Ep.70 Are we all grifters now?

The Mindcrime liberty show discusses grifting.  What is it, is there an alternative and what are the implications if it exists? Grifting is an accusation which one will encounter if one spends enough time online or oneself is online.  It is not only "unrespectable proles" but even Glen Greenwald (although he may be an unrespectable prole anyways) gets this accusation thrown at him from time to time.  Dave Rubin and many people further to the right of him get this accusation thrown at them.  What are the incentive structures of producing content?  Why isn't this accusation thrown at more established corporate and mainstream media organizations such as CNN or NBC? Rachel Maddow reportedly gets 30 million per year for her show on MSNBC, Wolf Blitzer at 5 million, Shephard Smith at 15 million and Megyn Kelly gets reportedly 23 million.  Aren't they much more profitable then Glen Greenwald, Alex Berenson, Thaddeus Russel, Ron Paul or Jordan Peterson's substack column and youtube channel let alone Alex Jones who has been banished from almost the entire mainstream internet?  If grifting is a problem a critique ought to acknowledge the difference  between big money grifters and the small money grifters.  Glen Greenwald and Thaddeus Russel for all their intelligence and capability seem to be in the wrong business if grifting is the goal compared to Megyn Kelly and Rachel Maddow.

 

If the problem does exist what ought to replace it?  Public funding of media seems to produce content which is not only of an agenda it is increasingly considered bad by large segments of the population according to survey data.   NPR in the US is almost entirely watched by voters of the democratic party and to many is insufferable to listen to or watch.  Organizations like the BBC are in a parallel situation increasingly and as Peter Hitchens describes with its recent shows twist history and smear Brits. The problem with a good portion of publicly funded content, especially on controversial subjects, is easily recognized in other societies and is what Anglo-Americans would call propaganda if it wasn't their own government doing it.  The managerial elite and their supporters clearly dominate and watch organizations such as the BBC and NPR and if they alienate them too much would clearly lose the support of its backers leaving them in  a position which might be worse then Glen Greenwald or Michael Tracey's substack column. The primary benefit of the mass patron model is decentralized support as long as one doesn't ban people from using the means of exchange  and banning "unregulated" means of exchange like crypto.  It seems like everyone is in a way beholden to some sort of patron but one has to examine who exactly makes bank and who exactly gets by comfortably.  What is to be made of those who produce content for no money? Are they just "attention seekers" who like to here themselves talk? Is it not the case that the Marxist dream is a kind of profit free production of content?   Aren't we all grifters by some definition and is there any significance to that accusation as its usually applied?