When and how did 'Fake News', 'Mainstream media' narrative take off?

Kermit.de.frog

I don't recall prior to Trump confirming he was running for election this whole thing of 'fake media' (code for all "main" media), which has reached levels of delinquency among sections of the public everywhere that are really toxic, being an issue?

Or maybe it was but I never noticed.

Nowadays it seems no one trusts any "main" media which is leading people to other sources which are actually fake and spreading a perverse, crooked view of the world to more and more people which I think is really dangerous and will lead to repercussions down the road.

Over 70 million people voted for Trump partially on the back of this.

When did this really kick off? I assume it was brewing under the surface because I definitely don't recall this mass stupidity, which is what it is, prior to 2016.

I don't remember it being a thing prior to 2016 at all. Everyone knew media had leaning, left or right, sure but it was never taken to these extremes.

I think it's worrying what this will produce in the years ahead. Maybe a lunatic worse than Trump will get the highest office in the world.

Or maybe you disagree and media is getting it's comeuppance.

We laugh at the Gemmas and Waters of this world. There is more and more of those people out there in part on the back of this.

When did it really start to be an issue for (some of) the public?

DontHitTheDitch

I think it festered from the left and the right. The right seemed to have a fondness for conspiracy theories based on their own hatred of ‘big government’ out to swindle them out of what they see as their hard earned cash and hard fought for personal rights. So that goes way back.

The left were more inclined to see themselves as people with better judgement and better morals who felt it was their duty not to tear down the media but to bend it to their will.

I think social media changed all that, it meant you could build an imaginary bubble of like minded people. This leads to extremism and a feeling that everyone outside the bubble can’t be trusted, and in particular, can’t be trusted to see the world through their new ideological goggles.

The death knell was the exponential growth of paranoid conspiracy thinking like “the patriarchy” or “the mainstream”, both of which see established institutions as out to get them. They want to either control the narrative or dismantle any platform for dissenting voices.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

It's been there since Nixon, but Trump wast he first person who actually coined the phrase.

One eyed Jack

Terms like mainstream and propaganda are around a while. Fake news was only around since Biden took up office in the EU.

DontHitTheDitch

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119124540#Comment_119124540

The EU? Don’t you mean “that, eh, outfit over there, ah. The other side of the sea, they got that big tower and women with hairy armpits and, eh, roast frogs on the lawn”

L1011

Far left moaned about "mainstream media" twenty years ago - hence Indymedia and so on. Horseshoe theory comes in to play here.

When both sides are bitching about your coverage, there's a decent chance you're actually fair.

Mo Ghile Mear

I read somewhere that Genghis Khan is reported to have used "disinformation"( i.e. fake news) as a tactic to maintain his power and confuse his enemies.

And that was in 1200 AD!!

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119124582#Comment_119124582

Dunno - has Ireland been kicked out yet?