Because, to first approximation, this is true. Every organization, every person has their own biases and agenda. I'm not sure why Americans believe that objectivity in news reporting is even possible. Other countries don't seem to have as much of an issue with this, since you typically have news sources that are either owned directly by the government or are published by political parties.
There's news podcast I listen to ("Raport about state of the world" - Polish only sadly), and host always tries to advocate for both sides when asking questions and often there are guests from the both sides, that present their point in calm, collected manner.
Then there's our state TV, which will tell you that EU is devil, opposition is devil, basically everyone is devil apart from ruling party, which is presented as (quote) "National Champions".
We must expect and educate next generation to expect truth-seeking in journalism, because otherwise we have no future.
I don't speak Polish so I may be making unwarranted assumptions here, but "showing both sides" isn't always so great either. It's better than the opinionated state news you describe, but "both sides" doing their little talk is the exact reason climate change deniers have so much fuel.
Sometimes, something just isn't true and the other side doesn't get equal attention to defend their points. You can calmy explain how lizard people inside hollow earth run Hollywood to turn our children into gay frogs, but these people shouldn't get any air time, not even to be made fun of.
Thing is the lizard-people theory is ridiculous at its face and it could be argued that giving someone like that airtime would harm the lizard-people conspiracy. It's the more mainstream (but still niche) beliefs that are vulnerable in this one-on-one environment, like a debate on man's effect on climate change. There's a pretty general consensus that we are contributing to the change of our planet's climate, but hosting a "both sides" debate on something like this makes it seem like it's an open question. And a motivated bad actor who wanted to shift the needle has many tools at their disposal that an honest person doesn't - lying, misleading, misrepresenting research, or simply pulling the "just asking questions, do your own research!" line.
Sorry to be clear we're both in agreement, I just could see a both-sides-er chiming in that actually a debate on lizard-people would be a bloodbath and therefore everything actually should be presented this way, and wanted to added another issue.
Additionally for another real-world example with more immediate consequences we can look at the whole "vaccines causing autism" issue - something that was completely fabricated by a now-disgraced ex-doctor called Andrew Wakefield, but which gained traction due to being presented to the public as if we just don't know for sure (when we did, and his "research" was utterly eviscerated). Wakefield was basically laughed out of the medical profession, but due to the legwork the media did he's managed to establish himself over in the USA and his work effectively kick-started the modern-day anti-vaxx movement.
> and it could be argued that giving someone like that airtime would harm the lizard-people conspiracy. It's the more mainstream (but still niche) be
Not necessarily. The thing about arguments is that it’s like businesses. What determines your success isn’t if you have the best product. It’s that you have the best business. Marketing , connections , etc. The best product , and likewise the best argument, doesn’t necessarily win on merit alone. You just have to make it look good enough for it to be viable , even if the idea isn’t viable at all.
I’m not saying that I could get on TV and argue about lizard-people. But there certainly is someone who could and that’s enough.
Yeah it's a good point, if you have someone totally inexperienced up against someone who knows the tricks (some of which I mentioned) you could see some odd results. I feel like there are a few issues which are gonna be a really tough sell, and the whole "the royal family are lizards" is one of them. David Icke has spent much of the last couple of decades on that and is still regarded as a kook.
That's right and you need some sort of boundary of what are you willing to discuss. Eg. for the guy I mentioned it's very clearly justifying Russian invasion, but then he's open about it.
Of course it sometimes creates other problems. In the end I think root problem is almost complete lack of responsibility for lying to wide public(not even legal responsibility, but just social). As climate change denier you're free to repeat the same disproven BS over and over, without no evidence and nothing happens.
Interpreting "objective" to mean "fairly representing both sides" is a large part of what got american media so fucked in the first place.
If one side says cook at home as much as possible for your family to be healthy, and the other side says go down to the ditch and drink the pond scum, what are you doing by representing both sides there? One of the important duties of journalism is making editorial decisions that drinking pond scum isn't a balanced opposition to cooking dinner.
Journalist practice for decades has been going incredibly far out of its way to find an alternative "side" for any perspective that's presented. They then do a lot of work for them making it seem as reasonable and mainstream as possible.
This is exactly how you get fringe reactionary political views elevated to the level of national concern.
I like google news because I can see both right and left takes on stories, and which stories are only covered by one side. It also has international coverage, which is nice for instance where Israeli media had by far the most accurate reporting on the nature of Covid-19.
I use media to find out what America believes, and where it is headed. Your list of sources is going to leave you surprised fairly often. My goal is to not be surprised.
Beware "people on the ground". They are a terrible source of fact checked verifiable info.
Personal opinion is not news. It's merely one person's unfiltered view of the world. And because it's uncurated by a trustworthy filter, it's impossible to know whether it's worth your attention, much less serious consideration.
The same strategy holds: one never looks at a single data point as "truth".
Once again, even in a Reddit thread, the goal is to triangulate. This may include, for example, seeking out info in other sub-Reddits (moderator bias), seeking more niche sub-Reddits, etc.
Where two liars are speaking, you cannot split the difference and synthesize truth. I also like to check with various sources with differing agendas. However, I view this as a way to stay abreast of the the various agendas.
This is still very much an issue in many countries with government owned "nonprofit" media. Even in countries with low amount of corruption and high freedom of press.
>> Every organization, every person has their own biases and agenda
Yes, but not really the issue... thats why there is an editing process. If an org has a proper editing process then a lot of that gets accounted for.
Most of the skewed stories come from organizations that don't employ trained editors, don't have a clear editorial workflow, don't have a corrections policy, and don't have fact-checkers.
I would argue that medium to large orgs like CNN, NYTimes, Washington Post, Bloomberg, WSJ, FT, Guardian, USA Today, Texas Tribune, LA Times, SF Chronicle, New Yorker, Vox, NPR, Houston Chronicle all have these processes in play and are reliable.
(Yes, there are always stories with issues that get though out of thousands and thousands of otherwise solidly reported pieces. No system is perfect.)
> Yes, but not really the issue... thats why there is an editing process. If an org has a proper editing process then a lot of that gets accounted for.
Because... Editors couldn't possibly have motives that similarly contain bias, corruption, out other such common frailties of the human condition?
My point is that you do not know how the editorial workflow works. You may not even be aware there is one. There is. It usually accounts for a lot of this. Not perfect, most systems are not - but it goes a long way to providing better reporting.
Think of it from a coding point of view.
Many people think that some developers write code directly on production, to their personal style, and thats it. That certainly happens.
Other teams have coding standards, style standards. Tabs versus Spaces. CamelCase for Class names but something different for variables?
The commit their code, and do a pull request and someone else reviews it. Edits are proposed or demanded. Code is reviewed again, then maybe it goes to production. Its been known for production code to have issues, but generally after going through a process most are prevented then if the developer was able to merge in code without review.
The larger orgs I mentioned have a involved editorial process for editing stories.
> My point is that you do not know how the editorial workflow works.
I think you have it the other way around. The bias is institutionalized so deeply that the process makes it essentially impossible to get a non curated with bias point of view out of the organization.
Look at how tightly political leanings are tied to news outlets.
If it were as easy and objective as you say we would get a lot more random pieces out of outlets instead of the rather rigid ideological publications we see in existence today.
Even Reddit subs and hacker news, which are much more random than news outlets, have pretty clear political leanings. With sufficient samples you can even break down the subgroups within the community.
News orgs don't have nearly the internal diversity required to possibly remove such bias. They are homogenous.
>> I think you have it the other way around. The bias is institutionalized so deeply that the process makes it essentially impossible to get a non curated with bias point of view out of the organization.
That appears to be your opinion, likely that of many here. However thats not how it works.
I have worked in media for 20 years and have had the opportunity to see how many editors, newsrooms, and publications in general work. I have sat in editorial meetings where coverage and stories are discussed. I have been present when editors and writers go back and fourth on stories.
The problem is that for any given news org, you and most people do not know what it takes to publish a story at some of these places. Thats NOT a criticism of you - I think we'd all be better off if folks knew how it worked.
So, does the representation of said news room consist of a group that votes in line with the same distribution as the general population or does it lean significantly to a single side?
Money is on, it was homogeneous. Which means, You can't even see your own biases as other points of view were culled in creating and nurturing the org structure.
> Its been known for production code to have issues, but generally after going through a process most are prevented then if the developer was able to merge in code without review
One more point.
Companies never ever have evil anti user dark patterns enter production because of code reviews, do they?
These kind of broad questions about "the media" seem to be almost useless. It's like asking a Philadelphia Eagles fans if they have a positive opinion of most football teams.
I personally am quite certain that some news orgs are deliberately misleading and pushing agendas. Some are doing absolutely heroic work investigating and reporting. And there's a huge spectrum in between. Are "most" being dishonest? Idk how to even measure what "most" means.
Just because it's impossible to be 100% objective all the time doesn't mean it's impossible to be somewhat objective with the goal of being as objective as possible. The alternative is just go full ideological, and then you no longer care about the truth, only pushing a narrative to confirm the biases of your paying customers. Or sensationalist just to drive clicks and views.
Nobody believes in perfectly objectively reporting.
This is more about the rising belief that there is a massive conspiracy by them (the liberals, the Jews, the military industrial complex, the star chamber, take your pick) to systematically distort news in a coordinated way so as to realize their plans for world domination / genocide / fascism / destroying the family (circle one).
I don't think those conspiracies are what are driving this kind of distrust. In my experience, the most common belief on that end is simply that the reporting is meant to keep people too busy bickering over meaningless issues (in the sense that the bickering itself won't accomplish anything of substance) to prevent them from actually organizing and acting against real problems which would be inconvenient for those who benefit from those problems.
Eg keeping people bickering about racial issues instead of agreeing on the aspects of policing which need reform, or from focusing on class issues.
The tens of thousands of reporters, mostly young liberal arts majors?
It’s the “meant to” that makes it a conspiracy theory. Tell me that news is unhealthy, or that each individual actor has self interest in promoting some agenda, and I think it’s an interesting topic.
But as soon as there is a person or group out there secretly “meaning for” some result from the actions of tens of thousands of people, that’s by definition a conspiracy.
I think it’s just human nature. We are wired to believe that “there must be some explanation”, and it’s easy to lean into a sentient God or an evil cabal.
IMO the truth, that it’s a runaway uncoordinated emergent behavior with thousands of actors pushing and pulling in different directions for their own reasons, is a lot scarier.
'meant to' by incentive structures and culture in how these companies work, which are set by the 'higher ups' who benefit most from them. For example, a popular anchor (say, Tucker Carlson or Rachel Maddow) will naturally also be popular and influential within their associated organization. They benefit from pushing a certain perspective, and so they will of course influence the organization to further move in that direction.
While there isn't some hidden moustache twirling mastermind carefully directing all of the media about what to report and how to report it. Practically, I don't think the distinction matters too much because they all share the same incentives and they are individually deliberate in applying those same incentives.
As a broad example, Tucker and Rachel both benefit from appealing to their respective base's political views. They also benefit greatly from the bickering between their bases, thus it suits them to further push that divide (if they actually get issues addressed they have to constantly figure out what people want next to stay relevant). Similar incentives apply to politicians, so they do the same. Both Tucker and Rachel also benefit from being close with the associated politicians, so they tow that line too. The result being that they act in concert without explicitly conspiring with each other to do so.
> But as soon as there is a person or group out there secretly “meaning for” some result from the actions of tens of thousands of people, that’s by definition a conspiracy.
There are many interest groups pushing to influence mass behavior in many kinds of ways. Some do so transparently, others less so.
We've overloaded "conspiracy" to mean at least two different things: the traditional definition of secret plotting to do bad things and a more modern derogatory connotation involving far-fetched conspiracies like politicians being lizard people.
Something can be a conspiracy and also be true and it is reasonable to investigate the extent to which reporting is influenced by different interests.
The first approximation is: a typical journalist working at a serious news organization has some amount of bias but at the same time tries to be objective.
So it is approximately false, they don't deliberately mislead.
My threshold for "serious news organization" is that CNN gets there, Fox News doesn't.
I stopped reading CNN due to their terrible headlines, but I just went at the top headline is "Animals are reportedly dying after toxic train wreck. What it means". Well CNN has reporters, why is there hearsay in the title? Could you just look through some records or conduct a quick survey to figure out the truth of those reports.
I would point to the general way that in the USA the balance of rights is tipped away from people and towards corporations, e.g. very little sick pay, very little paid leave, very little parental leave, very few rights for employees, Healthcare provided at the whims of employers and insurance companies. etc
It's hard to take this comment at face value when the content on CNN and Fox News is so different. I wouldn't really argue against CNN being interested in maintaining the status quo, but Fox News is reactionary.
Fox news is reactionary against progressivism, leftism, etc... but the status quo in the US is pro military, pro oligarchy, pro gun, pro life, conservative, white and Christian. The "leftist" party in the US, the Democrats, can at best be described as center-right, there is no true left with any real political power.
The Democrats are pro-war, pro-capitalism, only nominally anti-gun, pander to the Christians as much as Republicans, and don't even side with labor anymore, as we saw with Biden crushing the railroad workers' strike, which was even supported by supposed progressive firebrand AOC.
> My threshold for "serious news organization" is that CNN gets there, Fox News doesn't.
I don't put those 2 channels in different categories at all. And certainly they don't divide from each other along lines of objectivity. They are both in the News Entertainment industry. Neither cares in the least about objectivity.
The only split I see between them is their mutually exclusive audiences.
Fox News is actually in a better place because they don't seem to be hiding the fact that they are there for entertainment and audience-building. They both care about their ratings first and foremost, but CNN is still trying to keep some veneer of serious journalism.
As a test: I haven't watched it recently, but how has CNN mea culpa'd over the news that the Hunter Biden laptop was real? A "serious news organization" should have had a real period of soul-searching over that. I bet it was barely a blip on their radar.
