My 2025 Agenda

I'm a bit obsessed with how messaging tactics shaped the 2024 election. A healthy obsession? Debatable. But that’s not the point.

One thing that is clear is that the Democrats’ approach, which relied heavily on “legacy media”, like cable news, failed in comparison to the Republican approach, which went all-in on “new” media.

The Republicans took a shortcut directly into people’s lives, through smartphone screens and earbuds.

(They did also have a gazillionaire who turned his popular platform into a propaganda machine, which helped.)

But their approach didn’t materialize out of thin air.

It wasn’t spontaneous generation, but a long, meandering, well-funded, evolution.

I’m hardly the first person to notice that the proverbial ‘right’ and ‘left’ wings of this country have taken wildly different approaches to communication and integration with media - new and old.

The rise of Fox News, dominance on podcast charts, inventive uses of social media, and much more have led to an entire media ecosystem devoted to the modern-day conservative identity.

What does this have to do with medical education?

Everything.

The Democrats learned the hard way that their approach to communications is outdated, reaching and influencing an ever-shrinking portion of the population.

Similarly, evidence-based science is getting its butt kicked by people who are ‘just asking questions’.

Mastery of modern communications methods is proving more advantageous than mastery of science.

Simply put: the old rules no longer apply.

Is it fair to say it’s a right vs. left issue?

I don’t know.

But I do know that “exciting and relatable vs. stodgy and condescending” maps on to both “right vs left” and “pseudoscience vs science” pretty damn well.

Whether you’re educating the general public or the next generation of medical professionals, you have to know that you’re up against a flood of exciting, intriguing, dopamine-inducing yumminess that’s both easy-to-access and easy-to-swallow.

Of course they’re not reading textbooks anymore.

So how do medical educators succeed in this brave new world?

I don’t know, but I want to find out.

Through The MedEdge, I’ll explore questions like:

• How has the loneliness epidemic fueled the pseudoscience industry?

• Are parasocial relationships at the heart of ‘wellness culture’?

• How have Big Pharma’s health influencers changed public discourse?

• Is it possible to make a ‘nutritious’ podcast that people like?

• What does it mean to be an expert? Who gets to decide?

• Why is contrarianism so seductive? Can we harness it?

• How do you get to nuance in a 3-second world?

• Should we put the traditional ‘lecture’ out of its misery?

• Fanaticism is as American as apple pie, so should we just lean in?

• How did a venerated public servant become vilified during the pandemic?

• How does the ‘medical establishment’ regain people’s trust?

• How can we tell compelling stories based on medical facts?

… and more

If that sounds interesting to you, I’d love to hear it!

If that sounds terrible to you, I’d like to know that, too.

If you know someone who’d dig this direction, please invite them to subscribe!

If you have an idea for a topic, please send it my way 😊 

Have a great week!

Ky

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