Without Tucker Carlson as a lead-in, Hannity's viewers drop by half

[KathyPartdeux]

I hope so.

[generic_name]

[KathyPartdeux]

I have no opinion on that one.

But sure - being queer is great! Anything that encourages it is fine in my book.

[MildBill]

having a hard time staunching the bleeding.

Bleed, hellbeast, bleed.

[MikeR]

Is there any data whether Fox’s ex-viewers have switched to other right-wing fantasy news networks or have they stopped watching television entirely?

[elk]

[Brainspore]

I doubt the latter but it’s a nice thought…

Everybody Goes Outside Instead Of Watching Itchy And Scratchy - The Simpsons

[snigs]

Given how they, and Trump, used to pride themselves by ratings as a measure of success, it’s sweet that by their metric, they’re not half what they were a week ago.

[DizBuster]

[Magic]

I didn’t watch Tucker Carlson regularly, but would see him occassionally in a hotel lobby or airport, or a clip from a comedy program. His schtick seemed to be seeding fear, doubt and hatred with hypothetical questions about what could be. He seems to appeal to racists, homophobes, transphobes and misogynists and was especially good at baiting them. The real story here is that without really good racist homophobic transphobic misogynistic content Fox News’ rating are cut in half. Headline should be: Half (all) of Fox News’ audience are bigots.

[milliefink]

[micah]

The problem is that there is a good chance many of these people end up consuming even more extreme and dishonest “news”. They’re not turning off Fox and turning on CNN or MSNBC or (gasp) reading a legitimate newspaper like the NYT or even WSJ. They’re turning to Newsmax and OANN and Infowars and The Blaze.

Heck, just the other night while folding a ton of laundry in my building’s laundry room, I was treated to half of a phone conversation between my building’s leading resident conspiracy theorist* and some unknown friend of hers, during which she went on and on about how unfortunate Tucker’s firing was because he’s the only one on TV who “tells the truth.” I’m quite confident she will continue to tune into Tucker wherever he lands, and that it’s not going result in her being better informed about reality.

*We have several conspiracy theorists in our building, but she is the most visible as she doesn’t work and spends all her time walking around the place and doing things like taking hourlong personal phone calls in the laundry room at midnight. FWIW I used to think she was more of a left-wing conspiracy theorist (in league with the more irrational environmentalists and left-wing NIMBYs in the neighborhood), but anti-vax hysteria and transphobia seem to have pushed her the other direction (or maybe across the gap in the horseshoe).

[Janine_Randall1]

I think the AR-15 lapel pins are making people die.

[milliefink]

[euansmith]

And the other half are lazy bigots.