Shed No Tears for 2 Sleazy Leftist Media Publishers

Diogenes’ Middle Finger: Two flagship leftist publications of the digital-media age recently announced their own demise. (a moment of silence please)  It’s notable what’s been missing from media narratives about Vice and BuzzFeed’s fall: any recognition that in their pursuit of buzz and clicks, their leaders abandoned some important journalistic principles and contributed a great deal to the declining trust in media.

They raised up a generation of half baked journalists that have helped make media untrustworthy and their information suspect. Vice, once valued at $5.7 billion, did their part by selectively targeting the small community of thirtysomething hipsters with niche identity politics viral rage content. The “young and online” orientation eventually infected all of media and had its own deleterious effects on journalism in general. As more and more “young and online” reporters embraced identity politicking and put pressure on their editors and managers to publish pleasing political narratives rather than often-uncomfortable facts, they help skewed younger readers perceptions of what the rest of the world believe about controversial political and cultural issues. Just read twitter. more