Dem
47
GOP
53
Earlier this week, we had an item about how right-wing activist Enes Kanter Freedom and failed Senate candidate Royce White have declared for the WNBA draft, insisting that they qualify because they now identify as women. We noted that Freedom was the first to announce, and that "White jumped on board shortly after and said he was declaring for the WNBA draft, too." Reader A.G. in Scranton, PA, quite rightly corrected us, pointing out that it should have said "White jumped on board shortly after and said SHE was declaring for the WNBA draft, too." Our apologies to the readership, and to Ms. White.
Anyhow, we never, ever thought we'd be writing so much about a sports league, particularly that sports league, but we go where the news takes us. And, in truth, we are mere pikers as compared to Fox. MediaMatters, which is primarily a Fox watchdog, published the results of a little study they've been conducting. They found that over the course of this summer (which, mind you, still has a month left in it), Fox has devoted more than 13 solid hours of programming time to the WNBA, spread across a staggering 206 segments. The vast majority of the coverage has been anti-trans stuff, and most of the rest has been about "hard fouls" (which is Fox code for "the Black players are meanies to the white players").
We pass this story along for two reasons. The first is that it's Exhibit #792 demonstrating that Fox is not a news operation (particularly in primetime). That is why we do not use their dishonest branding, writing Fox most of the time, and Fox "News" when we have to distinguish between the cable channel and the broadcast channel. There is at least some irony in the fact that while Fox beats the WNBA dead horse, over and over, in the name of "protecting women," it has all but ignored the domestic violence allegations against Rep. Max Miller (R-OH). Again, not a news organization.
Second, we get e-mails every single week asking why Democrats don't push back against Republican messaging. And the answer is that Democrats DO push back. But when they are up against propaganda onslaughts as relentless as the Fox anti-trans campaign, that is not something that can really be countered. Even if left-leaning media outlets and/or Democratic politicians were willing to repeat the same counterpoints hundreds of times, in response to the hundreds of Fox segments, they would be tuned out by the people they are trying to reach. Fox viewers seem to have an almost unique ability to watch the same stories, over and over again, and to be outraged by them every single time. (Z)