The topic at hand is journalism and misogyny. That particular phrasing was often used as a thin veil over many vile attacks on women in visible positions during the gamergate thing. I see a lot of similarities with what happened to Pao (not that I'm defending her in particular, she's pretty dodgy, but the hatred was palpable).
And really, you're on HN, this is not the place where you need to fly the "don't trust the media" flag with such earnestness. I doubt many people here do, certainly not me.
> And really, you're on HN, this is not the place where you need to fly the "don't trust the media" flag with such earnestness. I doubt many people here do, certainly not me.
This is another common trope that happens a lot. We as HN readers are not any more special or immune to proven psychological tactics than anyone else. We are all still humans after all. This elitist sort of viewpoint that HNers are somehow smarter, better, or faster than most people at nearly everything isn't very helpful. I guarantee there are many people here that could benefit from 'basic' knowledge like this, because we all have our biases.
You can know not to trust most media, and apply it to 99.9% of the media outlets you encounter, but if that remaining 0.1% are sources like the New York Times or Fox News, because for whatever reason, your experiences led you to believe they were 'reliable', then knowing that 'you shouldn't trust most media' is useless when those outlets do you a disservice.
It's not elitist to think that the average HN reader doesn't need a reminder that you shouldn't blindly trust the media interjected into any random discussion that involves the media. Most of us read 1984 in high school, just like you probably did.
What's elitist is to think that the other camp only holds their opinion because they've been duped by the media, and that you're the one that's managed to see through it all with your superior scepticism, which is what generic_user is basically doing with their "The knife cuts both ways" comment.
And really, you're on HN, this is not the place where you need to fly the "don't trust the media" flag with such earnestness. I doubt many people here do, certainly not me.