Newswise — A new sociological study offers a surprising take on the state of American news: right-wing news media doesn’t just sit on the opposite end of the political spectrum from mainstream outlets – it operates more like a religion than a traditional news source.
While we often hear about polarized news media, research from Purdue University argues that this is the wrong framework. Instead of a simple left vs. right divide, sociologists Marcus Mann and Daniel Winchester argue that we’re dealing with two quite different media systems.
Mainstream outlets, such as The New York Times and CBS News, aim to report facts, inform a diverse American public, and cover a wide range of issues. In contrast, right-wing sites like Breitbart, NewsMax, and the Daily Wire focus on a narrow set of hot-button topics and are more concerned with reinforcing beliefs among a specific demographic than informing the public. The study concludes that the right-wing media world resembles religion much more than traditional news.
According to the researchers, these outlets:
- Promote a fixed worldview, treating sacred truths as more important than “mere facts.”
- Build a strong sense of community around shared values rather than encouraging independent thinking among individuals.
- Grow and change in ways that look more like religious movements than businesses.
This shift in perspective helps explain why these platforms are influential and why many Americans are drawn to them. As the authors argue, “Right-wing news audiences are seeking (and getting) a lot more than fact or fiction when they tune into Fox News, NewsMax, or the Daily Caller. Like church or temple, many Americans are now getting their beliefs, identity, and sense of belonging from this media system.”
--30--
This paper Beyond Polarization: Right-Wing News as a Quasi-religious Phenomenon was published in the June 2025 Sociological Theory, a journal of the American Sociological Association (ASA).
Comments
