Perceptions

A few days ago, I watched a German public TV forum, and it was mostly dealing with Trump, American populism, BREXIT, and why people 'fail' in recognizing things (the German moderator is the one who tried to flip this question).  So the moderator question was....don't Americans read or watch the news and realize how things are in the rest of the world?

Germans have a single perception about people and how things are supposed to work.  It's often a logical point, and dictated by the fact that they've met like-minded Americans and those people seemed to understand the German viewpoint very easily.

So this is a brief essay to lay out a simple landscape of Americans, and the dramatics of news in their lives (or lack perhaps).

Most American newspapers (beyond the NY Times or Washington Post) have all shrunk in size over the past thirty years.  In various regions, the papers now consist of a Monday through Friday edition (12 pages, of which two pages are want-ads), and a Sunday edition of 24 pages.

Out of that ten pages on a daily basis with basic news....only one page will chat over anything beyond the borders of the US....so BREXIT and refugees in Italy might not register with most Americans.  Two pages will be local or regional news from that state.  There might be one single page on business news, with a page or two devoted to sports. 

If you polled most Americans, the majority from the 1970s would have said (probably in the 75-percent range) that they read the paper weekly.  Now?  It's a lot less.

Time and Newsweek magazine?  They were big-name news magazines up until the 1990s.  Since then.....readership has dropped dramatically.

Viewing local/state news via your local networks?  That's what most people outside of urban America care about.  They might catch 30 minutes in the morning and maybe another episode in the evening.  International news?  It's rare and mostly via CNN.

Getting news via the internet?  You can question Americans and most will admit they read more now via the internet than a decade ago.  They will also admit skepticism over what they are told and routinely to a second source to vouch on the authentic nature of the news.

News while driving to work or returning?  It's part of everyday life now....along with talk-radio, and the commentary hosts.

So I come to three key factors about Americans and their perceptions on 'news':

1.  Over the past forty years, skepticism has grown enormously.  Trust in bankers, politicians, journalists, etc....has spiraled downward.  Most Americans probably trust their mail-delivery guy, more than the governor of the state. 

2.  As much as Washington politicians come often to the podium to say they are going to fix something....the general public perception is that whatever is fixed....really just leads onto a newer problem with more significance. 

3.  The bulk of Americans really don't give a damn about BREXIT, immigrates arriving in Europe from various countries, modern architecture, intellectualism, or getting lectured about you need the 'right' people to do the leadership jobs.  They care about the landscape around them....crime in their neighborhoods....the tax-base....the cost of living....increasing corruption and violence in their lives, and debt (especially stupid debt from university loans). 

I often 'preach' to the idea that traveling around the world has values.  You realize what makes Hong Kong tick, or what makes New Zealand such a charming place, or why drunk Irish guys tell so many woeful stories, or why unlimited speeds on the German autobahns are a national obsession. 

So I look at this German perception of Americans not getting enough 'news', and kinda think they ought to go over for three weeks....avoiding Hollywood, New York City, or Miami Beach, and just travel around the heartland to grasp how regular people live their lives.