Abstract

Despite Stewart admitting his own “socialist” sympathies, The Daily Show often critiques not only right‐leaning but left‐leaning language. Interestingly, despite the show's ironic satire, it aims at greater accuracy as a means to the larger end of truth in general, a stream of thinking termed “modernism.” But in “postmodernism,” truth is seen more as a continuum and a process. The show and its writers “teach that deliberation is not a means to an end but an end in itself. Discussion, dialogue, provocation, and questioning are valued for their own sake—not because they lead to truth but because they foster a community able to discern untruth.” Better, the author believes the show does lead to truer understanding. But more than information, the show promotes transformation—from knee‐jerk habits of mind to mindful self‐awareness. One way it does so is by catching how people try to manipulate opinion using the red herring tactic.