo-boos all better!”

How did it get that way?

…

Here’s the formula. Highly trained Anchorman (booming authoritative, focus-group-tested voice at the ready) or better yet, Anchorwoman (compassionate voice and pouty face, furrowed brow at the ready), reads the headline, tosses to reporter. Hyperventilating reporter further frightens with victim sound bite, followed by sound bite from plaintiff attorney (”This poor victim needs to be compensated.”). Followed by politician sound bite (”I’m introducing legislation …”) followed by reporter tag, which may or may not include response from big, bad, deep-pocketed corporation. Interestingly, that last component — the response from the corporate evildoers, often becomes, in my experience, a throwaway part of many stories — something along the lines of, “The XYZ company denies any wrongdoing.” Or even, “The XYZ company was unavailable for comment at news time.”

I’ve even noted a pattern among some media-savvy trial attorneys. Often, they’ll fax or e-mail a press release of a pending lawsuit or action to newsrooms on Friday afternoons — enough time for a reporter to get a camera crew, head to the law office, get the sound bite for the evening deadline, but not enough time for the deep-pocketed corporation, with it’s multi-layered media information office, often located in a distant city, to respond before deadline time. So, the story airs, unchallenged, with the charges stewing and brewing over the weekend. The corporation is sucker-punched, feeding frenzy gains steam, politicians take note. Damage is done, forcing corporation to consider out-of-court settlement, sparing them more bad publicity, but most importantly, sparing the plaintiff attorney all of that hard work of trial preparation, but with an easy payoff .

As one news director I worked for once said, “There are lots of things to be afraid of out there.” Indeed, cancer, household bacteria, child predators, hot weather, cold weather, tap water, electromagnetic fields, vaccinations, Chinese food, Mexican food, racism, fertilizers, homophobia, hate crimes, ad infinitum, ad nauseum.

And, who is most likely to be afraid of these threats? Well, the mainstream media machine, cynically and manipulatively, believes it’s that key demographic group, women ages 18-49. They, according to consultants and marketing executives, control the household remote and make the buying decisions. No. One. Else. Matters.

Later, describing the terminal PC and "Diversity" that infests local anchors, from the careful collection of Asian, Latino, Black, and limiting of White Men (to a very small number), the author writes:

Today, many large media companies have written policies — NBC/ General Electric and Gannett to name two — whereby station managers and executives cannot be promoted unless they themselves promote minorities and women. And where do managers go to ensure their own advancement, while hiring the perfect rainbow of staffers? The NABJ. NAHJ. NLGJA. NAHJ. These are the minority journalists associations. Black, Hispanic, gay and lesbian, Native American, Asian American. And curiously, among them, objectivity seems to be secondary to their particular form of advocacy and their “progressive” mandates. Each, in furtherance of their own mission is quick to claim victim status if quotas are not met or if their ideals are not expressed through “advocacy” journalism.

Now, local news is a money-maker for affiliates. Women, certainly don't find the terminal PC and "diversity" repelling. On the contrary, female audiences respond highly to these attributes, and cannot get enough of it. Why is that?

The author writes that women's natural compassion and empathy are at play, but my view is different. Rather, it is the constant competition for status and position among women, and their disgust at most White men who are at best, equal in status, that drives the "diversity" and PC nonsense. That further, women unless constrained and invested in society by a pretty permanent marriage to beta males and with beta male children, will always run hard-left in every possible way to produce an "aristocracy of big men." Women's innate desire to be Princesses (or marry into aristocracy), visible as a hard-wired behavior by little girls playing princess, pushes them left into this behavior. You cannot, after all, sell a group something it does not really want. No matter how slick the salesman.

Women in today's post-Industrial society face a lot of status competition. Over clothes, social positioning, educational background, "ticket-punching," and the like. This is why women hated Sarah Palin, excepting older women largely outside status competition, and responded positively to Tina Fey's impersonations that presented the notion that Palin's failure to attend Harvard (instead of the University of Idaho and community colleges) meant she was "stupid." From "Mean Girls," to the professional workplace, female rivalry for status is non-stop and anxiety producing. Status including notably, the quality of man a woman attracts.

Women, as noted by essayist and PUA blogger Roissy in DC face a fairly ruthless competition for the top, most status-laden, Alpha male. Most attractive women can have sex with the Alpha male, but relatively few can get them to commit to a steady relationship. Certainly almost none in the thirties. Even among attractive, beautiful, intelligent women in their twenties, at the peak of their beauty, few can get marriage or faithful cohabitation from a dominant, attractive, powerful Alpha male with many options. Which is indeed, the most desirable man. Women can and do share, powerful and dominant men. Many of Tiger Woods mistresses were not porn stars or prostitutes (though some were), but waitresses, to wealthy and famous BBC Newsreaders. None felt a bit of shame "sharing" him with his wife and other mistresses.

But anxiety runs through women, in the fairly ruthless competition to land exclusively the Alpha male (the brass ring prize). Though many overestimate the duration and power of their beauty, nearly all recognize that it fails, and the undeniable decline in male attention, particularly by the most desirable of men, the Alpha Male, in women's thirties is fear-inducing event. No wonder women are filled with fear — their social anxiety over "getting" the Alpha male pre-disposes them to this condition. Moreover, women are filled with contempt and loathing for the men who provide competition for scarce jobs and status, and yet fail to become "Alpha" men — commanding, powerful presences. This is why women, from Sandra Tsing Loh, to writers in the New York Times to feminists at Double XX all complain about husbands not being "masculine enough" and instead, becoming "Kitchen Bitches." Men who cook, are "supplicating" (no "real man" would deign to do nice things for them regularly, since a desirable man has women throwing themselves at them all the time).

Women have a huge complaint with modern men: they are not masculine enough (i.e. not dominant, powerful, Alpha men), and worse they are in competition with them while expressing often "icky" (i.e. unwanted sexual/romantic attention). Attention that might dissuade the intentions or distract the attention of the Alpha Male. Modern women, most of them unmarried, have an objective: find and hold an Alpha Male. Successful romantic comedies aimed at women ("the Proposal," "The Ugly Truth," "27 Dresses," "My Big Fat Greek Wedding") paint a good picture of the Alpha Male, as does of course "Sex and the City." He must be attractive, powerful, socially dominating, and wealthy. He can be informal or formal, country or city, WASP or ethnic, but must meet these important criteria. Most of a modern woman's social life is spent rejecting or forestalling advances from unsuitable, provider-status at best Beta Males, and winkling out the comparative Alpha status of the putative Alpha males.

In this, PC and "diversity" plays a huge role. No wonder a female-dominated audience for local news gets a female dominated newscast with very limited amount of White males and lots of "diversity." With PC Dogma repeated endlessly. Women love princes, princesses, dynasties, fairy tales, and the like. Women also love authority from "fashionable" figures of glamor and wealth. This is a generalization of course, not all women have these values, or find the Kennedy political dynasty a tragic but "beautiful" story, or idolize fashionable NYC opinion setters. But, most do. Fashionable opinion detests Sarah Palin, and so do most women. See also here:

According to the poll, 51 percent of men see her in a positive light, with an nearly equal amount of women view Palin in a negative way.

"The gender gap on Palin is not simply a function of the fact that women tend to identify with the Democratic party more than men do," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Even within GOP circles, Republican men like Palin more than Republican women do. John McCain put Palin on his ticket in 2008 to appeal to female voters, but it looks like men are a natural constituency for her."

Of course. Sarah Palin did not go to Harvard, did not marry a powerful, Alpha Male who intimidates other men or commands respect and adoration from powerful people, and did not abort her Down's syndrome baby. These are all actions that make most women 18-49 despise her (Palin does draw support from older women outside the status-struggle).

PC and Diversity are ways to first, winkle out who expresses orthodox, "correct" political opinions, and secondly to create such barriers that only the "most Alpha" of White males can surmount them. A world filled with politically correct, "diverse" folks with careful measurements of Asian, Latino, and Black female anchors and reporters, with minimal amounts of White men, is the ideal for most White women 18-49, and finds of course approval by non-Whites as well. A recent episode of the "Dog Whisperer" at advertising agency Chiat-Day, showed almost no White males, but lots of gay men of various non-White ethnic backgrounds, and many non-White women as well as White women. A multicultural, diverse paradise for women!

Naturally, the opinions, the nanny-state aspect of government (in response to anxiety driven by status competition, competition for Alpha males, and disgust over Beta male attention) find an appreciative audience in women. BUT … the economic decline, the low state of marriage, and the pressure on co-habitation by men taking the brunt (about 75% of all job losses since the start of the recession in 2007 have been men) of unemployment and underemployment means a big shift. More split-ups, particularly for fluid, fragile, and short-term oriented cohabitators. Far fewer marriages. Which means in turn a LOT more men living alone and making their own buying decisions.

Particularly as the web poses a threat to local news (why wait until 10-11 pm when you can get local news at any time), the ability of local TV news stations to extract local advertising dollars is probably on a par with that of newspapers to extract classified ad revenue in competition with Craigslist. Particularly since local advertisers are not interested in ideology, merely sales revenue, more split up couples or ones not forming in the first place means more men making buying decisions, reached more cheaply on the web, well the shift towards internet advertising is likely only to accelerate.

Which is likely to set up the template for the struggle for the culture and politics of America. On the web, for the most part, the highly trafficked sites are male-oriented (though not all conservative). Sites such as Drudgereport, or Instapundit, or Hotair, or Comic Bloc, or Ain't It Cool News, or Slashdot, might vary in politics, but are uniformly "male" in orientation. They are mostly written and controlled by men, for a male readership. One generally uninterested in careful "correct" opinions, celebrity-famous people worship, princess fantasies, dogma denying reality on threats and non-threats, and careful "diversity" with meticulous, ethnic/gender/sexual orientation balances designed to minimize the "threat" of nerdy White men.

Meanwhile, TV, print media, big media, and movies are undeniably feminine for the most part. With an equal part of "Access Hollywood" and "American Idol" to "the View" celebrity-fashion worship and local news threat-fear mongering, the battle lines are drawn. On the one side, women 18-49 with considerable demographic and monetary strength, wanting everything their own way, like an episode of "Gossip Girl" that never ends. On the other hand, older women, and White males, who find that marginalization of their concerns is a massive threat. Against this rough stalemate are the wild cards: continued economic recession, and extreme economic stress, threats of terrorism-Jihad that the female PC-driven consensus cannot deal with (and is notably and unavoidably incapable of dealing with), and new technology (internet, internet-enabled smartphones) favored by early adopter men.

Certainly there does not seem to be much in common across the gender lines between ages 18-49, nor does there seem to be compromise or peace any time soon. One side must win, and the other lose. For decades, technology and business have conspired to make men the losers. Events and trends may make that, however, a thing of the past.