Why does anyone watch network news programs?
Serious question.
I know the history: in the 1950's, TV networks started an evening show (first, fifteen minutes long, later lengthened to thirty minutes) in which a presenter would read news stories.
The news programs were painfully conventional from the start, and have always echoed a very establishment view of the world. The programs were centered on American news, and while foreign stories of sufficient gravity would be covered, a mildly serious American story trumped a very serious foreign one.
There was no controversy. Stories would always reflect an establishment narrative. In fact, CBS news admitted years later that the current morning's New York Times front page stories would basically be the trajectory for the evening's broadcast.
We as a society eventually came to the Cronkite syndrome, where CBS presenter Walter Cronkite was seen as a trustworthy, authoritative news source, and considered so trustworthy that a large percentage of Americans thought it a good idea for Cronkite to run for president.
All of which made sense in that time. Sort of. There was no internet and alternate news sources were both hard to access and of sometimes dubious validity.
Fast forward to 2021. You have multiple news sources on your phone. You have access to primary source documents to verify news events. News podcasts are available from dozens of sources. You can talk to people around the world for close to free if you want to verify news stories. And news sources, whether establishment or otherwise, can be easily and quickly tested as to their biases.
But there is still a not small minority that watches these evening news programs regularly. I suspect that these viewers are not young and not in the least tech or internet savvy.
Every source of news is biased. Every one. There's a kind of legacy idea that the big networks are bias neutral. They're not, no more than anyone is. Even worse, the establishment media will all tend to tell the same news narratives.
It's unlikely that anyone reading this is one of those watching network news programs. But however you get your information about the world, be smart, be savvy, and understand the viewpoint of those giving it to you. You're not living in 1967 any more. Start consuming news like that's true, as well.