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Do you believe the "mainstream media" has a liberal bias? (1 Viewer)

Does the "mainstream media" have a liberal bias?

  • Yes, and it heavily slants news reporting

    Votes: 269 55.6%
  • Yes, but it doesn't slant news reporting too much

    Votes: 84 17.4%
  • No, the news is neutral

    Votes: 52 10.7%
  • No, the news has a conservative or corporate bias

    Votes: 79 16.3%

  • Total voters
    484

timschochet

Footballguy
This subject keeps coming up, and I'd like to see how the FFA feels about it. For the purpose of definition, I define the "Mainstream media" as CBS, NBC (Network news only), ABC, CNN, the New York Times, Newsweek, Time, The Washington Post. I would not regard either FOX or MSNBC as mainstream, nor would I regard any of the "New Media" (internet sources) as mainstream.

It seems like every conservative these days seems to believe that the news sources I have listed here are heavily biased against them- not simply against conservative candidates, but also against conservative philosophy. There is also a prevalent belief among certain progressives that these sources are actually biased against leftist ideology because of its corporate nature. These two ideas seem to be at odds with each other.

I am one of those few who continue to believe that the news sources I have listed do their best to present a professional, objective look at the news, and that their choice of topics and programming have much more to do with promoting ratings (and in the case of the newspapers and periodicals that are left, readership) than they do with promoting any ideology one on side or the other. But perhaps I am naive, certainly, those who think like I do seem to be shrinking, and the shouts of "bias!" on both sides are getting louder.

What's your opinion?

 
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Those of you who are voting that it "heavily slants" the news, can you give some examples? What would be heavily slanting the news to you, and what, in your opinion, would be an objective presentation?

 
I believe most network cable shows are biased not in any political sense, but biased towards news that gets reactions out of folks, whether it's fear, loathing, despair, sadness, anger, frustration or sympathy. News that informs us in any detailed way seems to be gone from the networks and cable shows, it's all about getting a reaction from us and having us stay tuned. Different networks do this in different ways. Some do it with more of a liberal slant, some with more of a conservative slant. But they're all less "news networks" than "reaction factories". How else can we describe why a story about a lady who killed her kid is prime news, with all the other stuff going on in the world? It's the salacious we're being sold, and we're less informed because of it.

It's almost as if we're all cows, hooked up to the feeding machines on one end, and the milking machines on the other, the more we watch the network news and zone into either talk radio, cable news, or any one source of information. We need to go out and GET our news via multiple sources in order to be informed, rather than sitting on our couch, letting the news come to us. Once we realize that it's not really the news that they're offering us, but rather a set of stories packaged to elicit reactions from us, the only responsible reaction is to remove ourselves from the feeding and milking tubes, and branch out on our own, finding information from a variety of sources, and the more reputable the sources, the better.

Read the opinion pages in papers for what they are, realize the biases, seek out the stories that contain more information than biases, read a variety of educated peoples opinions even if they're biased (the elite of the slanters). Avoid talking points in all forms, as they're intended to appeal to our reactive nature, not to our intellectual nature.

All this isn't easy to do, and I'm not saying I have it all figured out, but I try my best to seek out the news from a variety of sources that I don't believe are just out there to elicit a reaction from me to keep me tuned to their content stream.

 
Since you restricted the news media to inclue, I answered that they do have a liberal bias.

However, radio is so dominated by the right wing it's hard to say there is an overall liberal bias.

And this is all relative... if the US media were at the same place in the spectrum as the rest of the civilized world, then they are "liberal". The right wing in the US is on an island.

But the biggest problem with the news media is that they don't report the news. They are entertainment. Have you ever been in another country and seen what it's like when they just report the news?

 
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I believe most network cable shows are biased not in any political sense, but biased towards news that gets reactions out of folks, whether it's fear, loathing, despair, sadness, anger, frustration or sympathy. News that informs us in any detailed way seems to be gone from the networks and cable shows, it's all about getting a reaction from us and having us stay tuned. Different networks do this in different ways. Some do it with more of a liberal slant, some with more of a conservative slant. But they're all less "news networks" than "reaction factories". How else can we describe why a story about a lady who killed her kid is prime news, with all the other stuff going on in the world? It's the salacious we're being sold, and we're less informed because of it.It's almost as if we're all cows, hooked up to the feeding machines on one end, and the milking machines on the other, the more we watch the network news and zone into either talk radio, cable news, or any one source of information. We need to go out and GET our news via multiple sources in order to be informed, rather than sitting on our couch, letting the news come to us. Once we realize that it's not really the news that they're offering us, but rather a set of stories packaged to elicit reactions from us, the only responsible reaction is to remove ourselves from the feeding and milking tubes, and branch out on our own, finding information from a variety of sources, and the more reputable the sources, the better.Read the opinion pages in papers for what they are, realize the biases, seek out the stories that contain more information than biases, read a variety of educated peoples opinions even if they're biased (the elite of the slanters). Avoid talking points in all forms, as they're intended to appeal to our reactive nature, not to our intellectual nature. All this isn't easy to do, and I'm not saying I have it all figured out, but I try my best to seek out the news from a variety of sources that I don't believe are just out there to elicit a reaction from me to keep me tuned to their content stream.
You raise some excellent points here.
 
Results are a surprise when you consider the voting population. The FFA has a conservative Republican majority.

 
But the biggest problem with the news media is that they don't report the news. They are entertainment. Have you ever been in another country and seen what it's like when they just report the news?
:goodposting:When in Italy a few years ago it was eye opening to watch CNN International every day. Reporting of the news without editorial looks a lot different.
 
I would not regard either FOX or MSNBC as mainstream, nor would I regard any of the "New Media" (internet sources) as mainstream.
While I disagree with the former, the latter illustrates how out of touch you are. Forget bias; you don't even understand how people get their information these days.IOW, "That's the way it is" is not the way it is.

 
Liberal bias? No. The most commonly discussed forms of bias occur when the media support or attack a particular political party, candidate, or ideology, but other common forms of bias include

[*]Advertising bias, when stories are selected or slanted to please advertisers.

[*]Corporate bias, when stories are selected or slanted to please corporate owners of media.

[*]Mainstream bias, a tendency to report what everyone else is reporting, and to avoid stories that will offend anyone.

[*]Sensationalism, bias in favor of the exceptional over the ordinary, giving the impression that rare events, such as airplane crashes, are more common than common events, such as automobile crashes.

Other forms of bias including reporting that favors or attacks a particular race, religion, gender, age, sexual orientation, or ethnic group.

 
Liberal bias? No. The most commonly discussed forms of bias occur when the media support or attack a particular political party, candidate, or ideology, but other common forms of bias include

[*]Advertising bias, when stories are selected or slanted to please advertisers.

[*]Corporate bias, when stories are selected or slanted to please corporate owners of media.

[*]Mainstream bias, a tendency to report what everyone else is reporting, and to avoid stories that will offend anyone.

[*]Sensationalism, bias in favor of the exceptional over the ordinary, giving the impression that rare events, such as airplane crashes, are more common than common events, such as automobile crashes.

Other forms of bias including reporting that favors or attacks a particular race, religion, gender, age, sexual orientation, or ethnic group.
You should link your source.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=101

 
Liberal bias? No. The most commonly discussed forms of bias occur when the media support or attack a particular political party, candidate, or ideology, but other common forms of bias include

[*]Advertising bias, when stories are selected or slanted to please advertisers.

[*]Corporate bias, when stories are selected or slanted to please corporate owners of media.

[*]Mainstream bias, a tendency to report what everyone else is reporting, and to avoid stories that will offend anyone.

[*]Sensationalism, bias in favor of the exceptional over the ordinary, giving the impression that rare events, such as airplane crashes, are more common than common events, such as automobile crashes.

Other forms of bias including reporting that favors or attacks a particular race, religion, gender, age, sexual orientation, or ethnic group.
You should link your source.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=101
They should link their source. Are you sure they didn't read it here first? Besides, it's no secret that media bias is studied at schools of journalism, university departments (including Media studies, Cultural studies and Peace studies) and by many independent watchdog groups from various parts of the political spectrum. In the United States, many of these studies focus on issues of a conservative/liberal balance in the media. Other focuses include international differences in reporting, as well as bias in reporting of particular issues such as economic class or environmental interests.

An academic study cited frequently showing a liberal media bias in American journalism is The Media Elite,* a 1986 book co-authored by political scientists Robert Lichter, Stanley Rothman, and Linda Lichter. They surveyed journalists at national media outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, and the broadcast networks. The survey found that most of these journalists were Democratic voters whose attitudes were well to the left of the general public on a variety of topics, including such hot-button social issues such as abortion, affirmative action, and gay rights. Then they compared journalists' attitudes to their coverage of controversial issues such as the safety of nuclear power, school busing to promote racial integration, and the energy crisis of the 1970s.

The authors concluded that journalists' coverage of controversial issues reflected their own attitudes, and the predominance of political liberals in newsrooms therefore pushed news coverage in a liberal direction. They presented this tilt as a mostly unconscious process of like-minded individuals projecting their shared assumptions onto their interpretations of reality.

A widely-cited public opinion study[2] documents a correlation between news source and certain misconceptions about the Iraq war. Conducted by the Program on International Policy Attitudes in October 2003, the poll asked Americans whether they believed statements about the Iraq war that were known to be false. Respondents were also asked which was their primary news source: Fox News, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, "Print sources," or NPR. By cross referencing the responses according to primary news source, the study showed that higher numbers of Fox News watchers held certain misconceptions about the Iraq war. The director of Program on International Policy (PIPA), Stephen Kull said, “While we cannot assert that these misconceptions created the support for going to war with Iraq, it does appear likely that support for the war would be substantially lower if fewer members of the public had these misperceptions.”[2]

 
I would not regard either FOX or MSNBC as mainstream, nor would I regard any of the "New Media" (internet sources) as mainstream.
While I disagree with the former, the latter illustrates how out of touch you are. Forget bias; you don't even understand how people get their information these days.IOW, "That's the way it is" is not the way it is.
Actually I do understand it. But when I use the term "mainstream media" I am only using common parlance. I could just as easily refer to it as the "old media". But when you claim that this is not how people get their information these days, I think you're still very wrong. The network news shows still have ratings that are far superior to anything that appears on cable TV. Furthermore, most people don't read the internet for news. What news they get comes from the network and local news shows. So this is still, IMO, very "mainstream."

 
An academic study cited frequently showing a liberal media bias in American journalism is The Media Elite,* a 1986 book co-authored by political scientists Robert Lichter, Stanley Rothman, and Linda Lichter. They surveyed journalists at national media outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, and the broadcast networks. The survey found that most of these journalists were Democratic voters whose attitudes were well to the left of the general public on a variety of topics, including such hot-button social issues such as abortion, affirmative action, and gay rights. Then they compared journalists' attitudes to their coverage of controversial issues such as the safety of nuclear power, school busing to promote racial integration, and the energy crisis of the 1970s.The authors concluded that journalists' coverage of controversial issues reflected their own attitudes, and the predominance of political liberals in newsrooms therefore pushed news coverage in a liberal direction. They presented this tilt as a mostly unconscious process of like-minded individuals projecting their shared assumptions onto their interpretations of reality.
I've read this before, though I've yet to be given convincing examples of how this is performed. Certainly the Iraq War, which you mentioned, was a situation in which all of the major news networks behaved like cheerleaders when we invaded, and not just Fox.
 
Those of you who are voting that it "heavily slants" the news, can you give some examples? What would be heavily slanting the news to you, and what, in your opinion, would be an objective presentation?
Bump. The results of the poll so far is overwhelming. Most of you reading this believe in a "heavy bias". Examples, please?
 
Those of you who are voting that it "heavily slants" the news, can you give some examples? What would be heavily slanting the news to you, and what, in your opinion, would be an objective presentation?
Bump. The results of the poll so far is overwhelming. Most of you reading this believe in a "heavy bias". Examples, please?
The poll results are the best evidence that the media is NOT biased.
 
Those of you who are voting that it "heavily slants" the news, can you give some examples? What would be heavily slanting the news to you, and what, in your opinion, would be an objective presentation?
Bump. The results of the poll so far is overwhelming. Most of you reading this believe in a "heavy bias". Examples, please?
The poll results are the best evidence that the media is NOT biased.
I don't understand. Can you explain this?
 
Results are a surprise when you consider the voting population. The FFA has a conservative Republican majority.
Iirc, ffa polls show the typical fbg is a fiscal conservative but social liberal and leans more Libertarian than Republican.I think the media certainly has a liberal bias. I believe most people think Democrats are for the people and Republicans are for big businesses. Stations simply present the news to a fan base that only wants to hear certain things. If Obama did the exact same things he's done but were a Republican I have little doubt the media would attack him more than they have. Because it fuels the stereotype many people hold. Most people don't want to hear they're wrong.
 
I'm still struggling with where you say that Fox News isn't mainstream.
They are mainstream as far as ratings go, but no one watches Fox News or MSNBC to get the unbiased news. If you're watching one of those stations, you have already decided the slant you want put on the topics and you just want to hear other people share your beliefs. People waqtching ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, etc, are (for the most part) just trying to find out what's going on in the world.
 
Fox News's conservative bias far exceeds the cumulation of all the liberal bias. There's no one even remotely closely to the likes of Hannity and Beck. Even the so called moderate on Fox news, O'reilley, is worse then anyone I've seen on the other cable news stations.

Most people that voted that the news has a heavy liberal bias are probably conservative so like, duh, of course they're going to vote that way. Just look at the discussions that go on this board and you'll see that objectivity and impartiality left the building a long time ago. Its all about taking a side and defending it at all costs. The hell with acknowledging that almost always, both side have some valid points and trying to reach a middle ground.

 
There are numerous issues and topics where there is an undeniable bias. Here are a few biases I see in the media.

1. Global Warming. Perhaps the most biasedly reported topic of all. I believe at one point 97% of stories on the issue would put the pro-global warming side of the issue without giving any counter-viewpoint, even when they were reporting some extreme fear-mongering spin that had little scientific support.

2. Abortion. Despite the fact that the vast majority of the public support more restrictions on abortions than the status quo, politcians who favor such positions are consistently labeled with the 'extremists' tags. On the other hand, even the most extreme pro-choice politician who supports things which are way out of the mainstream like partial birth abortions or federal funding for abortions get the 'moderate' label.

3. The economy. Depending on whether we have a Democrat or a Republican in the White House, stories on the economy are reported completely differently. The spin during the Democratic years is much more positive while during Republican years the negative is hightlighted. During the Reagan/Bush years stories of homelessness were highlighted on a weekly basis, as soon as Clinton was sworn in, the media dropped the issue.

4. Gay Rights. For years and years the media searched for a story to champion gay rights on. They would find a good story report on it but then the facts would roll in, and it would not fit their narrative and they would drop it. That changed with Matthew Shepard. The media used that story for years as their narrative to advance the gay rights agenda.

5. Tea Party. When liberals groups rally the reporting highlights their issue and their cause. When the Tea Party rallies the search is on to locate the most radical elements and to paint the movement as racists.

Those are just 5 areas I see a consistent bias in reporting.

 
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There are numerous issues and topics where there is an undeniable bias. Here are a few biases I see in the media.1. Global Warming. Perhaps the most biasedly reported topic of all. I believe at one point 97% of stories on the issue would put the pro-global warming side of the issue without giving any counter-viewpoint, even when they were reporting some extreme fear-mongering spin that had little scientific support.
This issue was what I had in mind when I said the truth has a liberal bias. If 97% of stories assume that there's human-caused global warming, that's evidence of a conservative bias, not a liberal one. The number should be 100%.
 
Study after study refutes liberal bias in the media and pins bias directly on the corporations who aren't all that liberal.

 
Tim, do you believe that it's possible for a person to screen out all of their biases while doing a job like reporting?

Do you believe that it's typically done by those people?

What's the number one reason that is cited by reporters as to why they get into that profession?

 
Fox News's conservative bias far exceeds the cumulation of all the liberal bias. There's no one even remotely closely to the likes of Hannity and Beck. Even the so called moderate on Fox news, O'reilley, is worse then anyone I've seen on the other cable news stations.
Olbermann, O'Donnell, Maddow, Schultz are all tilted more than O'reiily and I would say a couple of those on are the Hannity level if not worse. Several reports have shown that FoxNews is far more likely to include the opposing side on their shows and coverage than MSNBC.
 
Study after study refutes liberal bias in the media and pins bias directly on the corporations who aren't all that liberal.
They certainly proved what they set out to prove, but I would hardly classify those as 'studies'. You would have an easier time convincing me the sky is purple. Sure there might be rare times when the sunset where there are different colors in the sky, but my eyes see blue skies enough to know what color the sky usually is.
 
Those of you who are voting that it "heavily slants" the news, can you give some examples?
Suppressing the news of the rape of Juanita Broderick by Bill Clinton is a glaring example. You think the LSM would have given W the same cover under similar circumstances? How about Rather risking his career and losing on the W reserve story? There are countless others, but these really put emphasis on the point.
 
Fox News's conservative bias far exceeds the cumulation of all the liberal bias. There's no one even remotely closely to the likes of Hannity and Beck.
You do realize that Beck and Hannity are not news shows and do not claim to be, right? No question Fox has a liberal bias, but to think that their news is any more slanted to their political philosophy than the liberal gaggle is silly.
 
There are numerous issues and topics where there is an undeniable bias. Here are a few biases I see in the media.1. Global Warming. Perhaps the most biasedly reported topic of all. I believe at one point 97% of stories on the issue would put the pro-global warming side of the issue without giving any counter-viewpoint, even when they were reporting some extreme fear-mongering spin that had little scientific support.
This issue was what I had in mind when I said the truth has a liberal bias. If 97% of stories assume that there's human-caused global warming, that's evidence of a conservative bias, not a liberal one. The number should be 100%.
Much of the reporting around global warming includes a lot of fear-mongering which has no consesus. And there are many legitimate concerns with the computer models whose results get reported as fact when in fact the science is still in the clueless stage when it comes to modelling our climate. The email scandal a year or so ago gave us a good glimpes into exactly how agenda driven a lot of the top scientistics in the field are and how loose they are with the data. The science behind gloabal warming is overstated and skeptism is rightfully growing.
 
The mainstream media has a money bias. If it makes money, they like it.
If that were true, they'd report the news without a slant. The liberal facets of the news media, and most especially the newspapers, are losing their followers. People have caught on and simply don't trust them any longer and won't invest in them.
 
Those of you who are voting that it "heavily slants" the news, can you give some examples?
Suppressing the news of the rape of Juanita Broderick by Bill Clinton is a glaring example. You think the LSM would have given W the same cover under similar circumstances? How about Rather risking his career and losing on the W reserve story? There are countless others, but these really put emphasis on the point.
Wiki:
In March 1999, a few months after the allegations publicly aired, 56% of Americans believed the allegations were false, while a third believed that Broaddrick's allegation of rape was at least possibly true. Similarly, 29% of the public felt the press should continue to cover the story, while 66% felt that the media should stop pursuing the story.[8]

According to Jack Nelson, Washington bureau chief of the Los Angeles Times, many journalists were skeptical: "This is a story that's been knocked down and discredited so many times, I was shocked to see it in the [Wall Street] Journal today.... [E]veryone's taken a slice of it, and after looking at it, everyone's knocked it down. The woman has changed her story about whether it happened. It just wasn't credible."[9] Joe Conason and Gene Lyons' book The Hunting of the President argued that Broaddrick's claim is not credible and contains numerous inconsistencies.
So 2/3 of the public thought the media should stop pursuing the story, yet the MSM is biased for not pursuing the story?
 
The mainstream media has a money bias. If it makes money, they like it.
If that were true, they'd report the news without a slant. The liberal facets of the news media, and most especially the newspapers, are losing their followers. People have caught on and simply don't trust them any longer and won't invest in them.
Are they reporting the Weiner story with a slant?If so, please list some examples.
 
The mainstream media has a money bias. If it makes money, they like it.
If that were true, they'd report the news without a slant. The liberal facets of the news media, and most especially the newspapers, are losing their followers. People have caught on and simply don't trust them any longer and won't invest in them.
Are they reporting the Weiner story with a slant?If so, please list some examples.
No, they've been hard hitting and quite upright on that one.
 
I think all news outlets tailor a presentation that jibes with the opinions of their viewers. The MSM usually presents an hour of fluff bolstered by news pieces that more or less reflect the opinions of Americans (pro-global warming because the majority of Americans believe in it, pro-abortion because the majority of Americans believe in it, pro- gay rights because the majority of Americans believe in Civil Rights). They give the majority of Americans what they want.

 
Are they reporting the Weiner story with a slant?If so, please list some examples.
Weren't they the ones who faithfully reported Weiner's lies about being hacked without any corroboration or investigation? A lot of blame was aimed at the messenger until the lies became unsupportable. When the elephant in the room is that large, even the LSM can't make it invisible.
 
I really hate these questions - because they assume something that has never been the case - that we've had an unbiased totally neutral media establishment in this country free of (for a lack of a better phrase) outside influence. In fact, the opposite is true.

At the founding of the nation the "media" was mainly newspapers and pamphletes and political writings that would be basically paperback books these days. And mixed in with that was town square speeches and public discussions. They were extremely "biased." Thomas Jefferson funded a newspaper whose sole reason for existing was to attack Federalists. That basic structure didn't change until radio became a news outlet. At that point, the written word media was still just as biased whether it be politically or economically (whatever made them money). Radio was singularly built on advertising revenue - raising the spectre of bias in all of their reporting as well.

Once television became a source of information in the media, the same thing happened. Corporate sponsors dictated terms. And those terms were based on the political realities of the day. All you need to see to understand that was the red scare media results of the middle of the last century. Other television shows themselves (which would dabble in news in some respects) would have sponsors tell them how to talk and what not to talk about.

Until the "new media" of internet took over, there never was a mythical unbiased media in this country. The true head int he clouds people in all these discussions are the ones that actually think the meida is a 4th wing of government totally beholden only to the truth, justice and the American way (the good one we idolize, not the real one of money and power).

In between the TV/Radio/Newspaper & magazine media talk radio took off. Talk radio has a huge conservative bias, as well as a bias towards, again, the corporate sponsors and people who, in the end, write the checks. Pamphelteers have gone by the wayside replaced more often than not with opinion talk radio and editorial columns of newspapers. The cry that the editorial page is different from the news page is and always has been laughable, but for some reason people still hold onto that ideal.

But what we have now is much more akin to our founding than at any other teim since the actuall founding. Internet media is the new pamphleteer and public speaker. Print media is largly dead. TV and radio continue plugging along but they will be dead soon too as more and more people look to alternate sources for information. But in the end there is and always has been a bias in the mdeia in all its forms. Pamphletes, speeches, radion, TV, talk radio, internet - all biased in some respects - all designed at the most basic level to make money.

Instead of worrying what the current bias is in whatever sector of the media you want to define, it's better to accept that we've always had it and instead of decrying it, simply look to more than one source of your information if you feel you aren't getting the whole story. As for those people that stick to one source - they are, in every definitiion of the word, typical Americans. Unlike previous moments in our history where you didn't have the opportunity to fact check Thomas Jefferson's newspaper or maybe even Rush Limbaugh's rantings - now you can pretty much find and read or see anything. Just accept that the talker writer or sponsor is either a liberal, conservative, marxist, socialist, christian, jew, rich greedy bastige, revolutionary, curmudgeon, or self important narcissistic windbag. You'll sleep better.

 
The mainstream media has a money bias. If it makes money, they like it.
If that were true, they'd report the news without a slant. The liberal facets of the news media, and most especially the newspapers, are losing their followers. People have caught on and simply don't trust them any longer and won't invest in them.
That doesn't make much sense. Didn't FOX and Conservative radio, become successful and make money because they perceived a liberal bias in news reporting and decided to create a product that promoted a conservative bias? By your rationale...they should have just tried to be the MSM.
 

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