Fox News: A Machiavellian Maneuver towards American Theocracy
As I sit here in my comfortable Florida home, sunglasses propped on my head amidst the warm glow of an early sunset, I glance over the latest staples of Fox News headlines with a sense of anguish. Each headline, each perfectly calibrated message, seems crafted with the sole intent to sow division and promulgate the unchecked agenda of the rising tide of Christian-nationalism. It is disheartening to witness Fox News manipulate the reality of events with orchestrated bias, resulting in the constant misleading of countless Americans.
The recent headlines regarding Hunter Biden’s conviction in the federal gun trial is case in point. Fox News – in its usual right-wing, amplified melodrama – has chosen to capitalise on every chance it gets to smear the Biden family. This distraction is a perfect example of the kind of emotional manipulation they deploy to divert attention from the pressing issues – poverty, systemic racism, crippling healthcare costs, the climate emergency, and the rights of marginalized communities like our LGBTQ+ brothers and sisters.
Another headline that piqued my interest was the dismissive way Fox News reported on USA Basketball's decision to not put Caitlin Clark on the Olympic team. The subtle undertones displayed towards Caitlin and the LGBTQ+ community are indicative of the right-wing media's prejudiced attitude. It is a clear call for viewers to question the capabilities of a person based on their gender identity – a divide and rule policy that Fox News has perfected into an art form.
Fox News also used the opportunity to blow the trumpet of socialist alarmism on the victory of the House GOP's Ohio special election. The headline cleverly devoids any context, playing on the fears of its conservative base, painting the narrative of the "leftists" as a threat to the American way of life. Through such disinformation, Fox News aims to fan the flames of division in America, pushing their Christian-nationalist agenda closer to the helm of power.
Finally, their coverage - or lack thereof - regarding the findings of ancient shipwreck artifacts subtly hints at a narrative that views historical and scientific discoveries through a narrow Christian-nationalist lens. By saturating these findings with doomsday symbolism, Fox News capitalizes on fundamentalist anxieties to promote their agenda of societal control.
Post-epiphany, I see through these manipulative tactics for what they are - manufactured fears designed to cement a divisive theocracy under the rich and the powerful, a world where perceived enemies of Christian nationalists are in grave danger. It's a world where compassion, empathy, and understanding are gaslit into non-existence.
Fox News' capacity to transform their selective outrage into a malignant contagion, spreading further division, and fostering a fertile ground for an American theocracy, is a threat that we must stand against. Our nation, in its beautifully diverse entirety, deserves a discourse that fosters unity, not division. It's time to rise above the fear, hate, and paranoia to reclaim the narrative of love, understanding, and acceptance. For the sake of our LGBTQ+ community, our immigrants, and everyone who does not fit into the narrow confines of right-wing Christian-nationalist rhetoric, we must not be swayed by propaganda that seeks to divide us.