Who Controls What You Believe? The New Propaganda Machine. 🎙️
Who decides what Americans see, hear, and ultimately believe? For decades, a relatively small number of television networks, newspapers, and media organizations had enormous influence over the national conversation. Social media was supposed to change that. Instead, we may have simply traded one set of gatekeepers for another.
On today’s Eric Thompson Show, Eric looks at the growing influence of mainstream media, social-media algorithms, and the emerging power of artificial intelligence. When outrage generates clicks and algorithms determine what appears in our feeds, separating legitimate reporting, opinion, persuasion, and outright misinformation becomes increasingly difficult. The answer isn’t blindly trusting traditional media—or automatically believing an alternative source simply because it challenges the establishment. It’s learning to think critically and verify what we’re being told.
Plus, Eric breaks down a major political story, looks at what's happening in the rapidly changing world of AI and business, and begins a new Gen X feature by traveling back to America in the late 1960s—the country Generation X was born into. From Vietnam and political upheaval to the civil-rights era and the race to the Moon, it was an extraordinary period of American history.
And, of course, we start things off with today’s famous birthdays.
The Eric Thompson Show — Ideas Shaping Our Future.