Fox News’ core appeal was a throwback militant masculinity, not theology

Evidence

In 1996, Bill O’Reilly joined Limbaugh in the right-wing media universe. Hired by Roger Ailes to host The O’Reilly Factor at the start-up Fox News Channel, O’Reilly channeled masculine rage in a similar manner, tapping into the anger and resentment brewing among conservative white men sensing their cultural displacement. O’Reilly, too, framed politics, and especially foreign policy, in terms of masculine power. Fox News quickly became a mouthpiece for American conservatism. With bombastic male commentators sharing the screen with women whose qualifications apparently included a sexualized hyper-femininity, throwback masculinity was at the heart of the network’s appeal. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 341

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s broader interest in consumer culture and media apparatus transmitting religious identity — Fox News as cultural artifact akin to the books and merchandise Du Mez analyzes. — connects to: Fox News initially disavowed a conservative agenda at launch. — Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants, 1421; Fox News succeeded because market demand for partisan news already existed — Lee McIntyre, Post-Truth, 139