Fox News was toxic long before Tucker Carlson's Jan. 6 movie
Stephen Hayes and Jonah Goldberg, center-right pundits and co-founders of The Dispatch, have been getting some good press for quitting their longstanding gigs as talking heads on Fox News. The occasion of their protest is Patriot Purge, a revisionist and conspiracy-laden documentary about the Jan. 6 insurrection spearheaded by primetime Fox host Tucker Carlson. Hayes and Goldberg had hoped the cable news network would moderate its stances now that former President Donald Trump is out of office, but Carlson's decision to blame the FBI for the violence on Capitol Hill last January showed those hopes were misplaced. So, they concluded, resignation was the only acceptable option.
Distancing oneself from Carlson is definitely a good idea. But I'm not sure this move quite makes Hayes and Goldberg into either heroes (as many anti-Trump figures on the center-right and center-left would have it) or villains (as frequent Fox News contributor and Carlson guest Glenn Greenwald implies). That's because the resignations will do nothing at all to change Fox News' politically toxic business model, with which Hayes and Goldberg have been perfectly content to play along over the past decade and a half, participating in Fox's enormous damage to our political culture in the process.
Fox News boosters, inside and outside of the network's offices, like to describe this business model as "respecting the audience." Defenders of Rush Limbaugh's talk radio program used to say much the same about it — that all it was doing was tapping into an underserved audience and taking its concerns seriously. But that account is almost comically one-sided. Just as the capitalist economy doesn't simply give people what they already wanted but actively creates new desires and shapes consumer tastes, so right-wing media doesn't just respect the pre-existing views of its audience. It also actively intensifies and radicalizes those views by flattering the prejudices that underlie them and providing an endless stream of provocations designed to confirm their validity.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
That's how the model works: Ratings rise and profits increase by giving viewers more red meat than they knew they wanted — a process that, over time, moves the Overton Window among American conservatives ever further to the right. Fox News is a machine for generating ideological extremism, in other words, and one to which Hayes and Goldberg were quite content to contribute, even for years after its ominous consequences for our politics had become obvious to all.
Better late than never? Absolutely. But never would have been better still.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Damon Linker is a senior correspondent at TheWeek.com. He is also a former contributing editor at The New Republic and the author of The Theocons and The Religious Test.
-
Today's political cartoons - April 28, 2024
Cartoons Sunday's cartoons - airline safety, teleprompter gaffs, and more
By The Week US Published
-
5 doom 'n' gloom cartoons about the mess we're in
Cartoons Artists take on long-term pessimism, dystopian fears, and more
By The Week US Published
-
The Church of England's legacy of slavery
The Explainer Should the CofE offer financial redress for its involvement in the transatlantic slave trade?
By The Week UK Published
-
Is the Supreme Court about to criminalize homelessness?
Talking Points The court will decide if bans on outdoor camping are 'cruel and unusual'
By Joel Mathis, The Week US Published
-
Myanmar: the Spring Revolution and the downfall of the generals
Talking Point An armed protest movement has swept across the country since the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi was overthrown in 2021
By The Week Staff Published
-
Arizona court reinstates 1864 abortion ban
Speed Read The law makes all abortions illegal in the state except to save the mother's life
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US Published
-
Trump, billions richer, is selling Bibles
Speed Read The former president is hawking a $60 "God Bless the USA Bible"
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
The debate about Biden's age and mental fitness
In Depth Some critics argue Biden is too old to run again. Does the argument have merit?
By Grayson Quay Published
-
It's not really about Biden's brain — unless it is
Talking Points Depending on who you ask, the renewed focus on the president's mental acuity is an election-year distraction, a legitimate point of concern, and sometimes both
By Rafi Schwartz, The Week US Published
-
Did Vladimir Putin gain anything from his Tucker Carlson interview?
Today's Big Question The former Fox News host spent nearly two hours talking with the Russian president
By Justin Klawans, The Week US Published
-
When Tucker met Vladimir: did we learn anything about Putin's thinking?
Today's Big Question Kremlin leader accused Boris Johnson of sabotaging Ukraine peace deal, insisted Russian defeat was impossible but denied plan to expand war into 'global conflict'
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published