Is bias in the media an issue?

[Seikend]

Bias in the US media undeniably exists. Fox News is often accused of a heavy conservative bias, and the NY times is a fairly liberal publication. This is seen as a negative thing that needs to be controlled. There are organisations in place such as "Media Lens", "MRC" and "Media Matters for America" that attempt to monitor for media bias.

The question I propose today is:

Is bias in the media an issue?

Note: I will be addressing media bias in America.

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I personally believe that bias in the media isn't an issue.


The main argument that I seem to find for why media bias is an issue is that it informs our political decisions.


My first point to make is that people are not limited in their choice of media outlets. 77% of Americans have an internet connection (Citation), with a vast number of different media outlets available. Newspapers are sold in every city and according to Wikipedia, American TV has 45 different 24-hour television channels (Citation).

Within this wide selection of media outlets there is a wide variety of bias available. The very fact that there are at least two distinct and significant organisations that monitor conservative media bias, and at least two others that monitor liberal media bias is a testament to this.

What I propose is that people have a free choice in terms of what media bias they listen to. People already have political beliefs and if a media outlet does not correspond to their beliefs it will be seen as wrong to them. Therefore people will look for an outlet they are agree enough with. It is not the media bias that informs our political decisions, but our political decisions that inform our media bias.

 

[ballin4life]

The main issue with media bias is not one of conservative vs liberal, because most everyone knows that Fox News leans conservative and CNN/MSNBC lean liberal, for example. So the slant that a given media outlet gives a story will usually be taken into account. It's also pretty difficult to be completely objective.

The main issue is what gets reported. That's the power of the mainstream media - if they decide something is important, it gets brought up on the national stage and becomes an issue. If they decide something is unimportant, it is relegated to internet blogs and other lower profile outlets.

 

[Photos]

yes, bias in the media is an issue because the public's information, which the public takes as what is true, is now skewed, thereby skewing their perception. this makes it harder for people to get an unskewed picture as all accounts are skewed, and must be pieced together for the truth. this results in people not caring and living with skewed views.

 

[Seikend]

The main issue is what gets reported. That's the power of the mainstream media - if they decide something is important, it gets brought up on the national stage and becomes an issue. If they decide something is unimportant, it is relegated to internet blogs and other lower profile outlets.

Surely this is self-correcting? A media outlet wants to get the greatest coverage it can. Therefore it will report news that would be demanded by their respective set of listeners.

If a piece of information isn't demanded but it is important, surely it belongs to PSAs?

 

[ballin4life]

Yes I agree that in the long run the media will attempt to report the things that get the most viewers to tune in.

 

[Violence]

I believe that it is at least very difficult to report unbiased news. I agree that people choose what they would like to watch and thus support media bias, but at the same time, there's another factor that I think is quite important.

I feel that political satire is a very powerful tool whenever the news tends to get to an extreme in either direction. In my opinion, it helps to keep things more moderate by exposing fallacies and absurdities on both sides, which is what makes it more popular regardless of political stance.

I think that without the existence of political satire, we would see even more bias in the media, and it maybe get out of hand.

 

[Seikend]

yes, bias in the media is an issue because the public's information, which the public takes as what is true, is now skewed, thereby skewing their perception. this makes it harder for people to get an unskewed picture as all accounts are skewed, and must be pieced together for the truth. this results in people not caring and living with skewed views.

To begin with, my response to causing people to have skewed views is in the OP.

What I propose is that people have a free choice in terms of what media bias they listen to. People already have political beliefs and if a media outlet does not correspond to their beliefs it will be seen as wrong to them. Therefore people will look for an outlet they are agree enough with. It is not the media bias that informs our political decisions, but our political decisions that inform our media bias.

Secondly, by allowing media bias does not mean that every outlet will be heavily skewed. I will be honest, I don't know American Media very well, and so I don't know if there is one outlet which is considered mostly balanced.

As started by ballin, it's difficult to be perfectly balanced, but consider this. If there exists demand for a balanced account for events, then surely a media outlet which provides this will thrive and will do well? So if America has balanced outlets, then the public have that option. If America doesn't have any balanced outlets, then surely there is none to little demand for a balanced account

And this doesn't even take the internet into consideration, where if there is an interest for something, it WILL be created.

 

[Dre89]

Are you guys considering magazines as media too?

Because magazines portraying models as stupidly thin is ahving a negative effect on young girls.

Or is that a different issue? (Genuine quetsion, I'm not being sarcastic).

 

[Seikend]

Are you guys considering magazines as media too?

Because magazines portraying models as stupidly thin is ahving a negative effect on young girls.

Or is that a different issue? (Genuine quetsion, I'm not being sarcastic).

Well, my initial focus was on political bias. However, I'm very happy to open it up to media bias in general, especially if it'll cause more conversation.

If we open it up though, I'll have to spend a while to think about my stance and such.

 

[Makaveli X]

The problem with having a bias in media (specifically news) is it creates this polarization between the Democrats and Republicans. Republicans follow Fox News and Democrats follow MSNBC. If they watch news channels that confirm everything they believe and then watch the "other" channel, eventually this "us vs they" theme begins to set in.

We've clearly seen how polarized Washington has become. Of course, for there to be NO bias whatsoever is impossible. Complete objectivity is perfection; nevertheless, the aim of news should be to report information as objective as possible.

The advent of cable television (news) has lead to polarization between parties, and it will continue do so.

 

[ballin4life]

It's a good thing for Washington to be polarized.

That way they pass fewer laws that will mess up the country even more.

 

[rvkevin]

Republicans follow Fox News and Democrats follow MSNBC.

Fox news isn't news. News is supposed to inform viewers, not increase the number of false views they hold.

 

[A Pimp Named Slickback]

Have you guys heard how the Republican senate plans to fillibuster any new laws until the Bush Tax Cuts are extended?

good god

This senator's speech to the President is very informative as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tq1zpHF0J04&feature=player_embedded

 

[ballin4life]

The problem isn't the greed of the rich.

It's the greed of the politically connected.

The two groups happen to have a lot of overlap.

Also that senator's speech has some really stupid parts, i.e. who is winning in the economy and who is losing? The economy is NOT A ZERO SUM GAME.

 

[Makaveli X]

It's a good thing for Washington to be polarized.

That way they pass fewer laws that will mess up the country even more.

I just want to clarify, do you believe in limited government?

 

[ballin4life]

I just want to clarify, do you believe in limited government?

Compared to what?

My personal opinion is

anarchism > minarchism > "limited government" > "unlimited government"

My previous statement though was more of a jab at the things that Washington has done recently when there wasn't as much partisan conflict (war in iraq/afghanistan, TARP, stimulus bill, etc).

 

[Ballistics]

TV news runs on ratings, and funding from large corporations, so of course they are going to be biased, if you want unbiased news, listen to NPR, the source of their funding is donations.

 

[Landry]

I think the real problem to address is not whether or not the media is biased, that seems pretty self evident in the nature of media, but how we as Americans handle the media. The problem is that most of us just aren't astute enough as critical thinkers to see through some of the crap the media shovels our way. Most major media outlets, both liberal and conservative, seem to think that by telling a lie or half truth enough times will eventually make people believe it, and you know what, it works. We seem to be unable to discern the difference between news reporting (which exists almost exclusively in news print and on NPR these days) which reports only the facts and opinion stations. Every media outlet from Fox News to CNN report stories by interjecting their own opinions into the pieces, jading their report. Unfortunately most people seem to take these opinions as news and immediately accept them as factual. We aren't a country of critical thinkers, and that's why biased media seems to have been so effective over the last decade.

 

[Kanelol]

Bias in media is indubitably an issue. What lies before us and behind us are small matters compared to what lies right to our faces.

Look at it like this. The media in general, be it any form of news, radio, television, magazines, newspaper, etc. is tasked with the responsibility of updating the populace at large on literally everything they need to know in both world events and social life.

Given the fact that all media sources are run by human beings, regardless of how hard they strive to be objective in their reporting, (and most of them don't even give us that courtesy, they just blatantly spout their opinions as fact) they're still human beings, subconsciously looking for a way to support their own opinions.

There is bias in media, that's not even a question. Now, the real problem becomes how the average person deals with it. In a perfect world, everyone would be able to analyze a situation from multiple sources of information and points of view, and come to a somewhat logical conclusion regarding what actually happened and how they should feel about it.

Alas, this is not the case. People are brutally conditioned (if I were slightly more pessimistic I would use the term "brainwashed") by whichever media source they choose to embrace. How they come to this decision is a long and unnecessarily complicated, but suffice it to say that the choice is essentially made for them by their living conditions. Their parents, their peers, their geographical locations, etc. All of these things contribute to someone unconsciously embracing a certain media source, as they choose one that will appease their ingrained political and social views.

There's really no easy solution. We can hope that at some point the general intelligence rises to the point where people see they're being deceived, but that's ridiculously optimistic.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

Are you guys considering magazines as media too?

Magazines always have serious bias, but that's because there are sub categories of magazines, such as video game magazines.

and even more sub-categories of that sub-category.
you got:
nintendo power
xbox magazine
playstation magazine

nintendo magazine will obviously disregard anything that isn't focused to their subject, which is perfectly fine, however..

some people will take this as ignorance or they are 'bias' to game reveiws.

there are all-around magazines, such as game informer, now:

nintendo power gives a wii game a 9.
gameinformer gave it a 7.

here comes the bias part.

a nintendo fanboy will probably be outraged by a 7, and claims that the magazine is bias.
a anti-nintendo person will claim how correct and honest the review is, and that the fanboy has his expectations too high.

this will cause an arugement.

nintendo fanboy will point out contradictions (they only talk about 'X' games, they only give 'X' games good reviews, they only cover 'X' games, etc.)

anti-nintendo fanboy will either state:
a. he's stupid
b. the wii sucks so it's games are never feautred or reveiwed well
c. both

it's usually both.

afterwards, the anti-nintendo fanboy will either state his favorite games, or games he should play.

nintendo fanboy will either call it:
a. unoriginal
b. not as innovative
c. grimdark crap

you get the point.

i don't like bias in magazines, or anything.
bias just causes people to get upset over such docile things like a game reveiw, you should see /v/ rage or spam 'umad' over game reviews, it's sickening.

i just used video game magazines as a point because i'm not savvy with politics.

i think the main thing is that everybody has an opnion and people these days are too ignorant to even care or to try to look at things their way.