From the WTF File: The Most Watched Host in All of Cable News For Young Democrats? Tucker Carlson??

[ancianita]

Last edited Tue Mar 15, 2022, 04:37 PM - Edit history (1)

We Democrats should find out why.
Cuz WTF, right?
Why does Tucker Carlson Tonight get high Democratic viewership at all -- but especially from young people.

This item from the above Wikipedia link got me inquiring:

Mediaite reported [Feb 2022] that "in the month of October [2021], Tucker Carlson [was] the number-one watched host among Democrats in the key 25-54 age demographic – across all networks."[20]

Why am I bothered? Because Democrats want the youth vote, and this viewership information is weird.
Also because Mediaite's owner, Dan Abrams would also know, since he's also worked for MSNBC and NBC and ABC in various major positions.

So I read the Mediaite February article referred to:
https://www.mediaite.com/tv/who-is-the-most-watched-host-in-all-of-cable-news-for-young-democrats-tucker-carlson/

In terms of total viewers, Fox has three of the top five shows watched by Democrats, while MSNBC has the other two.

Maddow leads among Democrats in terms of total viewers with 908,000. While The Five pulls in 732,000 total viewers who identify as Democrats and Tucker Carlson pulls in 722,000 to round out the top three. Hannity and Lawrence O’Donnell land in fourth and fifth place, with 6230,000 and 607,000 Democrat viewers – respectively.

Unfortunately for CNN and MSNBC, the same data shows that the top five most-watch programs among Independents are all on Fox. Tucker Carlson, The Five, Hannity, Special Report with Bret Baier, and The Ingraham Angle are the five most-watched shows by self-identified Independents – in order of popularity.

Among Republicans, it’s no surprise that Fox sweeps the top five watched programs. Listed in order of most-watched they are Tucker Carlson Tonight, The Five, Hannity, Special Report with Bret Baier, and The Ingraham Angle.

In raw percentages, Fox pulls in 58% of all Independents watching cable news, while MSNBC attracts 25% and CNN gets 17%. Among total viewers identifying as Democrats, Fox pulls in 39% while MSNBC pulls in 38% and CNN gets 24%.

All I could find to corroborate Mediaite is Pew Research, which doesn't list other studies, just its own during that same period. None of these media say why youth viewing seems so right wing biased.

Seeing the age of the crowds at the Capitol on Jan 6, aren't they the same demographic?

Could these numbers be due to COVID?
Could these numbers mean that young Dems live with older folks, and so watch what older folks have on, and so are a kind of sample bias? I want to believe the sampling is wrong. But the polls are from Nielson, Pew and Gallup.

It's just that the latest viewership report that FOX News bought Nielsen TV MRI Fusion show, according to FOX, that post-COVID numbers are holding.

I'm not upset. But DAMN. Tucker motherfucking Carlson??

Now I see why he's been our target. But we damn well better GOTV on youth this year.

[TwilightZone]

1. Maybe they're hate-watching him.

Seems like half his audience is people who watch him so they can complain about him.

[ancianita]

6. I hadn't thought of that. Didn't know hate-watching is a thing, just something my husband did

on commercial break from MSNBC.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

33. Or perhaps lol-watching. Drinking game?

[The Magistrate]

2. Young People Like To Point And Laugh, Ma'am

[ancianita]

8. Sir, I'd love to take your word for that.

[Silver Gaia]

24. That was my first thought...

That he isn't news to them. He's comedy.

But still, a majority seems too much.

[ancianita]

25. ...

But still, a majority seems too much.

That was my first thought. But then I kept looking. All I could find is that they might be lying.

[Silver Gaia]

31. That seems likely.

It appears to be a favorite way to "own the libs."

[live love laugh]

3. Is this credible?

[True Blue American]

4. I do not believe that poll!

[ancianita]

9. If you don't think Nielson's credible, then why? Do you have any contradicting poll links?

[lagomorph777]

10. I don't think so. Something is seriously fucked up here.

Unless there's some kind of beer-pong drinking game that involves ridiculing these douchebags, it makes no sense at all.

[ancianita]

28. Okay, here's a major discrediting fact:

Nielsen is no longer accredited by the Media Ratings Council.

From
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nielsen_ratings


More from the link:

There is some public critique regarding accuracy and potential bias within Nielsen's rating system, including some concerns that the Nielsen ratings system is rapidly becoming outdated because of new technology like smartphones, DVRs, tablet computers and Internet streaming services as preferred or alternative methods for television viewing. In June 2006, however, Nielsen announced a plan to revamp its entire methodology to include all types of media viewing in its sample.[29]

Since viewers are aware of being part of the Nielsen sample, it can lead to response bias in recording and viewing habits. Audience counts gathered by the self-reporting diary methodology are sometimes higher than those gathered by the electronic meters, eliminating any response bias...

Another criticism of the measuring system itself is that it fails the most important sample criterion: it is not random...

A related criticism of the Nielsen rating system is its lack of a system for measuring television audiences outside homes, such as college dormitories, transport terminals, bars, prisons and other public places where television is frequently viewed, often by large numbers of people in a common setting. In 2005, Nielsen announced plans to incorporate viewing by away-from-home college students into its sample. Internet television viewing is another rapidly growing market for which Nielsen ratings fail to account for viewers. iTunes, Hulu, YouTube, and some of the networks' own websites (such as ABC.com and CBS.com) provide full-length web-based programming, either subscription-based or ad-supported. Though websites can already track a site's popularity and the referring page, they cannot track viewer demographics. To both track this and expand their market research offerings, Nielsen purchased NetRatings in 2007.[35] However, as noted in a February 2012 New York Times article, the computer and mobile streams of a program are counted separately from the standard television broadcasts, further degrading the overall quality of the sampling data. As a result, there was no way for NBC to tell if there was any overlap between the roughly 111.3 million traditional television viewers [36][37] and 2.1 million live stream viewers of Super Bowl XLVII.[38]

I was unaware of the questionable use of Nielsen polls. So then why would Dan Abrams' Mediaite use them? Oh, right. Gossip value.

I thought Nielsen was solid, so thank you very much for making me do more research on them.

I'm breathing a little better about the GOTV 2022.

I'll just pull this headline from my file, and shut my mouth about viewership until I find some better sourcing about Democratic Party youth.

In fact, I'll probably delete this OP.

[iemanja]

5. They are driving his ratings up

Stop watching him already.

[Mr.Bill]

7. That means some of his advertisers are wasting their money.

Young Democrats are not likely to buy Depends or erectile disfunction meds.

[ancianita]

12. Most of us could say the same for MSNBC, my nightly TV news source beyond daytime digital media.

MSNBC's got more Big Pharma and luxury car commercials than I can tolerate.

[Samrob]

11. Are they part of the Nina Turner crowd?

Democratic parents are not doing a good job of raising their children, then.

[ancianita]

13. Good question. No one's asked them.

[AZProgressive]

37. Nina Turner is very different than typical left wing Tucker Carlson guests

She is spending most of her time campaigning for Congress with typical ideas like abolishing the filibuster’ M4A, etc

The type of left wing guest and may explain some of the young viewers is Jimmy Dore who hates AOC and the Squad. AOC and Nina Turner get along with each other and Nina Turner is also hated by this crowd. Jimmy Dore does have a lot of young viewers and he convinced them that AOC and the Squad are “sellouts”.

The kind of left that watches Tucker Carlson are those that think he is anti war or whatever but don’t know Tucker Carlson’s entire history such as advocating for Bush’s wars. Plus he lies about everything anyway but Jimmy Dore fans like Tucker Carlson. Not Nina Turner.

Edit: I forgot to mention Glenn Greenwald supporters on the left like Tucker Carlson.

[sarisataka]

14. Honestly, not surprised

Based on DU it appears many Democrats watch him, fox and other RW media.

I also see as many, if not more, threads about what the former President is saying/doing/thinking/would have done than about Biden.

[ancianita]

15. I haven't counted the Biden v TFG OP's here, but had the same feeling.

You say something we could look into. I wouldn't second guess DU'ers' reasons, but I'm pretty sure their political reasons aren't the Right's reasons.

[DeeNice]

16. Please tell me it's for a drinking game.

Every time he gets that look like a dog trying to figure out a doorknob, do a shot.

[ancianita]

18. I wish.

[DBoon]

23. These days, it could be a bong hit

[FakeNoose]

17. Pollsters just keep forgetting the one solid fact that we all know

Repukes LOVE lying to pollsters to screw them up.

One of their favorite lies is to tell 'em they are Dems. (or lib'ruls)

[ancianita]

19. Got a link? I haven't seen any around here that settle that polling as solid fact.

[Timewas]

20. Maybe

Repugs lying??Saying they are Dems.

[ancianita]

30. Yes. I found two links for that claim.

A Hill/Harris Survey put up by Newsweek in 2020 ...

https://www.newsweek.com/70-republicans-60-democrats-say-people-lie-when-taking-polls-1529841

and a Cloud Research study put up by The Hill in 2020...

https://thehill.com/hilltv/what-americas-thinking/515198-poll-66-percent-say-likely-a-significant-number-of-people-lie

[Kaleva]

21. There's over 250 million adults in the country so those numbers are very small

[ancianita]

22. I hear you. I'd like to think that the 7 million more votes for Biden in 2020 reflect that claim.

[uponit7771]

26. ****BELIEVE IT !! *** FAUX Floods SM and leads them to Carlson cause there is t ...

... any young Democrats reaching out like FAUX is on SM

ESPECIALLY with PoC !!!!!

[ancianita]

29. What's SM? Sirius? 'something media'?

Last edited Tue Mar 15, 2022, 05:53 PM - Edit history (1)

[uponit7771]

38. social media

[ancianita]

39. Ah thanks, shoulda thought of that.

[PdamnedQ]

27. A portion of why this number might exist is the mechanics of cable.

Fox News is usually part of the basic cable package, especially in rural America.

While MSNBC can be found in the expanded basic cable package somewhere behind the The Home and Garden channel.

It's baked in the cake.

Evil people make plans.

[Septua]

32. Here's a confirming link

https://www.deseret.com/2022/2/15/22935035/perspective-whats-with-all-the-democrats-watching-fox-news-tucker-carlson-rachel-maddow

The only explanation I can imagine for anyone watching Fox is simply to hear what they want to believe and never questioning what they hear. They are not rationale people.

[ancianita]

35. But

This is a blog. It can't be a confirmation of my OP, because it also repeats Mediaite's Nielsen report, which is all I originally passed along. It could be trying to make that fake news viral, though. Blogs don't exist to confirm news outlets, which Abrams' Mediaite claims to be, at least for the celebrity world; instead, blogs use mainstream media reports to fuel opinions in the form of comments from their audience. In my case, it used the "what's with Democrats" trope, which my OP fell for, dammit, because I'd not done enough homework on either Nielsen, Don Abrams or Mediaite.

I think I've researched enough to debunk the Nielson claim, or at least lead myself away from its dubious claim to validity and reliability.
It's true that Democrats might watch Fox News, but it's already been sourced here that

1. Nielsen's methodology and output are invalid and unreliable;
2. Around 10% of people who answer polls lie;
3. Any Democrats who do watch right wing cable news don't watch for the same reasons that Republicans watch;
4. The signal-to-noise ratio in American media is a constant challenge for even above average readers; and
5. Media resume builders like Don Abrams shortchange truth standards of journalism as they fail to have their for profit projects present informative information from valid and reliable sources.

Gotta tell ya, my own OP was a real learning experience.

[EarthFirst]

34. Im 42; I do not know a single individual in our social network that watches Tucker nor Fox...

These poll results seem odd.

[ancianita]

36. What do you mean by "our social network"?