In journalism circles, we often speak about our work in abstract ideals. Transparency. Accountability. Democracy. Truth. All of these ideals are urgently important. And yet, in this precipitous moment, as we watch an overt fascist prepare to ascend back into the White House, abstract concepts are not at the top of our minds as journalism leaders. Instead, we’re thinking about people: our loved ones, our neighbors, and our communities — including our communities of fellow journalists and readers, many of whom are among the most vulnerable groups that Trump has stated an intent to target. Real human lives must be at the center of all our reflections on the current, cataclysmic moment.
Those lives include our own, and the lives of so many media-makers engaged in journalism that functions as a weapon against fascism. We know that sharing truthful information and ideas among our networks, including through media outlets like those we work with, is a key facet of any effective resistance movement. And yet Trump’s vindictiveness toward journalists — and threats to channel that vindictiveness into active attacks — may make that work much more difficult even as its necessity is heightened. Meanwhile, folks in the media world are entering a moment of growing intensity, when we’ll be grappling with an endless stream of new crises to cover, to the extent that our work may feel impossible.
Nevertheless, there are things we can do! Taking action on the media front is key, and anyone reading this piece can find a lane in which to participate. Here, we offer five steps that media makers, readers, viewers and listeners can take over the next couple of months to meet the moment, come January.
1. Educate ourselves on media literacy.
Our worlds are flooded with media but perilously short on practical tools for understanding, filtering and critically approaching that media. Donald Trump and other fascism enthusiasts have made excellent use of the U.S. public’s lack of media literacy. Trump sailed to power on a tide of conspiracy theories, which were disseminated across social media and right-wing outlets and sometimes filtered into the mainstream. And his supporters feed off a steady racist, misogynist, anti-trans conspiracy diet, from “great replacement” lies, to “voter fraud” hoaxes, to the persistence of QAnon, and much more. Meanwhile, many corporate mainstream media outlets have spent the last year manufacturing consent for genocide, conveying the Trumpist threat narrowly instead of recognizing its linkages with fascist movements worldwide, including the Zionist project. That lack of context, too, is a type of misinformation. In the face of rampant conspiracy theories and context-free soundbites, critical readership, viewership and media participation are ever more important.
There’s never been a better time for self-education and community education around media literacy, to arm ourselves with discernment before the second Trump administration.
We can start by reading up. Explore Project Censored’s critical media literacy tools and sign up for its newsletter. If you’re on a university campus, you can also become part of the Project’s Campus Affiliate Program to build critical media literacy among students. Watch the webinar Prism hosted, in which the two of us (Lara and Maya), Aysha Khan and Joshua Potash drilled down on how to distinguish propaganda from journalism; how traffic-driving strategies can skew the news; and the impact money and corporate influence have on our media. Check out the Citations Needed podcast for deep drilldowns on false narratives perpetuated by the corporate media. Explore the work of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting for studies on how journalistic practices influence political conversations and policies. Make sure you are sharing trusted sources instead of panic-posting and panic-sharing.
Dig into the Kansas City Defender’s handbook for a look at the history of the radical Black press for a reminder that media can drive transformative change, and that it’s our responsibility as both media makers and readers to support it in serving the public good. And read a range of trusted, values-driven publications: There’s a wide variety even just among the Movement Media Alliance, the coalition we participated in co-founding.
Fascism thrives off of isolation, fear, disinformation and the silencing of voices of dissent and for liberation. In media, as in all realms, our power lies in connection.
For those of us who are part of media organizations, our newsrooms must interrogate the framing of each piece we publish. Our friends at Project Censored call this “frame checking.” Prism calls it “when they zig we zag,” meaning that we look at what is missing from existing reporting. We ask: Who is most impacted by the issue being reported and are they being centered in the piece? Who is absent from the conversation, and who benefits from certain narratives being excluded? When we don’t interrogate the framing of a piece, we risk creating a slant that reinforces a reductionist and simplistic narrative.
In between all of this, make sure to breathe, eat, sleep and pet your cat. Nobody is at their best, discernment-wise, when they’re........