Right, a constraint is power. This constraint is actually the most important. In case of a power imbalance though, there’s nothing the weaker party can really do but to rely on the good-will of the other party. It’s their choice how things work out, to the extent that the game board favors them.
If the journalist isn’t too powerful, and if they benefit from listening to you, and they’re not entirely obsessed about pushing a narrative which goes against your interests or knowledge, then things are favorable and more likely to turn out well.
My argument is that we can consider these things (power difference, alignment of views, the good/bad faith of the journalist in question, etc) as parameters, and that the outcome depends entirely on these parameters, and not on the things that we pretend to be important.
Is it for instance good advice to say “Word yourself carefully so that you cannot be misinterpreted?” For how much effort Jordan Peterson put into this, it didn’t do much to help his reputation.
Reputation, power and interests matter, they are the real factors. Things like honesty, truthfulness, competence and morality are the things that we pretend matter, and it’s even a rule that we must pretend they matter, as breaking the forth wall (as I’m doing here) is considered bad taste. But the pretend-game gets in the way of thinking clearly. And I think this “advice for journalists” post was submitted in the first place because somebody noticed that the game being played didn’t align with what it was “supposed” to be. The reason they noticed is because journalists aren’t putting much effort into their deception anymore, which is because the balance of power has been skewed so much
Generally, some of the ideas here are still potentially useful, they just don’t get you any guarantees.
When I say “There’s nothing you can do about journalists screwing you over” I mean it like “There’s nothing you can do about the police screwing you over”. In 90% of cases, you probably won’t be screwed over, but the distribution of power makes it easy for them to make things difficult for you if they hate you enough. Another example is “Unprotected WIFI isn’t secure”, you can use McDonalds internet for your online banking for years without being hacked, so in practice you’re only a little insecure, but the statement “It’s insecure” just means “Whether or not you’re safe no longer depends on yourself, but on other peoples intentions”.
From this perspective, I’m warning against something which may not even happen. But it’s merely because a bad actor could exploit these attack vectors. I’m also speaking very generally, in a larger scope than just Lesswrong users talking to journalists. This probably adds to the feeling of our conversations being disconnected.
But I will have to disagree about nobody being naive. When two entities interact, and one of the entities is barely making an effort in pleasing the other party, it’s because of a difference in power. A small company may go out of its way to help you if you call its customer support line, whereas even getting in touch with a website like Facebook (unless its through the police) is genuinely hard.
The content says “Journalists exist to help us understand the world. But if you are a journalist, you have to be good enough to deserve the name” Which seems to mean “If you’re going to trade, you need to provide something of value yourself, like offering a service”. I think this is true for journalists as individuals, but not for companies which employ journalists. If these people won’t treat you with respect, it’s because they don’t have to, and arguing with them is entirely pointless, even if you’re right. Nothing but power will guarantee a difference, and if a journalist treats you kindly it’s probably because they have integrity (which is one of the forces capable of resisting Moloch).
Repeating myself a bit here, but hopefully made my position clearer in the process.
Right, a constraint is power. This constraint is actually the most important. In case of a power imbalance though, there’s nothing the weaker party can really do but to rely on the good-will of the other party. It’s their choice how things work out, to the extent that the game board favors them.
If the journalist isn’t too powerful, and if they benefit from listening to you, and they’re not entirely obsessed about pushing a narrative which goes against your interests or knowledge, then things are favorable and more likely to turn out well.
My argument is that we can consider these things (power difference, alignment of views, the good/bad faith of the journalist in question, etc) as parameters, and that the outcome depends entirely on these parameters, and not on the things that we pretend to be important.
Is it for instance good advice to say “Word yourself carefully so that you cannot be misinterpreted?” For how much effort Jordan Peterson put into this, it didn’t do much to help his reputation.
Reputation, power and interests matter, they are the real factors. Things like honesty, truthfulness, competence and morality are the things that we pretend matter, and it’s even a rule that we must pretend they matter, as breaking the forth wall (as I’m doing here) is considered bad taste. But the pretend-game gets in the way of thinking clearly. And I think this “advice for journalists” post was submitted in the first place because somebody noticed that the game being played didn’t align with what it was “supposed” to be. The reason they noticed is because journalists aren’t putting much effort into their deception anymore, which is because the balance of power has been skewed so much
Your argument ignores the positions you are arguing with. Nobody here has a naive idea of what drives journalists.
Generally, some of the ideas here are still potentially useful, they just don’t get you any guarantees.
When I say “There’s nothing you can do about journalists screwing you over” I mean it like “There’s nothing you can do about the police screwing you over”. In 90% of cases, you probably won’t be screwed over, but the distribution of power makes it easy for them to make things difficult for you if they hate you enough. Another example is “Unprotected WIFI isn’t secure”, you can use McDonalds internet for your online banking for years without being hacked, so in practice you’re only a little insecure, but the statement “It’s insecure” just means “Whether or not you’re safe no longer depends on yourself, but on other peoples intentions”.
From this perspective, I’m warning against something which may not even happen. But it’s merely because a bad actor could exploit these attack vectors. I’m also speaking very generally, in a larger scope than just Lesswrong users talking to journalists. This probably adds to the feeling of our conversations being disconnected.
But I will have to disagree about nobody being naive. When two entities interact, and one of the entities is barely making an effort in pleasing the other party, it’s because of a difference in power. A small company may go out of its way to help you if you call its customer support line, whereas even getting in touch with a website like Facebook (unless its through the police) is genuinely hard.
The content says “Journalists exist to help us understand the world. But if you are a journalist, you have to be good enough to deserve the name” Which seems to mean “If you’re going to trade, you need to provide something of value yourself, like offering a service”. I think this is true for journalists as individuals, but not for companies which employ journalists. If these people won’t treat you with respect, it’s because they don’t have to, and arguing with them is entirely pointless, even if you’re right. Nothing but power will guarantee a difference, and if a journalist treats you kindly it’s probably because they have integrity (which is one of the forces capable of resisting Moloch).
Repeating myself a bit here, but hopefully made my position clearer in the process.