Media Bubbles

This morning I ran a Random search to see recent news (shameless plug for this site's search feature) and the 5 selected sources included some I don't normally read. As I scanned the various headlines, one from OAN stood out to me. It read:

Rep. Massie touts legislation to ‘fire Fauci’

While I tend to get my news from liberal sources, I usually don't find headlines from conservative ones too surprising. However, this one shocked me. I know that after more than a year of this, people are tired of COVID restrictions. We all desperately want to get back to some kind of normalcy. But, I thought there had been mostly good news lately. After a large surge in cases in January, which surely had nothing to do with people ignoring the virus and having holiday gatherings, the number of daily cases have been dropping. The weather is getting warmer, so we can start doing outdoor activities again. The COVID vaccines are becoming more widely available, and if enough people get vaccinated, we can really start to get back to normal. With all of this happening, I couldn't imagine that people would be calling for Dr. Fauci to be fired. So, I ran a search for headlines about him from the past week and saw these results. Sure enough, there are lots of articles on the right criticizing him. Then, on the left, there are lots of articles quoting his advice to continue to be cautious, wear a mask, and avoid crowded environments, even if you've already been vaccinated.

Looking through these articles, I think I managed to piece together the sequence of events. First, Dr. Fauci gave an interview on MSNBC, during which he provided his latest recommendations. Some argued that these were overly cautious or unnecessary, which then led to members of the House of Representatives introducing a bill to effectively "fire" him. This article from Newsweek has more details. However, the headlines on each side seemed unaware of the other. The left showed the advice but not the criticisms; the right dismissed the advice and focused on the criticisms. Even if you agree with one side, it seems strange that it's possible to have no idea what's being said on the other.

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