Tucker Carlson's book 'The Long Slide' explores evolution of media, downfall of magazines

Tucker Carlson’s latest book, "The Long Slide," showcases how the Fox News host’s career coincided with the downfall of the once-proud magazine industry. As magazines lost importance in America, civil discourse and free thought also eroded and Carlson has an idea why. 

"Technology killed magazines. Technology rearranged our brains, technology destroyed family dinner, conversation, reading," Carlson told Fox News Digital. 

"The Long Slide" is a collection of nostalgic magazine pieces Carlson penned over the past 30 years, annotated with new commentary to highlight how the media has evolved. It contains stories about everything from Carlson’s 2003 trip to Africa alongside Al Sharpton to his pre-fame job at a baked beans factory. Carlson’s journalism career began when the magazine industry was booming but things are drastically different three decades later, and the collection of work serves as a reminder of the desire for detailed, long-form journalism.  

"The main thing that I learned writing magazine stories for many years is that you have to listen to other people in order to do it. You have to," Carlson said. "This is difficult, particularly now as a talk show host where you're constantly on transmit, rarely on receive. But, you know, shut up for a second and hear what people are saying and maybe you learn something." 

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Carlson feels that simply listening to people is a "very useful skill" not just for journalists, but for human beings, despite technology doing its best to eliminate it altogether. 

"Unfortunately, with the proliferation of social media, everybody's on transmit. Everybody's making a TikTok video or proving their vacations is better on Instagram or tweeting their stupid political ideas," Carlson said. 

The "Tucker Carlson Tonight" host said very few people are actually reading nowadays despite a constant onslaught of readily available information to consume. 

"They're like scanning and reading the first three sentences and then forming an opinion, or having their own previously held opinions bolstered by those sentences," he said. "But it's much harder in 2021 than it was in 2000 to just like hear someone … you know, what's the case that you're making? You want to change the country. Tell me how." 

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Carlson, who grew up reading bundles of magazines on a weekly basis to gain perspective on the world outside his La Jolla, California hometown, now pines for the days of people actually listening to each other and feels the downfall of the magazine industry mirrors America’s dwindling attention span. 

"Magazine pieces are by definition longer so it requires a greater level of concentration. It requires time, uninterrupted time to read it, and it requires the ability to follow linear thought. You know, we start here, we're going to end here. And, you know, here's our journey. The sad thing is, in the last thirty years, America has become exponentially more complicated, just a very complex society," Carlson said, noting that even a once-simple task such as registering a car is now difficult. 

"Everything is more complex," he said. "So, living in modern America requires even greater analytical skills, level of concentration and people have less. So it's a bad, bad, bad combination. It's all driven by technology." 

"The Long Slide" also takes aim at corporate censorship and Carlson even blasts his own publisher in the introduction for canceling other books. But partisan censorship isn’t the only reason he feels most of the magazine articles featured in "The Long Slide" wouldn’t get published today.

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Carlson is interested in people and doesn’t think politics should be the driving force behind every piece of content. He enjoys reading and writing about art, nature, bird hunting, dogs, food and sex, but has noticed that most content these days is used to push an agenda. 

"I’m interested in a lot of things," he said.  "I think there's just not much of an appetite for that anymore. I mean, most journalism that I see, it's designed to give more power to my team and disempower the other team. I mean, it's just not really journalism. It's something else. It’s ammunition that’s being used on behalf of a political arm." 

He feels the biggest change in the media industry over the 30 years chronicled in "The Long Slide" is that people who historically defended free speech – such as editors, publishers and journalists – are now trying to extinguish it.

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"I'm blessed to work at Fox because the family that controls Fox is completely committed to free speech and they will allow their anchors, including me, to say things at high volume that they personally disagree with and they allow it anyway," Carlson said. 

"So I personally have the luxury of saying what I think, because my bosses allow it. And I'm grateful every day for that," he continued. "Telling the truth in a non-confrontational, polite, respectful way is still worth doing."

"The Long Slide: Thirty Years in American Journalism" is available now.