I think the problem is much deeper than media literacy. It’s social stratification and bubbles. There are so many people who will say that almost all of their friends and family are in one party. Heck there are even people who don’t even know people of races other than their own.

It’s also an issue of education and brain drain. Suppose you’re born in a rural community in the Deep South and you decide to go to medical school. You get accepted to a school in another state and move away to study. After graduation you go into residence in a hospital and eventually you become a fully licensed doctor, ready to start practicing.

Where do you go? It’s possible for you to go back home to your rural community but in all likelihood there’s no room for you there (not enough patients) and besides all that you likely don’t relate very well to everyone else. So you leave. You move away to the big city in another state.

This is happening on a massive scale in the US. Brain drain from red states and rural areas to blue states and big cities. It’s hard to have critical thinking and media literacy in an area if all the educated people are leaving!