Been thinking about right wing media tactics again thanks to a great @yourewrongabout episode on the topic. And I have a real world example for you all! Small thread:

An older person I know shared a news story about a Minnesota resident who sent an anonymous letter to neighbors with Christmas lights, calling the displays divisive and harmful. (This screencap is from Fox News)

A few things stand out here. 1) Why is an anonymous letter to four people in Minnesota being covered in national news? We don’t even know if the letter is real, and if it is, who cares? It contains no threats or violence. It’a just a random person being weird to 4 neighbors.

THIS IS NOT WORTHY OF NATIONAL COVERAGE. Literally nothing happened to the people displaying the lights except an unhappy note from a neighbor.

But, it’s really great rage fodder. The rest of the Fox News coverage is a rage tweet roundup about the evils of woke culture. There is no verification that the letter is real, there is no commentary from any self identified liberal.

And since Fox News doesn’t REALLY want to deal with the full scope of the current coup attempt, they need to keep that War on Christmas burning bright!

So they report one very small local incident of social awkwardness as confirmation of the all encompassing war on Christmas being waged by liberals today. “You can’t even *have* Christmas lights anymore!” (Narrator voice: you definitely can)

Anyway I did my part by saying something like “wow what a strange letter. For what it’s worth I am very liberal and know lots of liberals from various religions, and none of us care about lights on people’s homes!”

Maybe it helps, maybe it doesn’t... who knows. But anyway, when you see a story that asks the reader to be angry or afraid, please ask yourself if the item is really *news*, if it’s verified, and if there’s any evidence that the bad thing is widespread or has a practical impact.