The world has realised the great decline of the fourth power, the media or perhaps more accurately, mainstream media in the US.
Prior to election night in the United States, there was little doubt of the outcome. Hillary Clinton had all but won the presidency, and it would be a smooth transfer of power from one Democrat to another. The polls were singing the praises of the Clinton campaign, placing her comfortably in the lead for most of the key states, giving Donald Trump little chance for a light at the end of the tunnel.
Most of the mainstream media got it wrong because they simply couldn’t believe that Americans would elect someone like Donald Trump. Denial can be a powerful drug.
In part, that’s because much of the East Coast-based media establishment is arguably out of touch with the largely rural population that voted for Trump.
Think tank groups were already discussing Clinton’s rapport as the Secretary of State and what we could expect from her presidency. The minority, who dared to speculate a Trump win, was either ridiculed or accused of being a Trump supporter and pelted with accusations of racism, sexism or overall ignorance. When the special election coverage started and famous faces sat behind election tables to inform the masses, they were all smiles, but as the night progressed, things started to change. Despite the polls, despite the media, Trump was painting the states in Republican red one-by-one. In the morning, people were listing the long shot probabilities of Trump’s win, but in the end, it was all about how Hillary Clinton would win by combining this-and-that state’s electoral votes. To cut the long story short, at the end of the night, the United States had a new president-elect, and it was Donald Trump.
The important question is: How could the media, polls, analysts, experts and all manner of people who predicted a clear Clinton win be so wrong? Let us have the first look at international media and work our way out from there.
The majority of the international media deferred to the mainstream American media for election statistics and acted as a megaphone for their broad claims and data. However, there were those who wanted to approach it more carefully, especially after the equally surprising outcome of the Brexit vote earlier this year. Europe was once bitten and twice shy, after all. Despite all the caution, the confidence of the American media was contagious and on the day after the elections several headlines announced a Clinton win. Even in Turkey there was such a case, and the Posta daily newspaper released a correction after the blunder.
Nevertheless, in the case of Turkey, the majority of the media was more cautious about sounding the trumpets ahead of time. After all, the latest elections showed us how the polls and media can fail to predict the election results, especially considering the waning power of the media in the minds of the people.
Most of the international blame-game pointed towards the American mainstream media. Similar mistakes, such as incorrect headlines, were visible there as well. For example, Newsweek had Clinton on the cover with a headline saying “Madam President” on the day after the election, reminiscent of a similar case decades ago when the Chicago Daily Tribune had the headline “Dewey Defeats Truman,” after the United States presidential elections back in 1948. Contrary to the headline, Harry Truman won the elections that year against his opponent Thomas Dewey, the Republican candidate. This time the tables have turned in terms of party affiliation it seems.
This shows us the self-confidence the media has in in its predictions and influence, as well as demonstrating its lack of place in the current state of affairs.
The media seems to believe that the majority of the problems stemmed from polls and expert analyses, the sources used in creating the coverage, however, this wasn’t the case in this example. It was no secret that the majority of the American media was either in clear opposition of Trump or, at the very least, ran negative coverage of his campaign. So it is quite possible that the media picked and chose the polls or the polls were affected by the media as well. After all, mainstream media, along with influential figures, made it almost an offense to give voice to pro-Trump statements, ostracizing people who did. This led many Trump supporters to hide the color of their vote.
So not only has mainstream media lost the trust of the public, they also managed to earn the public’s spite. Therefore, it is quite plausible that the open support by the mainstream media and figures to the Clinton campaign may very well have spelled its doom.
We stressed in numerous articles how credibility is the mainstream media’s only support in the fight to stay relevant against new forms of news outlets and social media. We now see the result when mainstream’s last support is in shambles.
