Polls Subvert Democracy: Media's willful erasure of Kamala Harris' campaign

[PunkinPi]

Polls Subvert Democracy: Media’s willful erasure of Kamala Harris’ campaign
by Jeff Jarvis

It is journalistic heresy that I abandon the myth of objectivity and publicly support candidates. But the advantage of heresies is that they open one up to new perspectives. By seeing my profession and industry from the viewpoint of an interested voter, I get a new window on the failures of news media.

People know that I support Kamala Harris for president and so these days they’re asking me whether I’m still for her because, you know, the polls. Inside, I scream and deliver a searing lecture on the tyranny of the public-opinion industry, on the true heresy of journalistic prognostication, on the death of the mass, on the devaluing of the franchise of so many unheard voices in America. Outside, I just smile and say “you’re damned right, I do,” and wait to get to my desk pour out that screed here.

The coverage of Kamala Harris’ campaign is a classic case of media’s self-fulfilling prognostication. Step-by-step:

1. Harris’ campaign opens with a big rally and reporters say she could be bigger than Obama! Thus media set expectations the candidate did not set.
2. A parade of white men with established recognition (read: power) enter what had been a wonderfully diverse field, splintering the vote.
3. Harris’ poll numbers decline. Media declare disappointment against media’s overblown expectations.
4. Media give less attention to Harris’ campaign because, you know, the poll numbers.
5. Harris’ poll numbers fall more because media give her less attention and voters hear less of her, less from her.
6. The candidate finds it harder to raise money to buy the attention media isn’t giving her so the polls decline and media give her less attention. Candidates with more money get more attention. Pundits even use money as a metric for democracy. (And meanwhile, candidates can’t use the the inexpensive and efficient mechanism of Twitter advertising because media cowed the company into closing that door.) Harris closes New Hampshire offices. Pundits say they predicted this, taking no responsibility for perhaps causing it.
7. Return to 4. Loop.
8. Pundits mainsplain what went wrong with her campaign.

Not a single citizen has voted yet. Yes, campaigns come and go. That’s politics. But here I see this cycle affect the campaign of an African-American, a woman, a child of immigrants, someone 15–23 years younger than the three best-known leaders in the field, and someone who can take on our criminal president and his criminal henchmen. We need her perspective in this race and her intelligence in office. I want my chance to vote for her. But media gradually ignore her, erase her.

Continued here --> https://medium.com/whither-news/polls-subvert-democracy-5f0fea6eca42

[FailureToCommunicate]

1. All good points. Very depressing. In many ways.