Living life with blinders on

  

      As I listen to the news reports about people in Ukraine are having time convincing their relatives in Russia about what is happening in Ukraine.  Putin has been attempting to limit access to any information that doesn't come from his government-controlled sources.  It is hard to know how successful this can be in a time of VPNs and social media sources.  2022 is not the 1960s.  This situation reminded me of how Fox News and conservative social media platforms try to do the same thing.  I have relatives who have said they have stopped listening to traditional news sources because they are "fake news."  One relative told me in 2020, before the election, that news about the COVID virus would go away after the election because it was just to hurt Trump's chances to get re-elected.  They said that the Democrats thought that the Mueller investigation would do this but it failed so they had to find some new way and the virus was what they are using.  Looking at my relative's social media they have fallen into Trump's belief that the election was stolen.  They talk about voter fraud in cities.  When I point out that our own government officials have indicated that there wasn't voter fraud they ask me if I always trust the government.  The worst was an email from a relative that repeated Qanon theories after the January attack on the US Capitol.

      The separate media worlds that liberals and conservatives live in today will have significant impacts on the future of the United States.  As a liberal I know I would never choose to live in a red state and they would never choose to live in a blue state.  I even have felt discomfort when I visit places where you see Trump and "Go Brandon" flags.  I feel like I am in enemy territory.  Makes you long for the days of having a Walter Cronkite that we all could trust to give us the news.  Those days are long gone.

P.S.

      If anyone thinks that MSNBC is just as bad as Fox News, how many MSNBC broadcasters have moved away from MSNBC to other more conservative like Fox News.  I know that Tucker Carleson once was a conservative broadcaster on MSNBC but with Chris Wallace following Bret Brier, Jonah Goldberg, Stephen Hayes, and Nicole Wallace Fox News is truly becoming our country's version of the Russian Pravda station of old.