The greenest and hirsutiest of all evergreen media hair-shirts is the perennial "Whither media bias?" column. Because these kids with their iPads and InstaGrams and 4,000 channels of teevee. Sure you can get Zane Grey Theater and Quincy, but WTF is Pawn Stars or Punchface or The Handjob Jeanette and Doctor Crank McZombie Mysteries of Space Hour? Oh for the days of Walter Cronkite, when chain-smoking men in suits would play it straight down the middle on one of The Free World's three network news channels.
And because of all these fresh horrors, TheMurricanPeople hate the media. Or something.
Fickle bunch, TheMurricanPeople.
At any given moment I can flick through those 4,000 channels and find ten different professional pundits with ten different and wildly conflicting, ex cathedra opinions about the true hopes and fears of TheMurricanPeople, but they all agree that their profession sucks and everyone hates them, which is why, with, every new phase of the moon, some newspaper somewhere rolls out another in-depth, soul-searching assay of their own navels.
Today, the short straw was drawn by the New York Times, which neatly divided the problem of media bias into three, equal parts --
The Young Black People view: The media routinely slants the news to slander and endanger black people.
Young Black People See the News Media’s Double Standard...This generation grew up seeing double standards. They saw a young black boy's photo captioned with "looting" in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when a white couple photographed in a similar circumstance wading in the water with bags of supplies described as searching for food. They see Amber Alerts go national with pictures and narratives about white children in peril, but rarely the same attention to deaths of black and Latina/o children. They see journalists asking, with a straight face, if #BlackLivesMatter is a hate group.
Given these patterns and incidents, why would young black people want to trust the mainstream news media with stories about their lives?
‘Trust’ in the News Media Has Come to Mean Affirmation
...But more important, the Internet has changed society's relationship with the news. For one thing, it’s enabled us to construct digital silos, battlements from which, like the French in Monty Python’s Holy Grail, we fire invective on the people below....But there is ample proof that the Internet has also really “leveled the playing field” between the most powerful and the least. Now the marginalized can speedily gather, demand recognition and challenge the prevailing narratives. This happens every day and it’s far better than the alternative....
And the Wingnut view: The terrible Librul Media Conspiracy is even more terrible and Librul than you imagined!
Liberal News Media Bias Has a Serious EffectTimothy P. Carney is the senior political columnist at The Washington Examiner, and a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.News media bias is real. It reduces the quality of journalism, and it fosters distrust among readers and viewers. This is bad for democracy.Many prevailing biases exist in the U.S. news media. All news outlets are biased toward an eye-catching narrative. The Washington news media is biased toward Washington-based solutions. And the political press in the U.S. has an overwhelming leftward tilt, mostly on social issues, but also on economic matters.Conservatives aren’t imagining this bias...
In order of appearance...
...I agree wholeheartedly with the Young Black People view. Period.
..it is adorable that NPR still clings for dear life to slivers of Both Siderist flotsam in a storm-tossed sea of wingnut crazy (although they get points for at least mentioning the existence of Fox News.)
...and I can only assume that the Times decided to hand over a chunk of its "Whither media bias?" real estate to an AEI shill who works for the Moonie Times because former NYT columnist Bill Kristol was too busy handing out the Bill Kristol's Daddy Award to the "preeminent leader of the free world" at the annual AEI Cult of Moloch Box Social to dash something off for publication.
But as always, what is most fascinating is who the Times did not invited to comment on why TheMurricanPeople hate the media.
They did not invite me, or anyone like me, to contribute a few, well-constructed paragraphs on the subject of how decades of continuous lying and conspiracy mongering by the Right and wingnut-enabling-by-denial by the Beltway press has destroyed any possibility of restoring trust in the media.
Exhibit A: Any media organization which continues to employ an overtly dishonest Conservative killbot like Mark Fucking Halperin has given up any pretense of having any institutional interest in the craft of honest journalism (h/t Crooks & Liars):
You can build an organization around groveling hacks like Halperin or around honest reporting, but you can't have both.
7 comments:
It's nice to see that Mark Halperin has the same kind of beady eyes as our old buddy, Tom DeLay. Why does this not surprise me?
Halprin is either delusional, or completely in the pocket of the right witng crazies. Neither one gives me any comfort in any accurate media reporting. Carson is nuts, PERIOD This disqualifys him from any office, regardless of his faith or good intentions.
So perhaps the next question to the star of the "news" show might have been,
Are you voting for Carson in the Primary?
Carson pleads what he doesn't know (once President) God will show him the way. As well, for what direction God does not provide, he will have ADVISORS.
In all of watching Carson, The Dr. has not displayed a single iota of accepting advice.
What good is the advice of a scientist to Carson when he is preordained to dismiss the godless academia he espouses disdain for.
Who will speak out and defend Carson if Halprin does not?
What was the medias written reports when the good Doctor went to the White House Prayer Breakfast as an unknown, and used the prayer breakfast platform to disobey the 9th commandment.
Not very hard to imagine the world of a Carson Presidency.
When the terrorists enter the Popeyes organization. As they approach Carson in line for their demands.
Carson will either say,
1) Hey everybody, if you all charge at the Iranians. They can't get us all.
2) I will just tell the demanding iranians to see the guy behind the counter because he has what you want.
Halprin, If Carson tell the truth. In your view, what candidates do not?
He has a lot of good traits we want in a candidate, like he's f-ing crazy!
"Conservatives aren’t imagining this bias..."
It is actually something much worse than just imagining. Like an addict 6 inches from rock bottom, they desperately need to BELIEVE there is bias in order to absolve themselves of the horrid consequences their lifetime of blind political support all based in fear, greed, and hatred.
Funny how the liberal press keeps forgetting to publish/say/advocate anything truly liberal. Sorta like how President Obama keeps forgetting to turn us into a socialist hellhole through fiat.
Navel-gazing? They are not mammals.
I heard an NPR political something or during a discussion of Donald Trump's impending appearance on SNL that, basically, because Trump has a following he deserves to be heard or something. A few days later another "political commentator" on NPR said that Republicans focused on issues in recent debate.
And, DG, I vote with you.
Post a Comment