The New McCarthyism
When the government and a compliant media collude to trample speech, watch out. You may be onboard now, but an Uber ride to the gulag may be in your future too. All you have to do is bide your time.
Respect for the value of free speech to democracy occupies a shrinking amount of real estate.
In almost every other parallel universe, the biggest news story right now concerns revelations about collusion between our government and private proxies to restrict speech, as documented in the Twitter Files. The only reason that this isn't the biggest news story in our universe is that we are stuck in one where the media has just about hit rock bottom.
In our universe, the legacy media is inexplicably arrogant, condescending and incapable of admitting that they ever get anything wrong. Rarely does our media engage in meaningful self-examination, no matter how dire the need. Our media is more focused on indulging readers in silos that they cultivated than impartially informing anyone about important issues.
There exists a professor of journalism at the university where I taught for a quarter of a century who, I am told by the friends, has a fit whenever I or other members of the media criticize the media for incompetence or bias. That, in a nutshell, explicates the magnitude of the problem our media has with introspection. Good luck waiting for the media to confront it by themselves. When you fancy yourself above criticism, especially by the hoi polli, you are flying a dishonest, fetid enterprise into the ground.
The prevalent line in the media concerning the Twitter files is that there's just nothing to see here, folks. Instead of illuminating the peril of allowing our government to lean on private companies to censor disfavored speech, why don’t we, instead, examine the incredible, doomsday-level danger posed to democracy by Libs of TikTok. Let's expose those who opposed many of the prevailing narratives about Covid as conspiracy theorists - even if they were right. Let's excoriate anyone who objects to poorly researched “gender affirming” procedures for minors (which statistically looks a lot more like social contagion than an emerging medical issue) as a bigot. Let's take down anyone who resists speech compelled by the diversity, equity and inclusion police. Let's put those who object to wokeness supplanting rigor and merit on the next Uber to a distant gulag. Preferably one with year-round darkness.
The Twitter files story is relevant above and beyond what has been revealed by the files themselves, i.e., multiple attempts to suppress speech because it ran against narratives pushed by large swaths of the press and the government. This would be wrong even if the suppressed speech was incorrect, but in many cases it was completely legitimate, factually accurate speech that was suppressed.
All of this reveals the degree to which the media disdains and disserves much of the country. How dare you disagree with us. The New York Times and The Washington Post probably ought to include that on their mastheads.
The smug view by the media that they understand the world better than anyone else is one that I take great exception to. Rarely do reporters, editors or publishers have any significant expertise concerning the issues that they cover. The last time I checked, most journalists come from mass communication, rather than the disciplines were scientists, doctors, historians, sociologists and lawyers are educated.
The media, for the most part, would print a piece about riding a bicycle to the Andromeda galaxy if you told it to them with a straight face. They might even earn a Pulitzer for it.
This week, the House Oversight and Accountability Committee held a hearing concerning Twitter's role in suppressing disfavored narratives at the request of people associated with our government, notably the FBI and CDC, under the guise of preventing the spread of disinformation. My favorite moment of the hearing was when Representative Nancy Mace (R., S.C.) tuned-up Vijaya Gadde, Twitter's former head of legal policy and trust, for suppressing arguments from qualified medical experts concerning Covid-mitigation; arguments which were disfavored largely because they ran counter to prevailing, and as it turned out, incorrect, narratives. In one particularly amusing exchange, Mace asked Gadde, “Where'd you go to Medical School?”
Bust out the whooping stick.
This is not a new problem. Seven decades ago, the FBI was involved in another violation of First Amendment protections - McCarthyism. Between 1946 and 1952, the FBI doubled its number of agents in order to execute “loyalty-security” investigations designed by J. Edgar Hoover, and supported by the Justice Department and two presidents. Many of those whose reputations and careers ended in ruin were blacklisted by anonymous sources. There was no right for the accused to confront their accusers. Toe the line, say what we tell you to say, or else.
I'm sure glad that doesn't happen anymore.
Though it's complicated (there was an actual national security threat behind the Red Scare), McCarthyism is widely considered to be a dark, dark period in our nation's history. The parallels between McCarthyism and current behaviors are not exact, but there are some notable similarities. In both instances, government officials and agencies act as if the First Amendment only applies to speech of which they approve. The twist in contemporary McCarthyism is that instead of doing it themselves, the government is circumventing the First Amendment through pressure campaigns on private-sector proxies, like Twitter.
Another similarity between old and new McCarthyism is the degree to which the exile of those deemed guilty of disinformation is based on flawed but unassailable assertions (the Covid panic) or anonymous sources (Hunter Biden's laptop), with rebuttal getting buried in the process. The difference with the new McCarthyism is that much of the media is onboard, even complicit, this time around. This is something that I'm pretty sure has Edward R. Murrow rolling over in his grave.
The biggest difference between new and old McCarthyism is that it was the left who suffered the most from McCarthyism decades ago. This was a major reason that the left was so adamant in defending First Amendment freedoms for so long. But now that the left controls most of the government bureaucracy, most of academia, many corporate boardrooms and most of the media, they are far less keen on First Amendment protections that protect those with less power, and pose a challenge to their own preferred narratives.
As much as I got a kick out of Representative Mace's monster dunk over Ms. Gadde, it does expose a less cheerful issue that makes new McCarthyism arguably even more dangerous than the original - the dearth, with no end in sight, of ideologically and intellectually diverse opinions informing public policy. Both the media and the government seem to lack any comprehension of how important diversity of thought is in maintaining a functioning democracy.
Our government and media rely on sycophants to bolster their preferred narratives not because it’s good for democracy or freedom, but because it increases their respective bottom lines. None of this is helpful. Many of the Covid-mitigation strategies, foisted on us by government and media experts, often way out of their depth, were not only deeply-flawed but had catastrophic outcomes that we'll be dealing with for decades.
In a recent article in The Atlantic, Brown University economist Emily Oster argued that we should “Declare a Pandemic Amnesty.” Over my dead body. I understand the initial confusion and unsteady approach to a rapidly evolving international emergency which few saw coming. I get that the data informing our early response was wanting - on multiple fronts. But the degree to which governments colluded with media to censor valuable dissenting arguments for dealing with the pandemic, many of which would have informed better decisions, is unforgivable.
I've made the argument before that our government is terrible at discharging it's basic responsibilities. Our border security, for instance, is basically non-existent. What passes for our national energy policy is a bad joke. Crime is a serious issue. Our economy works, to the degree that it does, despite most government policies. Our infrastructure is in disgraceful shape. Though we spend more than most of the rest of the world, combined, on our military, we have our withdrawal from Afghanistan to show for it. Fiscal responsibility is an unknown term any government publication.
Hell, our government evidently can’t even deal with a high-albedo Chinese spy balloon in the stratosphere above our own country without help from a local Montana newspaper. They and the nitwits in the media who consistently confused the balloon’s mass with its size are the last people I want deciding how I evaluate information.
When a largely incompetent government colludes with a compliant and equally incompetent media to bolster narratives that make them appear better than they are, suppressing the rest, watch out. Even if you are onboard now, because they're playing your tune, it's just a matter of time until they are not.
Associated Press and Idaho Press Club-winning columnist Martin Hackworth of Pocatello is a physicist, writer and retired Idaho State University faculty member who now spends his time with family, riding bicycles and motorcycles, arranging and playing music. Follow him on Twitter @MartinHackworth
Excellent!