Hi all, I am writing a class paper on the news media. Generally, I’m trying to understand if people value the media as an objective source of information.
If you have some time to answer a few questions, I would really appreciate any input anyone is willing to provide.
Here are the questions:
If you read or watch the news, do you consider yourself well-informed?
If a story presented in the news interests you, do you seek out information about it from other sources?
Has there ever been a case in which you had personal knowledge of a story presented in the news? If so, do you think the story was presented fairly and objectively?
You need multiple sources/outlets and a thorough understanding of the source/outlet to appreciate how un-objective it is.
You could even understand the outlet yet get a specific spin from a particular host.
Watch a conservative on liberal CNN and be confused, or watch liberal Alan Colmes on conservative Fox…and be confused. And this is just a simple/basic illustration.
Some liberal outlets whore themselves to the ratings by employing conservatives they actually loathe because conservatives actually get ratings.
Online versions of international news outlets and blogs. American media is mostly useless, often laced with outright propaganda. Comparing nearly any story from U.S. media with sources outside the country is downright embarassing, although it can often make for great fun.
I consider myself well informed of what the issues are, but not of the full facts. I assume I am getting the spin.
Yes. Anything too amazing I check snopes.com. Anything paranormal or suspicious - I do an internet search linking the key words with the word ‘skeptic’. I find a web search usually shows me how reliable the story is by comparing multiple sources.
Often. As an author, I am often rung for a comment on a topic in the newspapers or for current affairs media on topics relating to my books. Given that the quote is almost always a misquote, I have learnt to be very careful to give short sound bites which can’t be edited out of context. They usually quote reasonably accurately, but misinterpret or add a context which wasn’t there, which skews the meaning. This is not deliberate. Most journalists work to ridiculously short deadlines on topics they know nothing about. As my field is science, I can rely on the fact the journalist knows nothing about the topic.
As one of my topics is the paranormal. I know of many many cases where the journalist and/or film crew thought the claim (especially psychics) was total crap but ran with it anyway because it was a good story.
My next book is about spiders. The media here is responsible for the scare campaigns on the white-tailed spider for causing necrotic blisters which it doesn’t. In California, the brown recluse has got a similar bad reputatoin when the experts there say there are no brown recluses in California. Every topic I research leads me to examples of abysmal journalistic standards, and also to some very good ones.
TV & radio news (ABC Australia - non-commercial). Sometimes the major daily newspaper. Plus the Internet as my check.
Consider the phenomenon that most of the time the media seems pretty responsible except when the subject is your own field or something you are knowledgeable in. Consider that people knowledgeable in other subjects say the same thing. lynne-42 has given you her personal experience.
The media - all media, foreign, domestic, and commentaries on the media as well - are trying to sell you a story. They are not as objective as you may have thought or they want you to believe. They may omit or minimize things that detract from a story, especially for headlines.
The cicada emergence here in the Midwest is a case in point. Local media gave the impression they’d be emerging on a particular day. Some people were confused because they didn’t see any for at least a week after that. The media didn’t emphasize that they wouldn’t be emerging en masse on one day or that the distribution wouldn’t be uniform. I’d bet the experts they talked to made that clear.
Another recent case. Reuters headline - Bush job rating hits record low in NBC/WSJ poll. Later in the story they say that the Democratic-controlled Congress has even lower numbers. Funny how that wasn’t worth putting in the headline.
The top bloggers will usually point out the worst errors. Read both sides from the media, read the top bloggers from both sides.
I’m currently reading Anti-Americanism by the late Jean-François Revel. He wrote that with respect to foreign coverage of the US, it’s pretty much the reverse.