Episode 12: “I Think the Best Advice Is Just to be Skeptical,” with Max Tani
Please note: This transcript has been automatically generated.
“I Think the Best Advice Is Just to be Skeptical,” with Max Tani
Please note: This transcript has been automatically generated.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Hey, y’all. So how you feeling? Some of us are starting to get our strength back. That resolve that says, no matter how you try to pry what I fought for my entire life from my hands, you not gonna get it. This legacy here in America, even though you think it belongs to you, belongs to all of us. And you can’t just come all willy-nilly trying to take it. And some of us are still tired, <laugh>. And it’s not just because it’s the week after a holiday, if you celebrate, it’s because yeah, watching America continue to make the same choice for white supremacy, patriarchy, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, antisemitism, Islamophobia and general, all out xenophobia and wackness, uh, it’s pretty depressing. Some people have decided to stop doom scrolling to take care of their heart. Some people have decided to stop watching the news altogether, or they’ve been really judicious about exactly how they are consuming the news, turning off cable television, turning on more podcasts. We appreciate that always. And reading more long form, well-researched pieces from reliable, genuine journalists who are unafraid to tell the truth. Sometimes it can feel like that latter group of folks don’t come along too often. Why is that? Well, in the face of fascism, the job of the journalist requires far more courage than it did before, and it was already a job that necessitated plenty of bravery.
On the show. Today, as we continue to wrap our minds around what 2025 will look like for all of us, we turn to the role that media is playing in our political lives. Max Tani, the media editor at the newsroom at Semafour, has been thinking and writing about this a lot lately.
MAX TANI:
I personally do think that it’s, uh, it’s important to be skeptical of the media because the media doesn’t always get it right. The media is often, is often wrong. It’s there’s a reason that it’s the first draft of history. Um, you know, as the kind of cliche goes.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
But first, the news. This week, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a landmark transgender rights case, United States versus Skrmetti. At the heart of the case is whether discrimination against trans people violates the Constitution. A question which the country’s highest court in the land has never answered. This case is also historic because it’s the first time an openly trans lawyer will argue before the high court. That lawyer is none other than the ACLU’s Chase Strangio, a friend of this program who joined us back on our show in 2021. Here’s what he had to say about gender affirming medical care back then.
CHASE STRANGIO on Undistracted:
You know, we’re talking about care that every major medical association supports. So the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the Endocrine Society, these are not radical organizations.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Right.
CHASE STRANGIO on Undistracted:
These are just like mainstream medical medicines saying this care is necessary, this care is safe, and this care is lifesaving. And then the government saying, Nope, we’re gonna take it away. And we don’t really even have metrics for the level of trauma that will cause.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
In this case, Strangio will be arguing that the state of Tennessee, which passed a law banning gender affirming care, is violating the constitutional rights of three transgender young plaintiffs, all of whose parents, by the way, approved of the care they received. But here’s the tricky thing. The Skrmetti case before the court was brought by the Justice Department under President Biden. Meanwhile, president-elect Donald Trump made anti-trans rhetoric a cornerstone of his campaign, and spent hundreds of millions of dollars on ads that mocked trans people and stoked fear about their mere existence. When he takes office, his Department of Justice will likely try to reverse the Biden Administration’s position and withdraw the case. In that scenario, what could happen next is up to the Supreme Court, and its very conservative majority. It could deny that request and proceed, kill the case entirely, or something in between. Frankly, we’ll have to wait and see. But if the last few years have taught us anything, it’s that the war against bodily autonomy is being waged on all fronts. And what happens with this case, just like the Dobbs decision, could be a stepping stone to limiting healthcare for us all. We’re so proud of you, Chase. We’ll be thinking of you this week and continuing to cheer you on for the way that you uphold all of us.
Now on to some better news. California assembly member Isaac Bryan has introduced a new bill that would give descendants of enslaved people admissions priority at the state’s largest public university systems. This comes as California lawmakers begin a special session to try to quote Trump proof the state. I know what you’re thinking. Didn’t the Supreme Court outlaw affirmative action last year? It did, but Isaac Bryant argues that his move would be only fair, given that in his words, quote, for decades, universities gave preferential treatment to donors and their family members. You sure right about that Isaac. Since legacy is so important in admissions for white wealthy students, it’s about time we keep that same energy to address the legacy of exclusion and harm to descendants of enslaved people. That has happened at this nation’s educational institutions. This is what we mean when we say reparations at every level, not just a check.Although there should be a check. And not just a piece of land, although we supposed to had that too.
Now, nothing is guaranteed yet because even liberal California drops the ball on progressive reforms. In September, Governor Gavin Newsom signed a law to apologize for the state’s history of racism against black residents. But that was the day after he vetoed a proposal to help black families reclaim their property. This is also the same state in which this year lawmakers blocked a bill that would’ve created an agency to administer reparations programs and voters rejected a ballot measure that would’ve banned forced prison labor, aka modern day slavery. I mean, the Terminator used to be the Republican governor in that state. It’s not all glitz and glam over there. This bill will face a lengthy approvals process, but it’s definitely a step in the right direction.
Now I wanna wrap things up. With a major win shifting out of the US and looking abroad, Belgium has become the first country in the entire world to give sex workers a robust set of labor rights and protections. We’re talking about the world’s oldest profession here, y’all, the nation’s government made headlines back in 2022 when it decriminalized sex work. Now, let me reiterate, in a world first, sex workers in Belgium are now entitled to the same employment rights as other workers in the country. This includes health insurance, unemployment benefits, sick days, maternity leave, vacation pay, pensions, plus the ability to refuse clients and services. Very important. It also requires the employers of sex workers to provide condoms and an emergency alarm button in workers’ rooms. Now, we should all look to countries like Belgium as a model for decriminalizing sex work and improving labor rights as a whole, because all people have and should enjoy dignity. That’s it for the news.
Alright, y’all, as we keep getting into all the different complicated parts of the answer to how the hell did its election turn out like this, <laugh>, it’s time we turn to the media.
Y’all, can we get like a little sinister sound effect here?
Because it’s become this entity that a lot of folks on both sides of the political aisle love to hate, get frustrated with and blame.
It is clear that we are existing in a media landscape that feels more fragmented than ever before. And we need to get honest with ourselves about the limits of national media. And yes, I realize that Undistracted and I are a part of the national media. We’re self-reflecting too over here. I promise. That’s why we’re always willing to have the conversation. We’re not just pointing out words, we are looking in the mirror. So I wanted to bring on someone who has been talking a lot about this phenomenon. Max Tani media editor at Semafor. Prior to covering the media, he co-authored the Daily West Wing Playbook newsletter for Politico. Let’s get into the conversation. Max, welcome to Undistracted.
MAX TANI:
Thank you so much for having me.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Absolutely. Thank you for coming because there’s so much to talk about. We’ve been spending several episodes really unpacking this election, trying to understand how we got here, where we are, and how we move forward through a multitude of different angles. And we have yet to really have the necessary conversation about the media, about journalism and, you know, all of the ways that we consume media, how it’s been impacting exactly how this election went and what we’re supposed to do moving forward. And I think a lot of us have found ourselves this election, but really for longer than that feeling like, you know, no one is talking about this or no one is covering that. And this can be whatever you find important at the moment, right? The impact of racism on the election, the climate, immigration, you name it. Of course, by no one we mean the media or the media that we consume. Um, but you’ve written a lot about why that sentiment is actually proof of just how siloed our media landscape is. I saw someone call this subject your Roman Empire, and I personally love to always ask people about their Roman Empire. So like, how did we get here? Does it, does it feel like this mistrust of the media has become a bipartisan phenomenon or is it something more?
MAX TANI:
I think it’s a really interesting question, and it is something that I think a lot about, uh, in my job writing about, uh, the news media and how people consume information and how that’s being changed by the internet and uh, by social media and all the ways in which people’s habits are changing. I think that one thing that I’ve been really fixated on and focused on since the election was this idea that there was a tre– in my view, a tremendous amount of both negative and, you know, at best neutral coverage of Donald Trump from, kind of, all the traditional outlets. If you picked up the New York Times on any day or clicked on the Washington Post website or on CNN or something like that, uh, you were not gonna find a positive story about Donald Trump. You just wouldn’t. You might find a story that is neutral, essentially at best.
This is something that I think has been going on for, you know, almost 10 years, and yet, uh, he’s been able to overcome that obstacle and continue to be one of the strongest political forces in our life. And so I’ve been wondering essentially what, what it means that the person who is now President-elect who’s won two elections, uh, can do that essentially without getting a single positive story written about him in any of the outlets that we consider to be the most influential news media outlets, uh, in the country. And I think a big reason for that is because people’s media consumption habits have changed. They’re getting their information from different places. And I do think that there is a, a level of mistrust in the media from, mostly from the right, but also from from some folks on the left as well.
And I think when it comes to these kind of information silos, I think that one of the things that’s happened over the last 10 years, over that same span, but it gets better every day, is the ways in which, uh, the social media algorithms and tech algorithms for the platforms have changed the ways in which we receive news at the kind of news that reaches us. It tends to be really, really focused. Uh, and the algorithms are so good at helping us find the information that we want to see, that oftentimes we’re not seeing a lot of other information that we might be confronted with if we had picked up the front page of a newspaper or consumed media in some, uh, some, some other way. So that’s, that’s something that I think is, is a really interesting and new-ish dynamic
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
That makes so much sense to me, um, because we really are telling the algorithm what we want and then getting fed the meal of our choice. Right. Um, but do you have an overall sense to why this trust in journalism specifically is plummeting? Like did it start with Trump or are we talking about something a mu that’s a much longer runway?
MAX TANI:
I, I think that, uh, trust in the news media has been declining for, for decades. Mm-Hmm. . And, um, one major factor is just, uh, you know, the reality is, is that when people talk about trust in the media, it’s such a broad topic. Yeah. It’s not specific at all. They’re thinking about a news story that they saw that they didn’t like, or something along those lines. The funny thing that thing that’s most interesting to me is that there are more options than ever, uh, in terms of, uh, where people can get their news and their information from. I think that the internet and social media and basically, and the platforms have allowed the democratization of news and information, it means that, people who might 20 years ago might have only really been able to either read a magazine or their local newspaper or watch whatever was on the broad evening broadcast news.Now they can find your podcast and they think this is the best way, this is my favorite way of getting information.
Um, and so maybe they don’t necessarily, they’re not necessarily registering you as like the media, for example.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Mhmm.
MAX TANI:
But you are, and that’s one of the main sources of places where they’re getting information. And when they’re talking about trust in the media, maybe they’re thinking of a CNN story that they thought was particularly distasteful or a broadcast on Fox News that they were appalled by. Um, so I think that there’s a few things going on. I don’t think that it means that people trust media less or information less. I just think that they’re getting their information from, from different sources.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
No, that makes so much sense, because I think a really salient point that you’re making is when we say “the media,” who are we talking about? The answer to that question is probably going to be different for every single person you ask. I’m also just thinking about the balance between an unhealthy level of distrust and a healthy level of skepticism. Right? I remember growing up and, you know, being raised by two activists, I was always taught to think critically and therefore read critically, right? Like, yes, I need to get the facts, but I should also be thinking about maybe what’s not being reported right? Or who’s perspective is being shared. And so, you know, it, do you think that there’s a risk of too much mistrust or is there a balance that you feel like we could recapture in some kind of way?
MAX TANI:
A lot of my job is actually reporting on, uh, and digging into situations where there have been failures, you know, in the media and whether that’s, uh, you know, the biggest institutions like the New York Times or influential podcasts or things like that. I personally do think that it’s important to be skeptical of the media because the media doesn’t always get it right. The media is often, is often wrong. It’s, there’s a reason that it’s the first draft of history. Um, you know, as the kind of cliche goes, I think that there are daily instances of, you know, screw ups and things of that nature. But, but I do think that one of the things that is alarming to me about the growing mistrust of the media, and in some ways the kind of general fragmentation and the, the kind of disempowerment of some of the legacy media outlets that we’re thinking about. You know, when they make mistakes generally, they are held accountable for those and they help hold themselves accountable for those.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
That’s right.
MAX TANI:
And you know, there’s a reason why a lot of these publications, they’ll put big corrections. Some of the organizations have people employed whose jobs it is to, you know, a lot of these places used to have ombudsman people. It was to read the criticism. And, um, I think that one of the things that we lose when some of these organizations, you know, gain less power or in some cases even go out of business, uh, is we lose some of that self-accountability. A lot of the things that have come into their place to replace them don’t hold themselves to those same kinds of standards or, you know, they will share conspiracies or things of that nature. And oh, if they’re wrong, doesn’t really make a difference. I think that we’ve, we’ve lost something from some of the disempowerment of these places, and I do think that we have to find a balance of the kind of healthy skepticism and total distrust. Um, I think it’s right. I think you’re right on the money.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
You know, it’s, it’s so interesting that you talk about the dismantling of some of these legacy spaces because as critical as of them as we may be, to your point, there was real value there. There was a time when I was <laugh> for some reason, a mildly popular subject of Breitbart, and I was like, I don’t know. I don’t know why you all are writing about me. Like no matter what I tweet at the time, no matter what I say on the news, no matter what I’m doing, you seem to have an opinion about it. And my former employer would have people send those articles to them and say like, is this, you know, like, why would you employ a person like this? And, and they would say, well, it’s not true. Right? This is not coming from USA Today or from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Right? Like, this is coming from a media site with an angle and to your point, no accountability. And it was so easy for people, I think, to believe what they were being sold because of the dismantling that you’re talking about. Right? We’ve seen a huge decline, for example, in local newspapers and local reporting. We’ve got some reports that show us that we’ve lost a third of local newspapers since 2005, and over 200 counties have no local news outlet at all. Why are those numbers so important? Because clearly the right has capitalized on that shifting media landscape.
MAX TANI:
Yeah, I do think that that is, you know, one of the really unfortunate changes in the media landscape today is the erosion of local news, and particularly the erosion of local newspapers. As it became easier to get your information online and get your information kind of served at you on social media. A lot of these places have have really struggled. And a lot of what’s come in to fill the gaps are, uh, you know, in some cases it’s, uh, just kind of local enthusiasts and people who are really passionate about news. You know, I admit I get some, uh, some of my news from, you know, local Instagram accounts that are just, like, super passionate about local neighborhood.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Yeah. Same
MAX TANI: In New York. And I think some, I think some of that’s great, and some of that stuff did used to be kind of the zone of kind of the local papers.
But you’re, you’re absolutely right that, uh, in other cases what’s filled, uh, filled the void are ideological, partisan news outlets, certainly on the right and, uh, to a slightly lesser degree, but in some cases, you know, definitely true to a certain degree on the left as well. I do think there’s something that’s lost, um, from the kind of end of, uh, local accountability journalism in many of these places. And I think that that is, um, that’s something that there hasn’t really been an answer for. Uh, as much as, you know, people have tried to fix some of these things through nonprofit news or in some cases even like, even some of these ideologically motivated outlets that are trying to fill those gaps, it certainly isn’t, um, isn’t serving the same, same function.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
You know, I wanna talk specifically about the election, which we did a little bit in the beginning. And you were talking about the fact that Trump was able to get elected without necessarily positive media coverage. Outside of the kind of very familiar corners that we know are let’s say friendly, very friendly toward him. What does that signal to you that he still got elected despite that?
MAX TANI:
I think it says a few things to me. I think that it says that it, it shows the limits of, you know, mainstream accountability journalism from legacy outlets. It just shows that there are a lot of people who either, you know, didn’t see a lot of the information, uh, that was being published, the reporting, the, in some cases alarming reporting from places like, you know, CNN or the New York Times, the Washington Post, or NBC, uh, they either didn’t see that or they saw it and they simply didn’t care, or they thought other things were more important. It’s difficult to say, which is which, uh, and I’m sure there will be a lot of studies, uh, that are done on this. There’s gonna be a lot of polling and analysis, but I think that it shows that people’s media consumption habits have certainly changed. And it shows the limitation, at least people who like Donald Trump, who are tuning out the media, uh, who, who, or who simply don’t care, or maybe some of the articles, you know, some of the information that would alarm them is just not reaching them because, uh, it’s not penetrating their kind of information bubble.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Do you think that some of those legacy outlets like the Washington Post and the LA Times, of course, declining to endorse Kamala Harris fed into what you’re talking about?
MAX TANI:
It’s a little bit complicated, because I think what that showed was the ideological views of the, of the owners. Now, I mean, I talked to a lot of, I did a lot of reporting on this. We broke the first story about the LA Times not endorsing Kamala Harris, that kind of snowballed, um, into this big story about the Post. And I think that, you know, from talking to staff at a lot of these places, some people I know are, you know, it’s just, uh, they were, you know, frustrated about it because they support Harris or their, their political views are in line with Harris. But, but others just simply also felt like this was a, doing a disservice to the readership to, you know, two weeks before the election decide, or a week before the election to decide that this wasn’t something that was important.
I think what those instances really showed were what the owners prioritized in this case. You know, you could read it two, one of two ways. You could just say, well, both of these people are very, very rich business folks who are gonna have business in front of, uh, the federal government, or, you know, and this is the thing that, that both Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire who owns the LA Times, and Jeff Bezos who owns the Washington Post, they both have said, you know, that they want to restore this idea, uh, you know, of that the papers are objective or they wanna gain back some of the trust from some of the readers.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
I’m sorry, that second one sounds like BS to me,
MAX TANI:
<laugh>I, that’s, you know, your word’s not mine. <laugh>. I, my feeling is, you know, my my feeling on this is I, I can’t see inside their heads, you know, I haven’t talked to them to either of them personally, so I, I don’t really know. I do think that, you know, if it was both of those things, uh, you know, at once, I wouldn’t be surprised or, you know, people have a way of convincing themselves of the things that are in their own financial interest.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Now, that’s a quotable. People <laugh> certainly express that, um, that, that interest every day. You know, besides the lack of endorsements, we’ve seen a lot of, I think Monday morning quarterbacking and Tuesday and Wednesday, because this conversation will go on ad nauseam about Kamala Harris, specifically not doing Joe Rogan’s podcast, and by a lot of people that is now seen as a really large error, potentially leading to her loss of relevance among a population of, of young men that is more diverse than I think people would like to admit. Do you think that that’s accurate, or is that, is, does that argument kind of rub you the wrong way because it rubs a lot of people the wrong way?
MAX TANI:
You know, I haven’t necessarily, and I think we wrote this the week after the election, I don’t think that if she had gone on Joe Rogan, uh, it would’ve made much of a diff– a week before the election– it would’ve made much of a difference. Yeah. I think that it was probably, probably baked in it’s one interview that would’ve reached, you know, a large number of people, but 5 million or 10 million people spread across, you know, uh, the country is a pretty small number. Uh, and so I, I don’t think that that tips the election in her favor. I do think that there is a broad, and I think fair and relevant conversation about how much to engage with media, maybe that might be unfriendly or that might be objectionable in some ways, overtly objectionable. But an acknowledgement that because of the changes in the way that people consume information, that people on the left are possibly, you know, candidates who wanna run for national office, uh, you know, might have to engage with, with those people because they’re, you know, they’re reaching audiences that are really important and crucial to winning.
And we saw that Kamala Harris actually did do some of this stuff. I mean, obviously she went and did an interview on Fox News. At the time, I reported a few weeks before the election that I think her team, if they had had more time to think about it, I think that they were prepared to do, uh, presidential debate on Fox with Trump. I think that that was something that they had considered. So I do think that it is, it’s something that they were thinking about, but, um, obviously not going on Rogan probably a missed opportunity, but I don’t think it would’ve changed the, the outcome of the election. I think that’s a bit silly.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
I think personally, again, me, not you, I’m struggling with how going on Joe Rogan, even though it’s a very large megaphone to appeal to men, would’ve suddenly reversed generations of misogynoir that she was fighting against. Um, that clearly wasn’t the only factor in the election results, but was certainly a factor. And so my own kind of frustrations around that aside, I recognize that there are different habits when we talk about who and why people consume kind of men’s media, quote unquote, versus women’s media. Like so many of these outlets on the right in particular are dominated by men and men like Joe Rogan, right? Who, who carry and possess that particular brand of presentation.
MAX TANI:
Mm-Hmm.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
What does it produce when you have women and men consuming completely different sources of news?
MAX TANI:
I think that it is something that the next Democratic candidate is really gonna have to think about. Um, because I think that as the platforms continue to get good at feeding you the information that’s exactly personally tailored exactly to who you are, I think that you are gonna continue to see the kind of fragmentation and silo of media, whether that is, uh, segmented by gender or by race, or by class, or whatever it is. I think that the algorithms are continuing to get better at kind of feeding information that’s tailored exactly to you. And so if you’re running for president, uh, and especially on the Democratic side, where you don’t have this kind of same level of Conservative media backing…
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Yeah.
MAX TANI:
I think that they’re gonna have to figure out better ways to communicate with people who may not be, uh, be seeing, uh, you know, all of the kind of, the kind of messages that they’re trying to deliver.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Now, max, you wrote something very recently that I’m not gonna hold you. It scared me.
MAX TANI:
<laugh>. Oh, no,
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
You said that 2024 has been a different kind of presidential transition in the media so far. Unlike 2016, there is no flowering of anti-Trump resistance. Quite the opposite. As ratings for liberal TV shows fall, the prosecutions of the former president fade out. I’m over here. Uh, like this is a scary prognosis, right? Because a lot of the folks who are in our Undistracted community like myself, consider ourselves progressive liberal, right? Certainly far to the left of Donald Trump. Um, and I’m worried that the kinds of perspectives that reflect our point of view are fading away. Is that a legitimate worry? Do we still need to see where the chips will fall, or is there work we have to do around that?
MAX TANI:
You know what, it’s so funny because you see this play out in sports media too. When a team loses, uh, oftentimes the audience for, you know, fans of that team, they’re not trying to tune in to watch, uh, you know, the analysis of oh, why everything went wrong, and to hear more about why their team lost. Right? It’s pretty depressing. Yeah. It’s not-
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
It’s a little depressing <laugh>, and we’re are, we’ve already got plenty to be depressed about. So like, why rub our noses in it? Right.
MAX TANI:
Ex-exactly. And so I think that that’s what you’re seeing, uh, and that’s what you’ve seen over the last few weeks since the election, is I think a lot of audiences on the left have, um, decided that, you know, maybe they’re gonna, uh, enjoy the holiday season and, uh, maybe tune out what’s going on in the news. I mean, we’ve seen this in cable news ratings. We’ve seen this in, um, in some of the traffic at, at a lot of online news sites of places I’ve covered or folks that I, I talk to, uh, in that business. But I do think, you know, when Trump gets back into office, uh, you’re gonna see a renewed level of interest in critical information about Trump and critical voices of Trump and his administration. And actually, you know, if you wanna look on the positive and the bright side of this from the progressive perspective, from the left perspective, I mean, you, you just have to look at the coverage and the impact that, you know, some of the media scrutiny has had on Trump’s nominees.
Matt Gaetz, uh, the second that he was nominated, there were a flurry of stories about, you know, allegations about, uh, you know, reports and his, uh, you know, relationships with minors, uh, in Florida. And that obviously was one of the factors that forced him out as, as AG. And there was a lot of media attention on that. There was plenty of, uh, you know, people who watched and listened and read those articles. So I, I do think that, you know, once Trump comes back in office, people see the things that he’s doing, um, in his policies and the impacts of his policies, I think that there’s gonna be a plenty of critical, uh, media and voices out there. Um, and people, uh, people will be, be paying a lot of attention.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
I mean, there are some people who say Donald Trump was very good financially for liberal media, right? There were lots of people who became stars. We, we started this podcast, um, gosh, at the end of 2020, right? So we were, we were right on the precipice of, of electing Joe Biden when we started this podcast. Um, but most certainly, I had been on MSNBC since that time as well. Um, and it was interesting to watch the landscape shift. And one of the things I’ve been thinking about is how we are a container for people who may be radicalized in this moment, right?
MAX TANI:
Hmm.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
We were a container for people who became radicalized during covid and who saw the failures of individualism and wanted to reach out for community, right? People who saw the shortcomings of government as it stood and wanted to create something different.
MAX TANI:
Mm-Hmm.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
And I’m really proud of that. And I’m also just thinking about, you know, people call it the FAFO movement, the f around and find out moment that is happening right now, um, for some Trump voters who are finally Googling what tariffs are and figuring out, oh, actually this is gonna cost me more money, not China or Mexico or Canada. Um, oh, actually it’s my own relatives that may be deported, or even me, myself. And I’ve been having a dialogue with myself. And I, to be very honest, don’t know where I land about if and how we are a container for those folks as they find their way to a different answer.
I don’t believe in shaming those people. Um, even though I am sorely disappointed, to say the very least, by their decision making because they messed, they messed around, and all of us have to find out, right? Like, they’re not the only ones who will suffer, um, or even suffer the most. And yet, I would rather you wake up to reality at some point than to never do it. So, I, I, I don’t, I don’t know that I have a perfectly formed question around that. It’s just a conversation I’ve been having with myself around progressive spaces and outlets like the Meteor that produces this show, like my friend Joy Reid who hosts The ReidOut. Do we just keep doing what we’re doing and let people find the truth and therefore find these spaces? Or is there some kind of obligation that we have to give us special and intentional welcome to those folks who are finding the light, shall we say?
MAX TANI:
I think that’s a really fascinating question, and when you figure out what you, uh, what what the answer to it is, you should let me know.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
<laugh>
MAX TANI:
You know, it’s so fascinating. I think the media that tends to, uh, support the, you know, whatever the, uh, you know, that’s aligned with whatever the losing side is of any election, I think really does tend to have these same types of conversations and same kind of, uh, introspection. It’s, uh, you know, and it doesn’t always lead to, uh, you know, anything either productive or not productive. I’m, I’m struck and I’m, I I’m thinking of, so something very vivid and specific, which is – and not saying, not comparing you, uh, in any way to this, but I think it’s an interesting example. Um, after the 2012 election, uh, after, after Romney lost, I believe there was a famous moment where Sean Hannity was then a, you know, continues to be a primetime host on Fox, said that Republicans need to support, uh, immigration reform in order to, find common ground with the Democrats, obviously, you know, they ended up going the exact opposite way, <laugh>, and none of that kind quickly.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
They moved quickly in the opposite direction. Yeah.
MAX TANI:
But, uh, I, I use that as, as an example of, you know, this is the same, what you’re going through is, is very similar to I think what a lot of, uh, people go through after, you know, many different kind of, uh, you know, major political losses and sometimes it leads people to, to, to change and to do new things. And sometimes it, uh, leads to weirder outcomes. Like, you know, <laugh> the one we saw after 2012.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Well, we’re definitely not moving toward the right, I can tell you that right now. Um, <laugh> before I let you go, we always really try to make sure that we are a resource for people as much as possible. You know, our community has really been sticking with us for a long time and wanting to have access to accurate, unbiased news. But we also try to keep this podcast to about 30 minutes, 35 minutes an episode because we also know people are busy <laugh>, people are trying to make a way outta no way, um, and lead their lives so they don’t necessarily have the time or even inclination to like read 25 different outlets about a particular subject. What do you suggest people do? Where should we be looking for our news?
MAX TANI:
Wow, that is a, that’s a great question. I mean, you know, I am unfortunately the exact opposite of the person you described–
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
<laugh>. You wanna read it all.
MAX TANI:
–reading and listening and watching.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
So we should just read you, because then you’ll help summarize and analyze ’em
MAX TANI:
<laugh>. No, no, no. Absolutely not. I really think that I have benefited as, as both in my professional life and in my personal life from reading, uh, reading and listening broadly, um, and trying to better pay attention to media that I, you know, agree with all the time, agree with some of the time, agree with not all the time. I mean, look, I still think legacy media outlets are, are really valuable. It doesn’t mean that you can’t be mad at them when they do things wrong or be appalled or frustrated because they do make mistakes. And, you know, that’s, uh, that’s obviously things to kind of, uh, to kind of be aware of. But I mean, I think I try to mix, uh, a healthy amount of what I think is, uh, uh, outlets that try to be unbiased and objective and that do short and longer form articles with podcasts and, you know, things that are being put together by people who are just really passionate about their, their field. And it doesn’t have to be a part of a legacy media institution.
So I think the best advice is just to be skeptical, but open-minded and to continue to support places that give you the news that you think is valuable and, and doing good things in the world. And I think that that’s, that’s really important and crucial for me. I, you know, I, I try to subscribe and pay for as many news outlets as the one, you know, places that are like giving me good information that I think is relevant or helps the world or makes a difference. I think, you know, that stuff is, is, is really valuable. And, you know, if they also wanna follow me on, uh, Twitter, I, you know, or at Blue Sky or wherever, and, you know, I’m not gonna be mad about that either.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
We definitely will make sure to share that information ’cause we’re not mad about it either. Skeptical, open-minded, and supportive. That’s what we like to be around here at Undistracted. Max, thanks so much for your time and all of your brilliance.
MAX TANI:
Oh, thanks for, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it. This is a fun conversation.
BRITTANY PACKNETT CUNNINGHAM:
Our institutions will remain as honest as we require them to be. So yeah, this is the media’s job, but it’s our job to hold them accountable.
That’s it for today, but never for tomorrow. Undistracted is a production of the Meteor and our friends at Wonder Media Network.
Our producers are Vanessa Handy, Brittany Martinez, and Alyia Yates. Our editors are Grace Lynch and Maddie Foley. Thanks also to Natalia Ramirez and Sara Culley. Our executive producers at The Meteor are Cindi Leive and myself. And our executive producer at Wonder Media Network is Jenny Kaplan. You can follow me on all social media @mspackyetti on all social media. And our team @TheMeteor. Subscribe to undistracted and rate and review us y’all on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or all the places your find your favorite podcasts. Thanks for listening. I’m Brittany Packnett Cunningham. Let’s go get free.