The Outrage Industry

A stimulating expose on how the roots of today's partisan rage lie in the "outrage industry" - deregulated, commodified media markets that will do anything for money and attention.

With a new foreword for the paperback edition reflecting Trump's election and the recent uproar surrounding right-leaning speakers on college campuses, this unapologetic conservative duo featured on FOX News, Townhall, The Federalist, and CNN combat the silencing of free speech in America. They're trying to silence you. But don't let them dictate the End of Discussion. In the age of Trump, a prejudice against free speech is spreading, fueled by a growing movement that believes ideas must be squelched to "protect" people. The presidential election of 2016 should have been the clearest sign yet to the Left that trying to convince half the country to shut up is not the same as actually convincing them. And yet, in its wake, the impulse to stifle and punish "incorrect" viewpoints, and the "deplorables" who voice them, is alive and well. It's a vicious and ironic cycle, especially in academia, where dissenting speech is deemed dangerous and equated to violence -- while actual violence is justified to bully its proponents. From Berkeley to Middlebury, the mob is on the march. Free speech isn't always pretty, but it's vital to the American way. We have to make America talk again. End of Discussion arms readers to find their voices and fight back against the death of debate.

The far right is back with a vengeance. After several decades at the political margins, far-right politics has again taken center stage. Three of the world’s largest democracies – Brazil, India, and the United States – now have a radical right leader, while far-right parties continue to increase their profile and support within Europe. In this timely book, leading global expert on political extremism Cas Mudde provides a concise overview of the fourth wave of postwar far-right politics, exploring its history, ideology, organization, causes, and consequences, as well as the responses available to civil society, party, and state actors to challenge its ideas and influence. What defines this current far-right renaissance, Mudde argues, is its mainstreaming and normalization within the contemporary political landscape. Challenging orthodox thinking on the relationship between conventional and far-right politics, Mudde offers a complex and insightful picture of one of the key political challenges of our time.

This text explores the aesthetics, underlying logics, and histories of two seemingly distinct genres - liberal political satire and conservative opinion talk - making the case that they should be thought of as the logical extensions of the psychology of the left and right, respectively.

The majority of Americans think that politics has an “incivility problem” and that this problem is only getting worse. Research demonstrates that negativity and rudeness in politics have been increasing for decades. But how does this tide of impolite-to-outrageous language affect our reactions to media coverage and our political behavior? Disrespectful Democracy offers a new account of the relationship between incivility and political behavior based on a key individual predisposition—conflict orientation. Individuals experience conflict in different ways; some enjoy arguments while others are uncomfortable and avoid confrontation. Drawing on a range of original surveys and experiments, Emily Sydnor contends that the rise of incivility in political media has transformed political involvement. Citizens now need to be able to tolerate or even welcome incivility in the public sphere in order to participate in the democratic process. Yet individuals who are turned off by incivility are not brought back in by civil presentation of issues. Sydnor considers the challenges in evaluating incivility’s normative benefits and harms to the political system: despite some detrimental aspects, certain levels of incivility in certain venues can promote political engagement, and confrontational behavior can be a vital tool in the citizen’s democratic arsenal. A rigorous and empirically informed analysis of political rhetoric and behavior, Disrespectful Democracy also proposes strategies to engage citizens across the range of conflict orientations.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Is social media destroying democracy? Are Russian propaganda or "Fake news" entrepreneurs on Facebook undermining our sense of a shared reality? A conventional wisdom has emerged since the election of Donald Trump in 2016 that new technologies and their manipulation by foreign actors played a decisive role in his victory and are responsible for the sense of a "post-truth" moment in which disinformation and propaganda thrives. Network Propaganda challenges that received wisdom through the most comprehensive study yet published on media coverage of American presidential politics from the start of the election cycle in April 2015 to the one year anniversary of the Trump presidency. Analysing millions of news stories together with Twitter and Facebook shares, broadcast television and YouTube, the book provides a comprehensive overview of the architecture of contemporary American political communications. Through data analysis and detailed qualitative case studies of coverage of immigration, Clinton scandals, and the Trump Russia investigation, the book finds that the right-wing media ecosystem operates fundamentally differently than the rest of the media environment. The authors argue that longstanding institutional, political, and cultural patterns in American politics interacted with technological change since the 1970s to create a propaganda feedback loop in American conservative media. This dynamic has marginalized centre-right media and politicians, radicalized the right wing ecosystem, and rendered it susceptible to propaganda efforts, foreign and domestic. For readers outside the United States, the book offers a new perspective and methods for diagnosing the sources of, and potential solutions for, the perceived global crisis of democratic politics.

Glenn Beck—author of thirteen #1 New York Times bestsellers—issues a startling challenge to people on both sides of the aisle: America is addicted to outrage, we’re at the height of a twenty-year bender, and we need an intervention. In the instant New York Times bestseller, Glenn Beck addresses how America has become more and more divided—both politically and socially. Americans are now less accepting, less forgiving, and have lost faith in many of the country’s signature ideals. They are quick to point a judgmental finger at the opposing party, are unwilling to doubt their own ideologies, and refuse to have any self-awareness whatsoever. Beck states that this current downward spiral will ultimately lead to the destruction of everything America has fought so hard to preserve. This is not simply a Republican problem. This is not simply a Democratic problem. This is everyone’s burden, and we need to think like recovering addicts and change. Mirroring traditional twelve-step programs, Beck outlines the actions that Americans must follow in order to prevent a farther decline down this current path of hostile bitterness. Drawing from his own life experiences and including relevant examples for each step, he is able to lead us to a more hopeful, happy future. From learning how to believe in something greater than ourselves to understanding the importance of humility, each chapter encourages self-reflection and growth. Addicted to Outrage is a timely and necessary guide for how Americans—right and left—must change to survive.