Superbly Articulates The Challenge of Mass Communication | True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact...

Alternate Realities and Suspicious Minds | True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society | Farhad Manjoo

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	• True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society Farhad Manjoo Wiley, 2008 - 256 pages average customer review:based on 12 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

You'll never look at the "news" the same way again

I really really like this book and highly recommend it to everyone. The book describes various cognitive biases that are built into all of us -- things called, such as, selective perception, selective exposure, "experts", particularized trust -- and how these interact with the sudden change in the huge number of news sources brought about by the internet and other information technology changes -- to give us a world where "objective" reality disappears and different people live in their own versions of "reality".

You may disagree with the author's beliefs about the particular examples he uses to illustrate these ideas -- Swiftboat Veterans for Truth, 9/11 conspiracy theories, the Iraq war, global warming, and so on. But his opinion on these things are not really the point of the book. The point of the book is how different people see these things in different ways, and how this difference persists in the face of more news, more information, more photos, more videos, more blogs, etc -- instead of more information getting us closer to the truth, it instead takes us farther away from the truth and further into our own echo chambers. And describing how this process works -- and how certain people, such as savvy public relations firms, try to manipulate the process to get certain ideas and belief out into the public -- is the real point of the book. So, regardless of whether you agree or disagree with the authors point of view on any particular examples, I guarantee, after reading this book, you will never look at the "news" the same way again.

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Superbly Articulates The Challenge of Mass Communication

This book is superb. And as a communication professional, I was both intrigued and saddened by the truth he's been able to articulate.

At the same time, I give it a "4" because it's a bit of a haul reading it. It's not a lack in his writing. It's the fact that he honors the complexity of the situations and problems he's considering. It shouldn't be written any other way. But be prepared to think about what you read.

Have seen a few reviews dis-liking his conclusions on specific issues. All I can say is that after 20 years of consumer research on message and communication issues, he's articulated some of the really tough stuff to get a handle on. And that may offend a few people who really don't want to understand how prejudiced we all may be. (Their reviews are case in point for his commentary.)

So, read it. It's superb. And, send it on. But, don't expect easy "answers". There really aren't any. And, that's what I like best about the book.

I'm tired of books claiming to offer simple answers. There's aren't "7 steps" to happiness and utopia. Humanity is too complicated for communication "theorists" to box into one single corner.

While this book overtly discusses political situations, it should be read by every marketing and advertising professional.

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Alternate Realities and Suspicious Minds

Facts are obsolete. Alternative realities are the rule. Trust belongs to yesterday.

Trust plays a surprisingly large role in the well-being of a culture. Manjoo asserts that countries having greater trust typically see higher economic output than do places where trust is low. Further, people are healthier in trusting societies.

It all might seem obvious. A generation should know that we can't go on with these suspicious minds. Yet trust is at a low. Nothing would tear apart a people so thoroughly as mistrust. Manjoo says that people exist in differing realities brought on by internet blogs and cable news. The main-stream media held the role of mediator in political disputes, but that role is now diminishing. I would suggest that science played mediator before the advent of the alternate reality of corporate "sound science".

Manjoo has a way with hitting on ideas that are fundamental to the "truthiness" concept and presents them in a manner that will interest many and many will understand.

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Intelligent discourse on the important issues of the day has largely gone out the window.

It may be hard to believe but the fact of the matter is that a significant number of Americans still insist that Sadam Hussein possessed WMD despite the fact that not one shred of evidence has emerged to justify this conclusion. Likewise, large numbers of Americans firmly believe that George W. Bush stole the 2004 Presidential election in the state of Ohio when every reputable study has concluded otherwise. The American electorate is hopelessly divided on these and countless other issues. And what is most alarming about all of this is that the facts don't seem to matter anymore. In his new book "True Enough: Learning to Love In A Post-Fact Society" author Farhad Manjoo examines the dynamics of how the American media has responded to and taken advantage of the seemingly irreparable rift that has developed among the American electorate. It is a fascinating case study.
When talk radio first emerged in the late 1950's and early 1960's virtually all of the shows were local and in most cases the hosts made a conscientious effort to present all sides of an issue. In 1949, the Federal Communications Commission had issued the Fairness Doctrine which in essence prevented a station from day after day presenting a single point of view. When Ted Turner launched CNN in 1980 the idea was to present hard news to an audience thought to be hungry for such information. However, the Fairness Doctrine was discontinued in 1987 and as a result the landscape of broadcast journalism and talk radio slowly began to change.
I think that is is fair to say that conservatives have come to dominate the world of talk radio for at least the past 10-15 years while the liberal point of view is on display nearly 24 hours a day on cable networks like CNN and MSNBC. Broadcasters have quietly decided that it is much more profitable to cater to an audience with a particular point of view than trying to be objective. Hence the emergence of people like Rush Limbaugh, Chris Matthews, Keith Olberman and Lou Dobbs who has morphed from a once highly respected financial news anchor into someone resembling Howard Beale from the motion picture "Network". Add to all of this the plethora of partisan websites and highly opinionated bloggers of all stripes and what you are left with is a hopelessly divided nation.
In "True Enough" Farhad Manjoo explains that it is really the audience that has changed dramatically over the past ten or twelve years. It appears that most of us are tuning out other points of view. More and more of us are cocksure that what we believe has to be right and that everybody else is wrong. And so we turn to programming that jives with our own beliefs. Manjoo illustrates the problem with a discussion of two concepts he dubs "selective exposure" and "peripheral processing". After reading Manjoo's extensive analysis you will come away with a far better understanding of how this problem has evolved over time. Unfortunately. Manjoo believes that the situation is not likely to get much better anytime soon.
For the most part I found "True Enough: Learning To Live In A Post-Fact Society" to be a pretty interesting read. However, I tend to agree with another reviewer who found that the book began to lose a bit of steam towards the end. Nevertheless, the ideas contained in "True Enough" are well worth your time and consideration. The polarization of the American electorate will continue to be a problem for the foreseeable future. If the events of 9/11 only served to divide us further one wonders if there is any scenario that will reverse these disturbing trends. Recommended reading.

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Book is true enough

This book challenges the conventional thinking that new media democratize information and will lead to greater vetting and truth. On the contrary, the author argues that new media encourage the retreat into reality tunnels. The greatest benefit of the book is a detailed analysis of the psychological factors that go into propaganda. It explains why "Swift Boating" works. Though I find what Manjoo says to be insightful and correct, I'm also wondering if there is also a nostalgia for solidity, to the days when there were less media, and diminished freedom of expression due to the top-down model of the one-to-many media structure of old. I think the warnings he makes about our tendency to regress into info tribes should be heeded. Does he want to a return to the Jeffersonian ideal of educated elites, or a newspaper saturated public sphere? Oddly, the solution, I think, is rather old, which is to use the Buddhist concept of mindfulness, which is to not hold onto some notion of mediated truth, but to surf it as an engaged, mindful observer.

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The comedian Stephen Colbert?s catchy neologism captured something essential about our age: that people are now more comfortable with ideas that feel true, even if the evidence for those beliefs is thin. In subtle and fascinating exploration, Salon writer Farhad Manjoo explains what?s powering this phenomenon. He explores how new technologies that give us control over what we see and read has caused "reality" to split across political and cultural lines, allowing opposing groups to subscribe not only to different opinions from each other, but also different facts.

With brilliant insights from psychology, sociology, and economics, Manjoo explains how myths pushed by both partisans and marketers?whether about global warming, the war in Iraq, 9/11, or even the virtues of a certain candy bar?have attracted wide support in recent years. His characters include the Swift Boat Veterans, Lou Dobbs, and conspiracy theorists of all varieties, all of whom prove that true matters less, now, than true enough.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3

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