05 ISSUE XI
MAY 2026
MAY 2026
the media’s burden
American culture is fundamentally violent because of relentless media exposure to U.S. militarism abroad and racialized violence at home.
By Ben Kellerhals
My first meaningful encounter with political media came in 2005, as Hurricane Katrina devastated the American South. I still remember the helicopter footage on the news of entire neighborhoods submerged, images that left a lasting impression on me as a child. At the same time, the crisis stirred an unexpected sense of collective care within my otherwise traditionally conservative family. We emptied our pantry and joined a long line of cars to contribute to national food drives bound for the disaster zone.
Image by Kevin Dietsch, via Getty Images.
Yet alongside these moments of solidarity, mainstream coverage increasingly revealed the failures of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which is responsible for “disaster management.” The administration of then-President George W. Bush exposed widespread negligence in and around New Orleans. Confronted with these competing narratives - of compassion on the one hand and institutional failure on the other. As I grew more attuned to American political media, this early experience underscored for me the importance of questioning official narratives in any historical moment.
Media memorials for the September 11th World Trade Center attacks, four years earlier, were also formative in my conception of how the United States creates nostalgic consent for colonialism. I began to question what these commemorations emphasized - and what they left out: the causes of the attacks, the disproportionate response in Afghanistan, and the ways 9/11 was mobilized to justify the invasion of Iraq. Such questions rarely fit within the patriotic mythology of America as a global arbiter of freedom. Instead, these narratives exemplified a form of soft power that shapes public perception, narrowing the space for critical reflection on the nation’s actions abroad.
As a child attending Fourth of July celebrations, I was taught that American soldiers stationed at an American base in another country enjoyed the same music, food, and culture as my community back in Peoria, Arizona. I was continuously reminded through the media that my freedom was at stake by US soldiers occupying someone else’s country. Moments of immense historical significance also formed my relationship with U.S. political media. My own political identity began to take shape as I saw coverage of Barack Obama’s 2008 election victory. By this time, at age seven, my passion for American history had already influenced my interests. However, nothing in the 2008 campaign prepared me for the feeling of historic awe, watching a country built on anti-Blackness elect its first Black leader. The TV news stations turned on in my house carried a strong tone of dissenting panic, as well as the denouncement of race as a relevant factor in modern American life, because of Obama’s victory. This totally misaligned and inaccurate perspective did not seem convincing to me whatsoever; I watched with tears the expressions of people like Reverends Jesse Jackson and Rosey Grier, and all the others who had experienced the horrors of American apartheid firsthand, and were now witnessing what they may have understandably thought they never would. As with the memorialization of national tragedy, the collective media of my youth took the historic election as a direct invitation to celebrate American values, freedom, and progress. After this point, I could clearly understand that in good or horrific moments alike, the media centered on nostalgia and jingoism.
None of this is surprising. The modern history of the United States has been one of corporate consolidation in media companies, which, in turn, craft and defend government-sponsored narratives in events of American colonialism. The nostalgia I was raised with as a young person is used as part of the process to destroy, control, and exploit the Global South. It is often said, cruelly but accurately, that the United States turns its imperial actions into fodder for cultural nostalgia. This pattern persists in the steady release of PTSD-focused films that frame destructive wars in the Middle East through the suffering of American soldiers rather than those they harm. Such narratives reveal a deep insensitivity and a troubling tendency to aestheticize violence. Historically, anti-imperialist voices are marginalized, while celebratory war stories flourish in mainstream media and cultural production.
This will not change easily. Real hope lies in transforming American soft power by imagining a political climate that centers equity over dominance.
As a young teenager, the crisis of police violence would regularly inform my sense of American justice. The rule of law, as it exists in the US, was a tool for routine violence against those lower in our cultural political caste hierarchy. During the second Obama administration, coverage for prominent cases of police violence soared in frequency across the media landscape. The deaths of Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, and Michael Brown were especially painful and indicative of their time. In each case, an officer of the law, or a self-righteous neighborhood watch member, was protected in their choice to kill Black American men. Moreover, national media coverage largely represented justifications of police violence against Black Americans across the political spectrum..
With constant exposure to brutality and a community often indifferent to it, I came to see American culture as rooted in violence. In the U.S., violence feels like a civic religion, inflicted on minorities, children, and women, saturating screens and shaping perception. Media outlets rarely challenge these norms, instead focusing on reactions to violence rather than its causes. During the genocide in Gaza, major institutions like The New York Times spread misinformation about October 7 and the pro-Palestine movement. Similarly, coverage of Black Lives Matter in 2014 and 2020 emphasized isolated unrest, sidelining deeper questions about how to meaningfully reduce violence.
Edward Snowden’s 2013 revelations about NSA surveillance introduced me to the long-standing U.S. tradition of shaping public narratives through soft power. Recent political crises have further eroded already fragile trust between the media and the public. By my lifetime, skepticism toward State Department narratives had been building for decades. Yet one advantage of our society is the presence of independent media willing to confront such issues, as seen in films like Oliver Stone’s “JFK.” While influential, such portrayals can also blur the line between truth and sensationalism. Can the media help rebuild public trust in government?
Experiencing adulthood has meant seeking new ways to express and understand community values, especially through media. Over time, my consumption habits have grown more politically radical and increasingly distanced from mainstream sources. Like many Americans, I came to recognize that the media I consumed was not neutral, but part of a larger system I was implicitly supporting. With the rise of highly personalized algorithms, my digital spaces now reflect a range of subcultures: young socialists, pro–Pan-African thinkers, and English-speaking Buddhists among them. These curated feeds do more than mirror personality; they actively shape and reinforce political identity.
While concerns about online echo chambers once dominated public discourse, they are discussed less today, even as their effects persist. I find a certain comfort in a feed largely free of conservative perspectives, where debates instead unfold within a narrower ideological spectrum, such as between liberals and socialists. This creates a sense of engagement without fundamentally challenging my worldview. Occasionally, opposing views appear, but are usually filtered through critique or ridicule. While this model makes for a more enjoyable and affirming experience, it also limits exposure to genuine ideological diversity. As millions experience similarly tailored feeds, the broader consequence may be a more fragmented public sphere, where understanding across differences becomes increasingly difficult.
maria alejandra acosta ramos is completing a BFA in Fine Arts at Parsons School of Design.