Newspaper Page Text
The ADVANCE, November 9, 2022/Page 6A
Stye Aiiuancg
OPINIONS
“I honor the man who is willing to sink
Half his repute for the freedom to think,
And when he has thought, be his cause strong or weak,
Will risk t’other half for the freedom to speak.”
-James Russell Lowell
editorials
Why the Legacy Media Is
Panicked About Eton Musk’s
Twitter Takeover
By Ben Shapiro
It has now been a
week since Elon
Musk took over Twit
ter, and the wailing
and gnashing of teeth
is still audible across
the legacy media
landscape. In one
sense, that’s rather
shocking: Why, pre
cisely, should mem
bers of the media be
so apoplectic about a billionaire taking over
a social media company from other million
aires, pledging to loosen restrictions on
dissemination of speech? In another sense,
the outrage is perfectly predictable: The
legacy media oligopoly is now under threat.
To understand the angst of the legacy
media and the Democratic Party over
Musk’s takeover of Twitter, it’s important to
understand the oligopolistic history of leg
acy media dominance. Until the 1990s, vir
tually all Americans had to rely on just a few
major legacy media sources: the three net
works, The New York Times, WaPo and the
like. A huge number of Americans relied on
local newspapers, but these newspapers in
turn relied on wire services like the Associ
ated Press, AFP, Reuters or McClatchy.
This oligopoly meant both market
share and control of the narrative.
The rise of the internet changed every
thing.
After Drudge Report broke former
President Bill Clinton’s Monica Lewinsky
scandal, the nature of the media changed
entirely. There had been hints of a brewing
dissent in the works — talk radio, the rise of
Fox News. But the internet shattered legacy
media dominance entirely. People began
diversifying their news diets en masse. The
legacy media were suddenly being called
out and fact-checked by outlets that people
actually read.
In the early stages of the new media,
people accessed their favorite websites di
rectly. They bookmarked these sites, and
they clicked on them each morning.
Then came major social media. Social
media re-centralized the mechanisms of
distribution for news. Instead of bookmark
ing 10 websites, for example, people fol
lowed 10 accounts on Twitter, or added
them to their Facebook newsfeeds. This
was highly convenient — and it was good
for a lot of nonmainstream news outlets,
who suddenly had access to billions of eye
balls. A thousand flowers bloomed.
And, for a time, there was stasis: Be
cause Democrats maintained political con
trol, these social media sites were praised
for their free speech principles, and clever
use of these services — a la the Obama
campaign in 2012 — was considered good
and worthy.
When former President Donald Trump
was elected in 2016, however, legacy media
outlets and the Democratic Party panicked.
They thought they had forged an unbeat
able electoral coalition; there was simply no
way Hillary could have lost legitimately.
Someone had to be blamed. The answer
was obvious: right-wing “misinformation”
and “disinformation,” spread by social me
dia, was the culprit.
The legacy media and their Democratic
friends now began to blame Facebook and
Twitter. Pressure was put on the social me
dia sites to stop acting as free platforms for
dissemination of a broad variety of views;
instead, the social media platforms —
which had monopolized news traffic —
could be used to reestablish Left-wing leg
acy media oligopoly. Pressure even came
from the Department of Homeland Secu
rity, as The Intercept reported this week:
DHS engaged in “an expansive effort... to
influence tech platforms.”
“Misinformation” would be fought by
shutting off the traffic spigots on non-leg
acy media; legacy media would be pro
moted and elevated. And because virtually
all news traffic to sites now came through
these social media sites, the oligopoly could
once more take hold.
People were banned for saying the ob
vious: men were not women; mass masking
was not an effective solution to COVID-19
transmission; vaccine mandates were inef
fective because vaccines did not stop trans
mission; black Americans were not being
Please see Shapiro page 11A
Too Much TV
It wasn't corn.
Moon Wright
dozed in the bed of
his truck, stretched
out on top of a load
of sugar cane.
I made a pass,
turned around, and
admired the sugar
cane.
I was in south Georgia, between Jesup
and Odum, visiting old friends, noting
changes in a place that used to be familiar.
I maintain what little sanity I enjoy due
to occasional trips into south Georgia.
When life gets the way life can get, I haul
myself into the land of tall pines, slow mov
ing dark rivers, and sandy soil. It calms me.
Slamming my door didn't wake him up.
He didn't bat an eye when his dog crawled
from under the truck and beat the fender
with his tail. The dog was glad to see me.
Moon worked turpentine most of his
life, collecting pine tar from cups hanging
on the trees.
When the turpentine business went
stale, he worked at a lumber yard, bought a
piece of land, raised kids, sent them all to
college, buried his wife.
He never owned a television. He be
lieves he wouldn't have gotten those kids
through school with one in the house.
He retired years ago but works at some
thing every day. This week Moon has been
cutting, stripping, and selling sugar cane.
In the spring he raised and sold vegeta
bles and now sells sugar cane and cane
syrup beside the road for seventy five cents
a stalk, or two for a dollar. A pint of syrup is
a dollar.
"People don't know what to do with it
anymore," he said and waved at yellow jack
ets. "One white lady asked how much I
wanted for my corn.” Moon wasn't selling
much sugar cane.
"It's because of TV. People watch the
TV rather than do something that's good
for them."
It’s hard to believe people have forgot
ten about sugar cane. Just a few years ago it
was common to see a mule hooked to the
“sweep,” a long pole attached to the rollers
of a cane mill. The mule walked in circles
turning the rollers. Juice poured through
burlap into a barrel, and then into to a large
syrup kettle where it boiled down into
syrup. What was left was molasses.
Many a flat Coca Cola was saved by the
addition of a little rum thanks to sugar cane.
Today, the only place to see a cane mill
is at a historic demonstration. We just
missed the Sugar Cane Festival in Leslie,
GA.
Fifty or sixty years ago, you'd find half
the population chewing a little sugar cane
in the afternoon. It was just the autumn
thing to do.
At a fast food joint, I was joined by a
couple of teenagers and handed them a
piece of sugar cane after the usual instruc
tions.
"Man, what kind of corn is this?"
Moon was right. Too much TV.
joenphillips@yahoo.com
By Joe Phillips
Dear Me
Remembering the
extraordinary kindness
of Vince Dooley
There is no
need for a reci
tation here of
Vince Dooley’s
myriad and
well-deserved
accomplish
ments on and
off the football
field. You have
seen and heard
them numerous
times since his passing on October 28 at
the age of 90. However, there is a side to
this great man you might not know
about. His extraordinary kindnesses.
In the late ‘60’s, my son Ken, along
with his best friend Rick, attended
Dooley’s football camps. Rick was a ter
rific athlete and excelled in every sport
he played. As a teenager, Rick and his
family moved to California. Had he
stayed in Georgia, I often wonder if he
might have ended up wearing Red and
Black.
Instead, he graduated from Cal
Poly-San Luis Obispo. In 1984, Rick
entered the Air Force and flew 49 com
bat missions in the first Gulf War. It was
a dangerous job. Enter Vince Dooley.
Although it had been a lot of years
since he had seen the little boy from
East Point running sprints at Sanford
Stadium, he heard where Rick was and
what he was doing and wrote him a let
ter of quiet encouragement. Rick told
me later that hearing from Vince D ooley
was a tremendous morale booster. Plus,
he delighted in taping the letter to the
cockpit for his co-pilot, a Georgia Tech
graduate, to see as well.
From the Air Force, it was on to
American Airlines where Rick rose to
the rank of captain, flying the big birds
internationally. And then disaster. In
the prime of his life, he was diagnosed
with esophageal cancer.
Although Rick’s health quickly and
steadily weakened, his love for the
Georgia Bulldogs did not. Enter Vince
Dooley again. Rick told me how he en
joyed watching his adopted team on
television out in California. I relayed
that to Coach Dooley, who sent him an
autographed cap and more importantly
and without being asked, enclosed a
long letter detailing his own family’s
battle with cancer and more words of
quiet encouragement.
Rick died in 2008 in San Rafael,
California, at the age of 49. Among the
things mentioned at his going-home
service was his love for the University of
Georgia and his friendship with a Hall
of Fame football coach named Vince
Dooley that sustained him in the tough
times.
Vince Dooley was there for me and
my family, also. When we lost our
grandson, Zack, one of the first calls I
got was from Vince. When son, Ken,
was hospitalized in New York and fac
ing serious surgery, Vince called with a
pep talk.
Speaking of phone calls, we used to
laugh about my calls to him during his
coaching days at the direction of my
boss, Jasper Dorsey, vice president of
Southern Bell’s Georgia operations and
By Dick Yarbrough
an ardent Bulldog. I dutifully relayed
Mr. Dorsey’s thoughts on what could
have been done better in last week’s
game and suggestions for the next one.
Had I been Vince Dooley, I would not
have taken the calls but he always did.
He was kind to me even back then.
Of course, there was the high-pro
file controversy with university presi
dent Michael Adams, a petty and ego-
maniacal person who couldn’t abide
having someone around with a higher
profile than his. I tried to help Vince
through that sad episode but to no avail.
The political deck was stacked against
us. Adams won that battle but eventu
ally lost the war. History will treat Vince
Dooley much kinder than Michael Ad
ams.
Success has a thousand fathers, and
everybody is high-fiving themselves
these days at getting the field at Sanford
Stadium named for Vince Dooley. But
they were sitting on their hands during
the years I was beating the drum for that
recognition in this space along with
former all-SEC UGA linebacker Dr.
Tommy Lawhorne, a retired vascular
surgeon. Vince knew how hard we were
trying and was grateful for our efforts.
Vince Dooley Field at Sanford Sta
dium did become a reality and the
credit belongs to Athens native Gov.
Brian Kemp, a boyhood friend of the
Dooley family. Gov. Kemp has done a
lot of good things during his time in of
fice, but none better than getting the
Board of Regents to make it happen
while Vince was around to appreciate it.
There are so many more things I
could say about my life and times with
this kind man, but suffice it to say I am
honored to have had him as a friend. I
will miss him very much. Vince Dooley.
Rest in peace.
You can reach Dick Yarbrough at
dick@dickyarbrough.com; at P.O. Box
725373, Atlanta, Georgia 31139 or on
Facebook at www.facebook.com/
dickyarb.
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