Zombie Media 81
support marginal activities and force them into the mainstream – as, for
example, in providing additional PR activity to a reality TV star who
was considering running for president – it was one of the most remarkable training grounds to have emerged in recent years. The involvement
of Yiannapoulos as virtually the only major journalist to actively support
Gamergate meant that Breitbart became an ally of this technology savvy
segment of the alt-right audience, and figures such as Mike Cernovich –
who latched onto the protest as a means to combat feminism – were
increasingly politicised by it. As with other forms of alternative journalism, neither Gamergate nor the alt-journalism movement it influenced
was simply caused by newly available technologies in the form of social
media channels, but the social, cultural, and political forces that shaped
Gamergate were able to exploit those channels first of all to try and reshape gaming journalism and then move against the mainstream media.
Post-Truth Journalism: Epistemology and Gatekeeping
The inauguration of Donald J. Trump as the 45th President of the United
States saw a remarkable proliferation of epithets for the relationship between journalism and truth. Trump’s own favourite was “fake news”, as
in his notorious tweet on 17 February, following a highly unusual press
conference (ostensibly to notify the media of the appointment of his labour secretary, Alexander Acosta, but which actually turned into an assault on the press assembled at the White House), in which he declared:
The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC,
@CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American
People! 1:48 pm -17 Feb 2017
Within the first month of Trump’s inauguration, his administration appeared to be in a constant battle not merely with the media but with how
to represent basic facts of the transition to power. Among various other
conflicts in the first six months of Trump’s presidency, disagreements
included the size of his inauguration crowd, whether or not he called the
White House a “dump”, various polls as to his popularity ratings and
many, many stories regarding the investigations into Russia interference
in the 2016 election.
As Danielle Kurtzleben noted, Trump used the epithet “fake news”
seven times in one of his press conferences on Thursday, 16 February.
16
What was particularly significant about Trump’s use of the term, Kurtzleben continued, was that it represented a shift of usage within a very
short space of time. Prior to Trump’s inauguration, fake news entered
mainstream circulation in reference to stories that were deliberately
intended to ignore or distort the truth. Trump, however, began to use
the term to refer to any unfavourable stories, seeking to use Twitter
support marginal activities and force them into the mainstream – as, for
example, in providing additional PR activity to a reality TV star who
was considering running for president – it was one of the most remarkable training grounds to have emerged in recent years. The involvement
of Yiannapoulos as virtually the only major journalist to actively support
Gamergate meant that Breitbart became an ally of this technology savvy
segment of the alt-right audience, and figures such as Mike Cernovich –
who latched onto the protest as a means to combat feminism – were
increasingly politicised by it. As with other forms of alternative journalism, neither Gamergate nor the alt-journalism movement it influenced
was simply caused by newly available technologies in the form of social
media channels, but the social, cultural, and political forces that shaped
Gamergate were able to exploit those channels first of all to try and reshape gaming journalism and then move against the mainstream media.
Post-Truth Journalism: Epistemology and Gatekeeping
The inauguration of Donald J. Trump as the 45th President of the United
States saw a remarkable proliferation of epithets for the relationship between journalism and truth. Trump’s own favourite was “fake news”, as
in his notorious tweet on 17 February, following a highly unusual press
conference (ostensibly to notify the media of the appointment of his labour secretary, Alexander Acosta, but which actually turned into an assault on the press assembled at the White House), in which he declared:
The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC,
@CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American
People! 1:48 pm -17 Feb 2017
Within the first month of Trump’s inauguration, his administration appeared to be in a constant battle not merely with the media but with how
to represent basic facts of the transition to power. Among various other
conflicts in the first six months of Trump’s presidency, disagreements
included the size of his inauguration crowd, whether or not he called the
White House a “dump”, various polls as to his popularity ratings and
many, many stories regarding the investigations into Russia interference
in the 2016 election.
As Danielle Kurtzleben noted, Trump used the epithet “fake news”
seven times in one of his press conferences on Thursday, 16 February.
16
What was particularly significant about Trump’s use of the term, Kurtzleben continued, was that it represented a shift of usage within a very
short space of time. Prior to Trump’s inauguration, fake news entered
mainstream circulation in reference to stories that were deliberately
intended to ignore or distort the truth. Trump, however, began to use
the term to refer to any unfavourable stories, seeking to use Twitter