How to sort through bias in media.

[Martin]

Article

Very nice article....very true too.

 

[JellyBaby]

Good read. For my attention-span challenged fellow Americans:

So much of the news seems to be credible and to have a ring of truth to it. But it is never more than a part of the story, it is never just the ungarnished facts, and it frequently comes with an agenda that is difficult to ferret out.

and

Always assume you are getting only part of the story and search out those alternative sources of information that can broaden your scope and your understanding of the important issues. No one has a monopoly on the truth, but there are a lot of interested parties keeping shackles on it.

 

[charrison]

Originally posted by: MartyTheManiak
Article

Very nice article....very true too.

It is simple. Read multiple sources with distinct viewpoints then draw your own conclusions.

 

[T2T III]

It is simple. Read multiple sources with distinct viewpoints then draw your own conclusions.

It's even simpler than that. Just go on "news fasts" and not listen to, read or watch any of it.

 

[Lucky]

Consider the following sentence: "The doctor admitted owning the gun that killed his wife." It tells us a number of things: there is a doctor and he owns a gun; he was married but his wife is now dead; the gun he owned caused her death. We know most people will read the sentence as being almost an admission or accusation that the doctor is guilty of murder. In fact, based only on that sentence, we don't know if the doctor was in any way responsible for his wife's death, if she was shot (could have been hit over the head with the gun), or whether she might have shot herself. Yet this is typical of newspaper headlines.

How does he get that most people will assume that is an admission of being guilty of murder? You can't write much more plainly that that.

The titanic complaint-cmon, that's nit picking and also debatable in a way.. I dont know anyone who would call delivery of a ship a "maiden voyage", especially in context. You think he could come up with something a little better than that.

Even to use a simple and recent example, review the coverage of the September 11 attacks. News media invariably described them as cruel, horrific, heinous, and so on because they were deliberately shaping the views of their audience. Now there isn't much doubt that most people would have agreed, but the job of the media is to report the facts and let the facts do their own talking. The editorialized adjectives were unnecessary to the reporting of the story.

Perhaps. But if everything was as bland and black and white as he would wish, you'd be asleep before the 2nd paragraph of every story in the paper. You think CNN is boring now? Imagine what it would be like after hiring this guy. This is because a certain amount of this is demanded by the public. They dont want to open the newspaper on Sept 12, 2001 bland, objective headlines. They want to know their newspaper is like them, shares their feelings, isn't emotionless. In fact, I'm not even sure you could live in this country, see the destruction of 9/11, interview people affected by those attacks, and report on the aftermath without using "editorialized adjectives".

Remember, December 7, 1941 was a "day of infamy" for the Americans; it was a great victory for the Japanese. It all depends how you say it and who is saying it.

So we journalists should write articles so as to not offend the minute population of our readers who support blind sneak attacks and planes crashing into buildings? This guy is saying everthing is relative, and I dont think that's true.

His examples he uses are not even backed by links or evidence. An "incident you remember" from 20 years ago? Sorry, but that's not the ideal case to be using in an article about media accuracy.

Did anyone really see the news value in several hours of live coverage of O.J. Simpson's Ford Bronco driving on a California freeway?

No, but didnt everyone want to watch it? He acts like networks can snap their fingers, put anything they want on the screen, and have eyeballs flock to it. I dont think people are as shallow or impressionable as he thinks. If people had thought a chase involving a well known celebrity was not important, CNN would not have continued showing it. I certainly agree that sometimes the media drums up or overplays certain stories, but not on the level he charges.

but are we really so shallow that this would matter more to us than people dying in conflicts all around the globe, than natural disasters all around the globe, than political wrongdoings everywhere you can imagine? Well, CNN thinks we are that shallow.

Uh, hello?!? You really think people want to watch 24 hours news only to see images of death, destruction, and despair? CNN would not stay in business for 2 weeks if they put his imaginary schedule on the air. He's goddammed right its a business.

Hard-hitting investigative journalism is a thing of the past; news is all sanitized and approved by some board of directors or group of shareholders or advertisers before it ever gets to air.

No, its not dead, and contrary to his claim, there are still news programs that do not engage in the practices he claims. 20/20? Dateline? Nightline? 48 Hours?

For the foreign student trying to make sense of American media, a real challenge is presented. So much of the news seems to be credible and to have a ring of truth to it. But it is never more than a part of the story, it is never just the ungarnished facts, and it frequently comes with an agenda that is difficult to ferret out

Hmm...he says this in comparison to what, the state run chinese media?

In essence, you must assume that if the mainstream media is reporting a story, it is not reporting the whole truth, and it has carefully edited what it is going to make available for public consumption. That puts the onus on the reader or listener or viewer to consider alternate sources of news,

Read: I am so bitter and angry and unable to get a normal job that I have to start an "alternative" news website and convince readers that everything else but me is untrustworthy.


I think the section on Critical Reading rings true.

 

[HappyPuppy]

I didn't read any of the above because I'm lazy and tired. I know the media always lies, just like politicians.

 

[kazeakuma]

"Believe none of what you read and half of what you see"
As soon as I remember who said it I will edit.
Of course they were referring to media, around the early 20th century. Holds true to this day, unless you hear it from the source themselves, there's always some bias/slant to it.

 

[IGBT]

Yes your right. Media bias is institutionalized and largely emotionally driven ie.unwavering support for the global cooling/warming pyromental enviro wacko's. The same bunch that contaminated US gas with MTBE. No doubt it's the road to WRONG...

 

[vladgur]

Thank you Lucky for expressing my point of view very eloquently. My wife was a tv journalist in Ukraine and studies journalism in San Francisco State which seems to hire only disillusionned wrecks of journalists to teach the new generation. Every time she comes home from school she tells me of her professors complaining about evil corporations owning the media, how you can never trust whats on tv, how media should be owned by the people(communism all over again with gov-t controlled media) for the people etc etc. In fact there was no organized events in SFSU on 9/11/02 and even though my wife brought two candles that day, she did not have a chance to light it.

Back to the topic, internet brings plethora of info to our mind and its our job to selectively pick out the right one(which is an arguable term anyways), but it seems that this yellowtimes.org news site has found following among people like MartyTheManiac who was mentioned in one of the other OT threads as feeling that 9/11 is over-rated (It must be in Canada).

 

[tcsenter]

Consider the following sentence: "The doctor admitted owning the gun that killed his wife." It tells us a number of things: there is a doctor and he owns a gun; he was married but his wife is now dead; the gun he owned caused her death. We know most people will read the sentence as being almost an admission or accusation that the doctor is guilty of murder.

That reminds me of an article appearing in the left-leaning Flint Journal about 15 years ago, the head line read something like "Family Dispute Turns Deadly After Man Kills Son-in-Law" with the article opening (parapharased) "A Flint man was killed after his father-in-law retrieved a gun from his closet and shot the man during an argument."

Sooo...you're thinking, 2nd degree murder, manslaughter at least, and the news writer made sure to use every 'buzz word' favored by the antigun movement. Except, these facts never seemed to make it in the article:

-the father-in-law was elderly and disabled
-the son-in-law was a drunk with a history of violence
-the son-in-law had already been jailed once for assaulting the father-in-law
-the son-in-law had a BAC three times the legal driving limit at the time of the shooting
-the son-in-law had forced his way into the home and was slapping the old man around demanding money
-the old man was never charged with a crime (ruled self-defense)

So even when you try to look for cases of self-defense by searching news articles, you're probably going to find only a fraction of them. That is NOT by accident.

 

[TheShiz]

The mass media is biased, of course. Ask yourself who pays for it? Advertisers. Corporations own it along with the government. If you want to avoid the bias you have to find various sources, definately don't stick to American websites and magazines. I think a good place to start is Z net at http://www.zmag.org they are funded by the people who read the website, not advertisers. In effect they are not afraid to let you know the harsh realities of the world.

Tim

 

[vladgur]

Originally posted by: TheShiz
The mass media is biased, of course. Ask yourself who pays for it? Advertisers. Corporations own it along with the government. If you want to avoid the bias you have to find various sources, definately don't stick to American websites and magazines. I think a good place to start is Z net at http://www.zmag.org they are funded by the people who read the website, not advertisers. In effect they are not afraid to let you know the harsh realities of the world.

Tim

Why would American mass media corporation that sells advertisement spots to Sony, BMW and IKIA be biased in its report on events in the middle east, gun control and washington politics. Im tired of this 60's treehugger assumption that because something is a successfull business it cannot be trusted.

Why does everyone have perception of "EVIL" corporations, sure there are few bad apples, but as far as I know, corporations are businesses and thus employ people and are run by people and these people live in this country and their families live in this country.

I went to that Znet site and not only the site was next to impossible to navigate, it seemed contained editorial opinions exclusively. How is that not biased? Everything in the world is usually biased one way or another, but that doesnt mean that you have to discount the successfull media companies as a good source of news

 

[TheShiz]

I am discounting them, because I think for the most part they are not a good source. But you cannot stick to one source, that much is obvious. But once you do find some good varying sources you will soon realize that there is incredible bias in the media. It is necessary to read things like the New York Times because then you come to see the types of opinions they are forming and the news that they are reporting. What is usually more interesting is the news they are NOT reporting. The advertising slant does limit what is reported. Do you honestly believe that these multi-million to billion dollar corporations simply sit by and do not pay attention to what is written? That goes against the basics of economics. They have this incredible influence that has taken years and years to build up, they are not going to give up that power. Also, most of these media RELY on funds directly from these corporations. It would not be good business for the media to go against what these companies want.

Maybe I am just jaded, but I think I am for very good reason. You may differ on this but I don't like to see humans exploited, civilians killed, and the environment destroyed so that people that are already well off to incredible excess will be able to get richer. American foreign policy is controlled by the corporations to allow them to generate the most profit. Humanitarian issues fall by the wayside all the time. I could give many examples if you are unaware of these things. This is done in part from the marginilazation of the public through the mass media, if you need evidence of that I can direct you to that also. This is done because people would be disgusted if they really knew what was going on in the world, so they need to be controlled.

Tim

 

[The0iL]

Bias is what separates BBC from CNN..

 

[CJZ]

That is why I watch CNN, The Newshour, listen to BBC, NPR, and sometimes the CBC. Different viewpoints.

 

[kherman]

I'm not going to bother with the article. I learned enough from the thread.

This is what pisses me off about the media claiming that Iraq is hosting Al Queda.

This is what our government has said:
1) Iraq's government supports terrorism
2) Al Queada is hiding in Iraq

This are two SEPERATE statements. Anyone ever notice that the media says that Al Quada is being supported by Iraq's gov't, in Iraq? Bush has NEVER said this to my knowledge.

My advice is listen to the speach or whatever, but ignore the comments by the media. Do your own interpretation.

I don't claim to know the reason, but have you ever glorified yourself at work for a simple task??? I have. I think the media does the same thing. Glorifying a trivial event, putting a spin on it, so they keep their jobs.

F the media.

 

[kherman]

Originally posted by: vladgur

Originally posted by: TheShiz
The mass media is biased, of course. Ask yourself who pays for it? Advertisers. Corporations own it along with the government. If you want to avoid the bias you have to find various sources, definately don't stick to American websites and magazines. I think a good place to start is Z net at http://www.zmag.org they are funded by the people who read the website, not advertisers. In effect they are not afraid to let you know the harsh realities of the world.

Tim

Why would American mass media corporation that sells advertisement spots to Sony, BMW and IKIA be biased in its report on events in the middle east, gun control and washington politics. Im tired of this 60's treehugger assumption that because something is a successfull business it cannot be trusted.

Why does everyone have perception of "EVIL" corporations, sure there are few bad apples, but as far as I know, corporations are businesses and thus employ people and are run by people and these people live in this country and their families live in this country.

I went to that Znet site and not only the site was next to impossible to navigate, it seemed contained editorial opinions exclusively. How is that not biased? Everything in the world is usually biased one way or another, but that doesnt mean that you have to discount the successfull media companies as a good source of news

I'm not going to argue the point as I can't really see a logical tie, but i'll try.
BMW sells cars, which use gas, which the Middle East supplies alot of. If we go to war, gas prices go up, and people will prefer more fuel efficient cars. So, media that has BMW as an advertiser, might be against war in the middle east, because if there is a wa, BMW will make less money, which means they will have less $$$$ to advertise, which means reduced profits for magazine. Far fetched, I may even edmit it, but why would a magazine take hte risk when anti-war is little to no risk in terms of advertising revenue.

I know little about the economics of the automobile industry, but complementary copy is VERY real.

Go pick up you favorite magizne that has advertising in it htat does reviews. A good start would be an audio magazine due to the large number of companies. Now look for a shoot-out. Bose vs Infinity vs B&G or something. I bet you find htat Bose wins and that they happened to be the only advertiser, or the advertiser that spent hte most $$ on advertising.

 

[jjones]

Why would American mass media corporation that sells advertisement spots to Sony, BMW and IKIA be biased in its report on events in the middle east, gun control and washington politics. Im tired of this 60's treehugger assumption that because something is a successfull business it cannot be trusted.

It's quite simple really. It's all about ratings and revenues, nothing more. The more drama built into a story, the better chance of creating an audience, and an audience is exactly what the news networks want. Why? Because of advertising, nothing more. Its' about money plain and simple, not about delivering an unbiased news service.

I don't feel this is inherently bad; they have to make a living just like everyone else. But I don't put much more value on what is reported on a news service than what I would on neighborhood gossip. There's likely some truth there, but you have to disregard all of the bias.

 

[Lucky]

i dont think many of you understand how the news business works.

Go pick up you favorite magizne that has advertising in it htat does reviews. A good start would be an audio magazine due to the large number of companies. Now look for a shoot-out. Bose vs Infinity vs B&G or something. I bet you find htat Bose wins and that they happened to be the only advertiser, or the advertiser that spent hte most $$ on advertising.

When you find that in a newspaper or news magazine, that might be relevant to this discussion. Although I think your argument, for any major and credible magazine, is false.

 

[Lucky]

I'm not going to bother with the article. I learned enough from the thread.

Way to further your knowledge.

This is what pisses me off about the media claiming that Iraq is hosting Al Queda.

This is what our government has said:
1) Iraq's government supports terrorism
2) Al Queada is hiding in Iraq

This are two SEPERATE statements. Anyone ever notice that the media says that Al Quada is being supported by Iraq's gov't, in Iraq? Bush has NEVER said this to my knowledge.

That's a joke, right? You show me where "the media" said that, in contradiction to what Bush/Rice/Rumsfeld have been claiming. Jesus, you nuts talk they are flat out lying about what this administration says.

 

[Lucky]

This are two SEPERATE statements. Anyone ever notice that the media says that Al Quada is being supported by Iraq's gov't, in Iraq? Bush has NEVER said this to my knowledge.

And why do you assume that the media gets its information from Bush only? link


Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld scoffed today at Iraq's assertions that it is not developing weapons of mass destruction, and he said again that there was hard evidence of ties between that country and Al Qaeda.

....

Mr. Rumsfeld went on to say that reports of contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda had been increasing since 1998.


The secretary said the United States had gleaned "what we believe to be credible information" that Iraq and Al Qaeda members had discussed "safe haven opportunities in Iraq, reciprocal nonaggression discussions." He said the United States also had evidence that Al Qaeda leaders had sought contacts in Iraq for help in getting weapons of mass destruction.




Still convinced we are just making this all up?

 

[Linflas]

The interesting thing about bias in the media is that it has always been there and only in the age of TV have we tried to pretend it is not. Newspapers from the outset openly backed one political party or another and in many cases incorporated the party name in the name of the paper so there was no mistake what side they fell on. Even small towns had multiple newspapers expressing a full range of opinion. Generally they used to leave the editorials to the editorial page but I have little doubt that even then, as today, the editorial slant of the paper determined newstory placement and prominence. There was an interesting book published recently (the name escapes me atm) that analyzed the current news media and proposed a very logical explanation for the seeming bias. The world view of the reporters and editors covering the stories influence on a subconcious level what they feel is newsworthy and what is not.

 

[JellyBaby]

But once you do find some good varying sources you will soon realize that there is incredible bias in the media.

In order to see the bias you must be active, not passive. You've got to do some reading instead of TV viewing. You must do some cross-checking and you must be able to think critically. A healthy distrust of what's reported is healthy, too...aka skepticism. Then a whole new world opens up!

 

[Zenmervolt]

Originally posted by: TheShiz
The mass media is biased, of course. Ask yourself who pays for it? Advertisers. Corporations own it along with the government. If you want to avoid the bias you have to find various sources, definately don't stick to American websites and magazines. I think a good place to start is Z net at http://www.zmag.org they are funded by the people who read the website, not advertisers. In effect they are not afraid to let you know the harsh realities of the world.

Wow, something biased farther left than the mainstream media. I didn't think that was possible. Of course, this must be objective since it's funded by it's readers and the readers, being a bunch of neo-hippies and socialists, can't possibly have an axe to grind.

ZV

 

[Martin]

Originally posted by: vladgur
Thank you Lucky for expressing my point of view very eloquently. My wife was a tv journalist in Ukraine and studies journalism in San Francisco State which seems to hire only disillusionned wrecks of journalists to teach the new generation. Every time she comes home from school she tells me of her professors complaining about evil corporations owning the media, how you can never trust whats on tv, how media should be owned by the people(communism all over again with gov-t controlled media) for the people etc etc. In fact there was no organized events in SFSU on 9/11/02 and even though my wife brought two candles that day, she did not have a chance to light it.

Back to the topic, internet brings plethora of info to our mind and its our job to selectively pick out the right one(which is an arguable term anyways), but it seems that this yellowtimes.org news site has found following among people like MartyTheManiac who was mentioned in one of the other OT threads as feeling that 9/11 is over-rated (It must be in Canada).

Don't be so quick to judge people you know nothing about.
1. I am not one of those people who follow YellowTimes. This link was posted on Fark (yes I am guilty of being a Farker). Despite the fact that YT is a leftist site, this is a nicely written article that applies to all media regardless if they have a left or right bias.
2. Yes I do feel 9/11 is overrated, but its not a candian thing. Remember, canadians died in the WTC too, but I don't know them, nor did I know the other ~3000 people that died there. Why should I care? WTC has not affected me in any way, except a steady stream of heavily sentimental, melodramatic articles/news clips which I happen to despise. Call me cold hearted if you will, but I simply don't care how many husbands died, I don't care about the 9/11 babies, the 9/11 orphants, the 9/11 widows etc etc...