Public sees media as biased, inaccurate, and uncaring.
By on Aug 13th, 2007 at 12:16 pm
Public sees media as biased, inaccurate, and uncaring.
A poll conducted by the Pew Research Center showed that more than half of Americans say U.S. news organizations are politically biased, inaccurate, and don’t care about the people they report on. “More than two-thirds of the Web users said they felt that news organizations don’t care about the people they report on; 59 percent said their reporting was inaccurate; and 64 percent they were politically biased.”
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A lot of it is propaganda.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:20 pmAnd this is shocking why???
August 13th, 2007 at 12:21 pmAnd that’s why we should re-enact the fairness doctrine.
(Sorry for chumming the waters, and then leaving)
August 13th, 2007 at 12:21 pmI am disappointed by the lack of detail in this story. I want to know the breakdown of people who believe the media is liberal vs. conservative in its bias. A poll taken about a year ago showed that most Democrats and many independents believe that the media does not have a liberal bias, but is either neutral or has a conservative bias. Of course Republicans thought just the opposite, but what really matters here are independent voters.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:21 pmWe’re not all like that.
Most of us care deeply about the news we are reporting, the problems we highlight, and the ideal of telling the truth. We honestly believe in the idea that a problem is a problem whether it is highlighted or not, but that if it is ignored it will only get worse.
The trouble is, that the reporter in the newsroom doesn’t make company policy. The owners of the newsroom do.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:25 pmImagine that…..
August 13th, 2007 at 12:26 pmI want dispassionate news reporting. I don’t want my news provider to care about me – I want them to inform me. Caring implies a bias.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:31 pmYou see, facts don’t have a “liberal bias” after all. It’s all just glorified propaganda coming from these loons.
The American public has spoken.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:34 pmFacts tend to have a conservative bias, lefties. Quit your whining.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:35 pmThis is yet another sign that Big Media is gouging the American news consumer.
If you elect me, I will take the excess profits of Big Media and spread them around fairly to the American people. This abuse has to stop.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:37 pm“More than two-thirds of the Web users said they felt that news organizations don’t care about the people they report on; 59 percent said their reporting was inaccurate; and 64 percent they were politically biased.â€
This is what happens when you have a corporate-controlled millionaire press corp and punditocracy speaking to a middle-class democracy.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:37 pmCT: “Facts tend to have a conservative bias, lefties. Quit your whining.” – - Obviously not a proponent of the Colbert Doctrine.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:37 pmHelen Thomas has no bias, I call bullshat.
Even though she is kept alive by an embalming fluid I.V., that chick can still bring the hard-hitting stateme…er…questions.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:40 pmIt’s just another failure of capitalism.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:40 pmI am disappointed by the lack of detail in this story. I want to know the breakdown of people who believe the media is liberal vs. conservative in its bias.
Comment by VerbalKint — August 13, 2007 @ 12:21 pm
Go read the full study, then – Pew always posts the complete results on their web site:
August 13th, 2007 at 12:40 pmhttp://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=348
are you sure this wasnt the response to fox news?????/
August 13th, 2007 at 12:41 pmFunny how it’s not mentioned that FOX is likely the “news” organization whose statistics are in all probability most responsible for these numbers.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:43 pmThis is what happens when you have a corporate-controlled millionaire press corp and punditocracy speaking to a middle-class democracy.
Comment by Ret. Col. Jack Ripper
And with voter apathy at an all time high, we allow this to happen.
Corporate interests run this country, since they have a bigger impact on politics. And because the majority of us don’t vote, we don’t matter to them.
The public gets what they deserve, not what they demand.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:46 pmare you sure this wasnt the response to fox news?????/
Comment by jacqueline — August 13, 2007 @ 12:41 pm
The numbers are very interesting. 79% of CNN viewers have a favorable opinion of Fox. Only 55% of Fox viewers have a favorable opinion of CNN. But 30% of Americans who get their news from newspapers or the Internet have an unfavorable view of both networks.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:49 pmFunny how it’s not mentioned that FOX is likely the “news†organization whose statistics are in all probability most responsible for these numbers
Yeah, that FOX smear channel. Hundreds if not thousands of media outlets and somehow FOX manages to steal the show every single day.
Fox…FOx…FOX…FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOXXX!
RUN!
August 13th, 2007 at 12:49 pmComment by Bruce Gorton — August 13, 2007 @ 12:25 pm
I have no doubt that there are some reporters and other journalists who care very much about what they do and see the people they write about as people (there are also some who don’t care about people as much as they care about getting recognition and advancement — but you will find these jerks anywhere). I believe some of that connection to the humanity of the world gets lost the higher one goes up the decision-making ladder — as happens in so many industries.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:52 pmWe need to try and find guilty all employees of Fox, then execute them.
Afterwards their facilities will be burned down, the rubble thrown into shredders and the ground sown with salt.
Lets get back to the old days when we had one or two papers and three radio stations; its just too complicated these days hearing alternate opinions.
August 13th, 2007 at 12:54 pmTHANK YOU TP, FOR FUKKING UP A THREE PARAGRAPH, WELL THOUGHT OUT POST. YOU GUYS ROCK.
*SARCARM SETTING TURNED TO HIGH*
August 13th, 2007 at 12:57 pmmissmolly
The absolute worst reporters are those reporters who forget why we tell the story, it is to supply the facts so that society as a whole can make informed decisions. The Press’ core function, is not to make decisions but to record them, and their consequences.
But, because the rightwing believes that to be a liberal bias, the fact that we care about the truth, means that they think they have a license to lie and, when they caught out on their lies, blame the “Liberal media.”
Think about it; they call education liberal because historically, most conservatives come out very badly. They call the courts liberal, because hate crimes are punished by those courts. They call the media liberal, because the media highlights their current deficiencies.
They hate fairness because what is fair, is not pro the rightwing.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:07 pmComment by CT_Version 3 — August 13, 2007 @ 12:57 pm
You’re absolutely hopeless chum!
I’d like to give you some advice as how to avoid such a ‘calamity’, but I prefer you to rot from the inside.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:08 pmI want dispassionate news reporting. I don’t want my news provider to care about me – I want them to inform me. Caring implies a bias.
Comment by Badmoodman — August 13, 2007 @ 12:31 pm
This is it — EXACTLY.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:16 pmBadmoodman
Being dispassionate doesn’t mean you don’t care. It means you care enough to tell the truth in its full light.
A good reporter must care, must be passionate, in order to seek the truth and to uncover the lies that people will say to make themselves look good.
A lack of bias is not symptomatic of apathy, apathy is what allows people to lie to their readers, viewers, listeners, however you get your news to lie to you.
A lack of bias comes from a conscious and very deliberate decision to tell the truth and not let your emotions get in the way of the story.
Caring about the truth, about the story, about the people in it, is what fuels the need to tell the truth, because somebody who doesn’t care about Bush’s wiretaps, is somebody who won’t write about them.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:25 pmYes the American public knows that the Liberal Media is all of these things.
You are pathetic, libs.
Comment by Master P — August 13, 2007 @ 1:20 pm
The “Liberal Media” is nothing more than a conservative catchphrase used to justify the fact that their right-wing ideology does not represent the majority of Americans.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:25 pmtoasterhead
Well, that and a few other things, like the fact that Conservative policies don’t work.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:29 pmMaster P: “Yes the American public knows that the Liberal Media is all of these things.
You are pathetic, libs.”
Would that be the same “liberal media” that invented 5 or 6 phony “gates” during the 90’s, and cheerleaded the invasion of Iraq a few years ago? Is it the same “liberal media” which has ruined the careers of those who questioned the invasion of Iraq? And, please explain to us how a bunch of conservative multi-national corporate boards would allow their valuable news organizations to be “liberal.”
August 13th, 2007 at 1:36 pmAnd, please explain to us how a bunch of conservative multi-national corporate boards would allow their valuable news organizations to be “liberal.â€
Comment by Ret. Col. Jack Ripper — August 13, 2007 @ 1:36 pm
Bingo!
A medium is only as liberal as the corporatocracy that controls it.
August 13th, 2007 at 1:38 pmYou see, facts don’t have a “liberal bias†after all. It’s all just glorified propaganda coming from these loons.
The American public has spoken.
Comment by CT_Version 2 — August 13, 2007 @ 12:34 pm
Facts lean left, moron. That’s why the American public is wisely abandoning the rightard maninstream news corporations.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:00 pmComment by ronjazz — August 13, 2007 @ 2:00 pm
In your mind.
“rightard”: invalid
August 13th, 2007 at 2:03 pm“Facts lean left, moron.”
According to what metric, to what ruler?
August 13th, 2007 at 2:04 pm“Facts lean left, moron.â€
According to what metric, to what ruler?
Comment by Typical Lefty — August 13, 2007 @ 2:04 pm
According to the facts. Why are wingnuts so willfully ignorant? I guess being at the bottom of the gene pool will do that. You all seem to forget how utterly and completely wrong you’ve been about virtually everything for the past 7 years. Your pride in your ignorance and arrogance marks you all as far less evolved than liberals. You clowns still use the same methodology of beating each other up and murdering each other that cavemen used 50,000 years ago.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:13 pmYesterday on Headline news I watched some guy saying how Cindy Sheehan “is out of touch with America, waaay to the faarrr radical left” & I thought huh, most Americans now agree with her & want out of Bush’s mess in Iraq-but not according to this guy. I changed the channel. The tv news tells you how to see the world, they don’t lay out the facts in any context anymore & it disgusts me; plus if it’s an important enough story-tell me now, don’t say, ‘tonight at eleven’. I don’t feel like waiting on their time anymore, not with their lousy track record.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:15 pmCindy Sheehan has more courage and patriotism than the whole Bush madministration combined. She made them look like cowards; that’s why the right-leaning corporate media has tried (unsuccessfully) to marginalize and trash her. A Gold Star mother fully deserves a real voice in this discussion, unlike the Deserter-In-Chief.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:17 pmTypical Lefty
From the metric of conservatives accusing every known source of information of having a liberal bias. The media is liberal, the schools are liberal, the judiciary is liberal, scientists are liberal etc, etc, etc.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:22 pmFrom the metric of conservatives accusing every known source of information of having a liberal bias. The media is liberal, the schools are liberal, the judiciary is liberal, scientists are liberal etc, etc, etc.
Comment by Bruce Gorton — August 13, 2007 @ 2:22 pm
“Fair and Balanced” means giving equal time to anti-science wingnuts who represent tiny fringe groups. I think the “liberal media” has been far too generous in giving the climate deniers and creationists a platform.
August 13th, 2007 at 2:34 pmA MUST watch speech from an episode of Democracy Now! to understand how deep and pervasive propaganda is in this country; Freedom Next Time: Filmmaker & Journalist John Pilger on Propaganda, the Press, Censorship and Resisting the American Empire
August 13th, 2007 at 2:48 pm