Note: Also available in Portuguese.
Over a year ago, Donald Trump was elected as the latest US president, in a surprise result which hit the mainstream media (MSM) hard. The problem was that the biggest media players in the US, and indeed worldwide, had nearly completely (and mostly unofficially) endorsed his competitor, Hillary Clinton. The MSM suddenly was faced with the unpalatable truth, that they had failed to adequately influence the outcome of the US presidential election, despite their gargantuan efforts to the contrary. The somewhat surprising result was that the public thought for themselves and the MSM was left with the knowledge that its potential to manipulate public perception on important issues was not as great as it had hoped or thought.
A consequence of this, is that it shone light on the media’s attempt to manipulate democracy to push their ideological position, which usually aligns with their financially advantageous goals.
In an age where newspaper circulation is down and alternative media influence is up, newspapers need to maintain a business model which is realistic and profitable, while retaining their dwindling relevancy. They achieve this mostly through advertising – and they are increasingly desperate to increase their online advertising revenue as hard copy sales take a hit. Companies pay newspapers to advertise their products so as to reach their target demographic. Interestingly, many people fail to realise that most companies’ preferred target demographic is women.
Wordlwide, 80% of all purchases are made by women. Let that fact sink in for a moment. Men may make more money than women, by working longer hours, engaged in more dangerous careers and entering professions which are more difficult but pay better, such as engineering – but women still spend more money that men do. If you want to sell your product, even if that product is aimed at men, you also target women, as they usually control the purse strings in relationships and the family unit. So when advertisers want to sell something, they know their best chance of capitalizing their return on advertising investment (ROI), is to reach out to the main decision maker in financial matters, which is usually women.
So, in their desperate quest to maintain profit margins, newspapers need to deliver the female demographic to potential advertisers. Doing so gives good ROI to the advertisers and makes strong business sense to the publisher.
So how do newspapers deliver the female demographic to their advertisers? The answer is ruthless manipulation, for which longterm exposure is damaging to women, men, and society as a whole. Before explaining how this manipulation works, there are some facts which need to be stated.
The first fact was already included above, in that 80% of purchases are made by women.
Secondly, women hold a disproportionate amount of wealth compared to what they earn. In the US for example, women own 60% of the wealth, yet earn only 40% of it through salaried or self-employment.
By 2020, one report states that women worldwide will spend the equivalent of 28 Trillion US dollars, yet earn only 18 Trillion of that themselves. One can easily speculate where the shortfall of 10 Trillion is coming from.
Additionally, when in a position of power, women are roughly 4-5 times more likely to exhibit positive sexism to their own gender, than men. This means that a female CEO is 4-5 times more likely to promote equivalently capable/qualified women over men, than a man is to promote men over women. One needs only look to Yahoo’s female CEO to see the changes she implemented to the company management and the consequent legal cases brought against her as she changed the gender ratio from 80% men to 80% women in a matter of 18 months.
Thirdly, women, enjoy seeing men fail. A controversial statement, but backed up with various studies. Whatever the reason, research shows that women are more likely to buy products when men are painted in a negative light, and women in a positive one. This creates a feel-good factor among women, and encourages them to buy products where this misandristic power-dynamic mechanism is in play. Television adverts and comedy shows have been exploiting this effective technique for a long time now.
Where the MSM comes in, is taking this mechanism one step further. By disseminating material which makes women feel good, they grab a slice of the female demographic and offer value to their advertisers. Women will consistently come back to read publications which make them feel good in some way. We are currently experiencing a race to the bottom to see which media publishers dive lowest to cater to the latest fad which boosts women’s self esteem, usually at men’s expense.
Fact-based journalism has given way to emotion-based journalism, in order to secure female readers. Whether that is the “Body-positive” movement, which dangerously aims to legitimize and remove stigma from obesity, to the fake “Wage gap” discrimination myth, which is constantly being rolled out as clickbait to secure women readers and get people commenting and arguing online – a good flame war is MSM’s new obsession in securing reader interaction and hence value for advertisers. Nowadays, a self-pitying female reader and an incensed angry male reader makes good business sense in terms of page views and online clicks, not to forget interacting with the comments section.
MSM will publish any material which teaches women they are victims and suffer oppression. Certain women read this material vociferously and become hopelessly addicted to it, as it helps them feel they are not responsible (in their own mind) for their weight problem, or following a gender studies course rather than an engineering one, or some other such insecurity and poor decision/attitude in life. The MSM is ruthlessly exploiting and misleading these women into thinking they have somehow been disempowered or oppressed. The method of choice to do this most effectively, is to embrace Feminism.
For those who care to read about these things, Feminism is a movement whose stated goals and actual goals are very different. Gender equality is the stated goal, whereas female privilege and misandry is the actual goal. The media gets a steady stream of “evil men” stories which many women love to read, and “poor female victim” stories, which again women love to read. A two-pronged attack which is incredibly effective at manipulating women into feeling victimised and/or not responsible for their own mistakes in life – and eventually parting with cash.
A knock-on effect, is that these women who are effectively addicted to victim status and being disempowered, need their next fix of “confirmation bias” from the media. It is truly an addiction. Contentious and ill-conceived concepts such as “patriarchy” are used to reel these women into reading more and more bigoted material on a daily basis, on why their flaws and failures are in fact the fault of men everywhere, and that society has an inherent bias against women in favour of men – which is demonstrably wrong. The end result is a disempowered woman and an aggrieved man – but a happy advertiser, who can now consistently reach the demographic with the most buying power. The MSM cares not for the damage it causes to any of the affected parties; its main goal is revenue generation. The long-term consequence, is the destruction of relations between men and women, which incidentally has been a stated feminist goal since the 80’s.
Another benefit of harvesting female readership, is the manipulation of democracy. Most floating/swing voters are women. Indeed, at every age in Western countries there are more female voters than male voters. Politicians are acutely aware of this, which is why few will criticise the feminist hate machine. Besides for the last election, the outcome of the previous five US elections was determined by floating voters, i.e. women. Political parties need to win their vote. So not only do we see the media trying to portray all women as frail and vulnerable, but we see politicians exploiting this shameless tactic to try and win their vote.
As a real-world example, in the ’80’s, there was only limited financial resources in the UK National Health Service for medical treatment, but as an election pledge, women were promised free breast-cancer screening to ensure their vote, and it worked (this was the infamous gamble Margaret Thatcher made in the UK to win reelection – no equivalent service was offered to men for screening of testicular or prostate cancer). By giving women victim status and promising special treatment, both the MSM and political parties benefit. At least they do short-term. The bigger picture however, is that decades of embracing feminism and anti-male propaganda, has made society fail both men and women in many ways, and it is being noticed.
Men’s Rights Activists (MRA’s) are fighting back against the negative portrayal of men in society by both the MSM and politicians. However, they are being demonised and accused of being misogynists (the feminist, and indeed the Left’s, go-to ploy to silence dissent or criticism). Just look at the furore over John McEnroe’s factual (in essence) comment that female competitors in sport have a biological disadvantage against males.
When Donald Trump defeated the opportunistic and corporate-sponsored Hillary Clinton, something bigger happened than just an election win. The public won. They sent a clear message to the MSM and politicians that their manipulation is transparent and will no longer work. The question remains to be seen, if this message reaches the ears of advertisers and if change is coming in the way that men and women are treated in pursuit of profit.
Until that moment arrives, if ever, women need to be aware of the MSM and politicans’ exploitation of females’ latent anti-male bias. It is time women silenced the hate rhetoric of feminism for good, and instead promote true equality. The problem is not feminism though, that is just a symptom; the problem is female antipathy towards men’s suffering and society’s lack of empathy for the same. Until women stand together with men, inequality will exist and women will be ripe for exploitation by the media and politicians chasing an easy election victory or quick profit.
