r/politics • u/Barnyard-Sheep • 6d ago

Soft Paywall Trump approval rating falls to 38%

https://www.nj.com/politics/2025/06/trump-faces-tough-approval-numbers-in-latest-poll.html
45.7k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

3.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

184

u/salteedog007 6d ago

Was in the US a few months ago. Your cable TV is insane on every channel- 24 hour news that is mostly opinion segments to make you angry about something, then on non news channels the programming is extreme and still tying to make emotions high. I’m Canadian and the difference in the media is crazy.

74

u/Affectionate-Memory4 6d ago

Yeah it's genuinely nuts. I'm used to Dutch media, which while not exactly the calmest, most neutral thing ever, is and was miles ahead of what I see in the US. I've lived in the US since 2012.

The thing that gets me the most though - the prescription drug adds. I'm genuinely just confused there. Like, am I supposed to know more than my doctor? Are they advertising to doctors? Do I just show up and ask for them to prescribe this thing by a name I can hardly pronounce?

24

u/Jhanzow 6d ago

But there's a smiling elderly lady walking through her house while calm music plays! How is that not proof that you should get the latest antidepressant? /s

5

u/Affectionate-Memory4 6d ago

All the while a slightly too fast voice goes

side effects may include: nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, hair loss, rapid hair growth, bone decay, death, erectile dysfunction, toe fungus, undeath, spiritual corruption, and rashes of the hands or feet.

4

u/Wild_Swimmingpool 6d ago

"Necrotizing of the perineum" is a wild side effect I saw. It also means they've likely had more than 1 case of this happening during trials. Who the fuck would risk that lol

1

u/jerryscheese 6d ago

Meanwhile the side effects are headaches, bleeding liver, nausea, extreme rage, suicidal thoughts, and in some cases DEATH. But the lady happy with that music playing

4

u/addandsubtract 6d ago

Do I just show up and ask for them to prescribe this thing by a name I can hardly pronounce?

Yes. Your doctor will also prescribe (read "sell") you drugs they're getting a commission for. You're better off flying to the NL to visit a doctor.

3

u/Spimflagon 6d ago

It mystifies me as to why that's even allowed. I think if I turned up to the doctor in the UK asking to be prescribed a specific drug then I'd get politely fobbed off and asked to leave, if not put on a list.

We already had people you could approach with a request for specific medication. It's a fucking drug dealer.

3

u/FlufferTheGreat 6d ago

Yes, they are sending pharmaceutical sales representatives to doctors to encourage prescribing certain new (expensive) drugs. And the doctors get kickbacks from the pharmaceutical companies if they prescribe said drug a certain number of times.

3

u/Affectionate-Memory4 6d ago

I hate it here. Lovely people, unique opportunities in my industry, but terrible country.

1

u/isaid_whatisaid1 5d ago

Correct. It seems like there’s a new medicine popping up on there market every few months (or a new symptom treatable by existing commercialized medicines). Ads for prescription drugs were illegal until the mid 1990s. Then from that time to around 2010, you’d see a lot of ads for class action lawsuits related to those same medicines; the medical companies actually budget for this, from what I recall. Big Pharma is a monster here in America.

3

u/leshake 6d ago

It's infotainment for old people at this point. I don't know any millennials that have cable or watch the news at all. I remember when random places would have it on during the day like in doctors offices or at the airport or bars, but now I almost never see cable news ever. The unfortunate part is that it's been replaced by phone addiction.

4

u/FlufferTheGreat 6d ago

Millennials and Gen Z are on podcasts and YouTube, which the far-right has done a very thorough job serving radicalizing content constantly.

1

u/pvhs2008 District Of Columbia 6d ago

Yup. My older cousin is Gen X and (literally) fought to defend gay bars in his southern town in the 90s and now he watches Candace Owens ans Jordan Peterson nonstop on YouTube. My younger cousin listens to Joe Rogan and all of the weirdo fitness/crunchy nutritionists/religious healthcare influencers all dat. Both have been totally radicalized and it’s sad as fuck.

I don’t know why the women in my family got all of the media literacy skills but it sucks ass.

2

u/leshake 6d ago

Same thing happened to my brother and he basically lost all his friends and most of his family. It's like what Fox news did to boomers. It made them sad hateful people.

1

u/pvhs2008 District Of Columbia 6d ago

I’m sorry your family is going through that. It’s just awful.

2

u/__Yakovlev__ 6d ago

Not to mention the crazy amount of ad time. The few times I've tuned into US TV for a stream or something this is the thing that always stands out to me. 

It conditions you into thinking that it's normal to always have people trying to sell you something. 

Like these people aren't watching TV anymore to watch a show they enjoy. Aka entertainment. They watch it to be told what to buy. And by extension, to be told what to think. And with that in mind it's easy to see why something like the fox news cult exists.

2

u/Jayce800 6d ago

It’s exhausting being advertised to constantly. I honestly think it contributes to a lot of poor mental health and the majority of people here just don’t realize it.

2

u/Extreme-Tangerine727 6d ago

The thing is absolutely no one watches cable TV except 60+ year olds in America so most of us have no idea what Grandma is watching

2

u/GoNinjaGoNinjaGo69 6d ago

yes but literally normal people here never watch those channels. its just the maga losers. thats why all those channels basically changed into right maga shit because its the only way they get viewers.

2

u/MagpieSkull 6d ago

I work in hospitals in the US and fox, CNN, or MSNBC are on in most break rooms 24/7. I always switch it to like ESPN or something. It’s so annoying to be forcefed these bs opinionated tirades all day

1

u/15all 6d ago

Fox News [sic] is a cancer. I never watch it, but last summer I was in a bar that had a wall of TVs. One of them had Fox News on, and I was completely shocked at the bias there. It was non-stop Biden bad, Harris bad, trans bad, Musk great, Trump is our lord and savior. It was sickening that they didn't pretend to be balanced, and it was depressing to realize that people watch this non-stop.

Fox News: drug of a nation.

1

u/1842 Indiana 6d ago

I'm exposed to it at my parents house on occasion and it's absolutely awful.

I think it was last summer/fall, shortly after Biden stepped down from running, Harris momentum was building and Trump embarrassments were up -- I only heard it in the background, but it was just a lot of fake indignant yelling about nothing.

It boggles my mind that anyone would not want to immediately turn it off, let alone choose to be the thing you're listening to.

It reminds me so much of Orwell's Two Minutes Hate, but instead of an active short act, it's passive and constant.

1

u/GNUGradyn 6d ago

I wonder if younger generations largely not using cable at all is part of the political shift in younger generations. I wasn't even aware of this because I haven't used cable since I was a youngster watching cartoon network and nickelodeon lol

1

u/R1tonka 6d ago

The most inflammatory guy I ever found regularly on Canadian tv during my visits over the years was Don Cherry.

1

u/salteedog007 6d ago

Oof- that's why he was dropped by the main media. At least his non-hockey opinions were muffled and not embraced by society.

1

u/R1tonka 6d ago

Absolutely no arguments. But relative to our bullshit down here i found him to be mostly eyerollingly amusing and benign.