Clear Thoughts: Rising above the echo chamber

What’s the worst part of being in an echo chamber? At some point, our thoughts stop being our thoughts. They’re someone else’s thoughts that we parrot. (The best part? Singing the theme song to the video game Halo.) Echo chambers are powerful and they’re everywhere. Social media feeds and search engine results serve us a unique universe of information. Geographically and socially, we are sorting ourselves by our party affiliations. But perhaps the biggest sources of ideas with which we already agree are news organizations. They play a pivotal role with the potential to either magnify the messages delivered or insulate them from rebuttals. How can we ever hope to form our own opinions based on objective reporting when we’re in an echo chamber? It all begs the question: What is the media’s responsibility in the face of an increasingly polarizing electoral landscape?

Two weeks ago, CNN hosted a town hall that featured the only declared Republican candidate for President: Donald Trump. The dust cloud of discussion CNN stirred up was huge. Some were critical. They wondered why they would host an event like this and asked what was learned or were shocked that the network would give a huge platform to such a divisive figure. Others thought the town hall was a huge success; they loved it. Especially the audience. There were no dissenting opinions or questions voiced, which might have played a role in that reaction.

“The audience wasn’t exactly a cross-section of the American public,” said Supreme Court lawyer Neal Katyal in an interview with Katie Couric responding to the CNN town hall. A majority of the more than 300 audience members had either voted Republican in one of the last two elections or planned to vote in the upcoming GOP primary. Nine audience members asked questions during the town hall; they were all Republicans and Independents with plans to vote in the GOP presidential primary.

We know echo chambers when we see one. That’s an echo chamber.

When you look at the ratings, it’s abundantly clear why CNN organized and aired this event. There were more than 3 million viewers that tuned in for a little over an hour, which is the closest CNN has come to catching up to Fox’s average viewership in quite a while. It amassed almost 4 million mentions on Twitter in the two days afterward. CNN has been struggling to get viewers’ attention for some time. As a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discover, a publicly traded company, CNN is ultimately accountable to its shareholders. This was a business decision.

As we head into the 2024 election cycle, it’s critical to remember that the modern media has evolved standards and a perceived responsibility to speak truth to power. But there are no written rules or laws that define or maintain those journalistic standards. Some media outlets are independent, some are privately owned and not beholden to shareholders, and still others are part of huge international companies whose first responsibility is to their shareholders — not the public. So, if we want to see objective information and framing of political ideas from media outlets, we must be mindful of how and where we’re directing our attention.

News organizations broadcast hyper-partisan politicians 4x more than they broadcast their bipartisan problem-solving coworkers. Providing a high-profile platform to controversial figures amplifies the influence those figures wield, drives up views and mentions, and ultimately reinforces division and toxic political polarization.

There are a lot of people competing for our attention. If you don’t want to see echo chambers created and aired to confirm beliefs we already have, we must “vote” with our attention. We “vote” with views, clicks, tweets, saves, and shares. So, how can we make a difference? “Vote” with intent.