The Media is the Religious Institution of the Western World

So for those who are too lazy to go to the comments and read the negotiations between myself and Con, he has proposed another definition to replace my original definiton of Religious Institution. I cede that his definition is superior.On with the Show______________________________________________________________________________________________The current state of the media promotes what are called Secular Religions[1], which is a term granted to a set of doctrines and dogmas that are virtually religious, simply without a supernatural or metaphysical aspect. Now I can understand the misunderstanding that this was going to be about conspiracies, however, I only posted the Clinton Kill Count Conspiracy as an example (albeit an extreme one) which the media would not cover. A more fitting example would have been the content of the emails exposed on Wikileaks.However, the debate here is not whether the media tried to help one or the other candidate, but if the media is a religious institution. And since I have taken the side of saying it is, I shall now continue to attempt to prove so. The religious institution, by defintion, has "an organized collection of belief systems and cultural systems". This is true. I am not trying to accuse the Media of being malevolent or involved in some greater conspiracy that has yet to be revealed. However, the first question which must be asked is 'why do religious institutions like Christianity and Islam and others promote some of the mistruths that they promote?" Solely picking on Christianity because I am most familiar with it, I shall first describe the fact the Roman Catholic Church spread the lie that condoms increase the liklihood of contracting the AIDS virus, and second point to some of the "Young Eath Creationists" who claim that man and dinosaurs existed together.[2][3] It cannot be quickly assumed that these organizations mentioned and others are acting malevontly, for I am sure if you talk to some "Young Earther" about him/herself, you would find a generous and compassionate individual. However, they spread these lies because they either believe the lie to be true, or if they are acquainted with the truth, they believe that they are lying for the Greater Good.So it is with the Media. Outlets like CNN did not fragrantly abandon all bias in favor of Hillary Clinton because they wanted war with Russia or some other theory that I could be accused of holding, but because they truly believed her to be the best choice. In their belief, they abandoned objectivity and did not discuss content exposed on Wikileaks but spent weeks on Donald Trump's "five word sentence" that DDO won't let me repeat here. To give another example, in my opening argument I mentioned Don Lemon refusing to brand the kids as evil. One can watch it and see Mr. Lemon trying to blame bad upbringing, or, in his words, "poor home training", for the behavior. Unlike other outlets like Fox and Breitbart (who I will get to very shortly), I will credit Mr. Lemon and assume that if the races were reversed, his reaction would have been the same. His premise however, is fundamentally flawed because he assumes that nobody would conceive of this. Yet history is rife with names like Ted Bundy, Jeffery Dahmer, Carl Eugene Watts, or even bigger offenders like Dr. Josef Mengele, General Shiro Ishii, and Klaus Barbie. So obviously, there are individuals quite capable of conceiving of such things. [4] I contend that Mr. Lemon is quite aware of this, and instead of calling them evil, found that perpetuating a mistruth was a way to discuss an issue he felt needed to be discussed. In doing so, he did the same a Catholic priest who dismisses evil not as an act of humanity, but as the actions of the Devil. Only he blamed a Secular reason instead of a supernatural one. He perpetuated the tenants of his own Secular Religion, which is Progressivism.I go quite hard on Progressvies (because it's so much fun) but you, Con, mention Fox News, Breitbart, and Tomi Lahren. You claim they have a right wing bias as opposed to CNN's left wing bias. I contend that neither side has a bias, but that will be a little further down. For now, let us consider the second Secular Religon, Conservativism. Much like Progressive outlets who hammer on one clause of one sentence Trump said ten years ago, groups like Breitbart are also known to take a fragmented soundbite and publish it as newsworthy. Much like their rivals, they are knowingly perpetuating mistruths in order to advance their dogmas. Comically, both sides, when confronted with facts cannot even bring themselves to accept those facts. For example, on Fox News a few years back, staple commentator Bill O'Reilly debated Tina Nguyen about Asian success as opposed to Blacks. Ms. Nguyen explained to Mr. O'Reilly that he was wrong, and he continually rejected her assertions because it contradicted his dogmatic views (in this case, that gangsta rap harms black communities). [5] His reaction was not unlike when a Creationist is confronted with evidence of evolution: denial.If this was only bias, which I concede is unavoidable, there could be productive debate and discussion on the topic. However, because they hold their opinions to be infallible dogma, conversation is almost impossible between media figures, as that neither one will actually discuss the events openly and in good faith. Instead, they only discuss things from the point of their dogma. You mention Tomi Lahren, and reminded me of the debate between her and Trevor Noah on The Daily Show. [6] This gives evidence to my point. Rather than have a constructive debate, Mr. Noah came from the Progressive Secular Religion, and Ms. Lahren from the Conservative Secular Religion. The topic was about the cases of shootings of black males by police officers in the United States. Of course they discuss statistics, but neither one really tries to discuss on a case by case basis. If this had happened, Mr. Noah would have to view the tapes of Michael Brown robbing a store and Alton Sterling's lenghty criminal record. Likewise, Ms. Lahren would have to acknowledge that Philando Castile was cooperating with police officers and was shot for possessing a firearm (a right granted to American citizens) and that Eric Garner was doing little more than selling cigarrettes for less than the State mandated by tax, and did not need to be choked to death by numerous officers - and the fact that his crime was reminiscent of a certain anti-tax protest on board a boat in the Boston Harbor during the 18th Century. Instead, they just cling to their dogmatic narratives and accomplish nothing.____________________________________________________________________________________________________Con, due to circumstances I will not be able to reply to your next argument until the 13th of January. I apologize in advance for the delay.