I ran across an interesting thread on X by Mike Nayna, the Australian cinematographer and writer. Timely given the Trump Administration's efforts to shake up the self-assuredness of places like Harvard and Columbia:

In 1922, a journalist by the name of Walter Lippmann published a book called Public Opinion where he explored the limitations of the liberal democratic order in the burgeoning era of mass media. 1/n

This was a time between the world wars when innovations in radio, the telegraph, industrial printing, & cinema were being honed as powerful tools for propagandising the masses. 2/n

He argued that the public doesn’t have direct access to objective reality due to limitations in knowledge & access to information. Instead, they rely on heavily mediated info & simplified constructs to create a distorted image of reality that he called a ‘pseudo-environment’. 3/n

Lots of people adopted his ideas, including mass murderers like Mao and self-assured westerners.

The information landscape we now inhabit is full of meticulously contrived messaging that’s distributed at mass scales to elicit pre-determined behaviours from you. The practice is so commonplace that complaining about it is like yelling at a cloud. 7/n

Throughout my time wandering the halls of many cultural institutions I’ve been struck by a consistent observation - The liberal principles around free speech & an informed public I assumed governed these institutions aren’t widely believed or practised. 8/n

Was there a time when you had similar assumptions?

Instead, a broad range of people employed by the media, arts, & academic institutions of the West are guided by a vision closer to the refined democracy that Walter Lippmann outlined in his book. 9/n

The public these neo-Lippmannites purport to serve isn’t conceived of as rational agents able to interpret reality for themselves but as a dangerous, racist, sexist, homophobic, infectious, & polluting collection of nodes that ought to be managed into better decisions. 10/n

Sounds sort of like The Horde.

He has a Substack essay, too:

Related Narratives

Others have written about Lippman. Interesting that he would come up again now.

The most important and overlooked story of the week. According to someone.

Music

Hope you have something nice planned for this weekend. Happy Easter!

This is the Thread before the Gardening Thread.

Last week's thread, April 12, Passover and Easter Weeks

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