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Are memes better at the news than the news itself? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 day ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I was thinking about this for sometime and some might wonder why someone might think that memes are better at delivering the news so I set up this comaprasion between the memes and the news.

What the news does.

a. Generally it tells you what's happening: b. encourages you follow a narrow #political "side" c. Might make you short sided, and falling behind with the community and society trends at large. You'l likely not be the most social person because you'll be angry with people more often then if you just consumed memes instead from different perspectives, d. news clips, videos, #podcasts, #newpaper articles, can take from minutes to hours just to began to scratch what is happening, and what the news agencies takes are.

memes

a. memes tell you what's happening, it gives you an insight to #culture and #society trends in different perspectives, b. Memes don't ask you to pick any side in itself, but they might encourages you to follow memes related to #topics you are interested in. Or #advocacy #movements you stand for. c. Memes are quick to consume and give you so much information in seconds to minutes when #scrolling through memes in a #socialmedia feed

This is such an interesting perspective on memes want to hear comments from anyone on their thoughts on this.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm gonna pretty decisively say "no".
By the very nature of memes, you don't know if they are talking about real events or just joking, you don't know who created it or their biases, and you only get an EXTREMELY simplified perspective & information. You are also limiting the news that you see, maybe missing out on something important in favor of something funny (not to imply that we should maximize the amount of news we see).

I disagree with your point B about memes, that they don't ask you to pick a side. I feel like memes are often more biased than traditional news. Even in cases where news is extremely biased, you can be aware of the bias and judge them consistently because they are not anonymous.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

I do believe there are biases in memes, that wasn't what I was getting at, rather I was more so talking about how the news has a narrow path bias, usually as simple as the left vs the right. While with memes it's more so talking about what is happening now, a specific topic, a specific cause, an event. And ones standpoint or perspective of just that specific event in the meme. again, my point is meme is not just informational but it's also news, cultural, social and at the very moment sometimes even at the minute/second.

To an extent though I do think that the news can have more in depth coverage. I think memes are good for global events but the more in depth or specific (local news for instance) news can be better since It is leaning more so on the information side.

Memes however, can keep you informed to an extent while not falling behind culture, and sociaty epectation Memes go deeper on the social and culture while reporting news. Which news does leave out or ignore, in preference of the narrow political path..