The news media and how they cover (or don't cover) News/Politics. Let's argue.

[Madam-Shogun-Assassin]

I feel like the news media is a big part of the public being ignorant about things. And frankly speaking, I think it's mostly intentional. I agree with Dana Milbank when he said...

“I don’t think anything in our training or experience as journalists prepared us for a moment in which one of the two major political parties is no longer cooperating with the democratic process."

I feel like before the Republicans became whatever they are now it was easy for the news media to just sell political horse races and "both side-isms". But now that Republicans went full blown fascists the news media is kinda forced to be real journalists now. But even still I see them kinda weaseling out of doing that.

For instance, Punchbowl News be like “I don’t think it’s incumbent on us to say, a person is a liar" If you are planning on reporting FACTS, that is indeed your job, it's probably your MAIN job ffs . If you wish to explain motivations for lying, well that's branching into opinion is it not? I mean the mental gymnastics of that statement.

I feel like people don't criticize the news media enough for the type of inviroment we're in. They're so concerned about looking partisan they forget to do their jobs.

[Tendrin]

https://twitter.com/magi_jay/status/1467890706211606534

Magdi is a good person to check out. Her media analysis game is pretty strong.

[JackDaw]

I feel like the news media is a big part of the public being ignorant about things. And frankly speaking, I think it's mostly intentional. I agree with Dana Milbank when he said...

“I don’t think anything in our training or experience as journalists prepared us for a moment in which one of the two major political parties is no longer cooperating with the democratic process."

If that’s true the training must be feeble beyond belief!

Think how tough it must be for journalists in countries where the state routinely uses its full power to intimidate the media…by any method needed, including imposing jail.

By comparison life for US journalists is cushty. And they should be doing everything they can to support democracy by exposing any politician that lies.

[Emperor-of-Dragons]

They also refuse to fact-check police reports, and instead report it as fact without scrutiny. That's definitely intentional too, since they're very cosy with police departments. Because for local reporters on the crime beat their law enforcement sources are their daily bread & butter. Regardless though, they have to treat them like any other source & actually fact check. But they rarely do, likely do to fear of losing access. There's also probably pressure from up top too.

[achilles]

They also refuse to fact-check police reports, and instead report it as fact without scrutiny. That's definitely intentional too, since they're very cosy with police departments. Because for local reporters on the crime beat their law enforcement sources are their daily bread & butter. Regardless though, they have to treat them like any other source & actually fact check. But they rarely do, likely do to fear of losing access. There's also probably pressure from up top too.

Which media are those? I haven't ever actually seen a pro police article in the past few years or so. Beyond the OP issue though, I'm reading terribly written articles that ignore grammar, tell the reader essentially nothing about the subject of the article, often leaving me wondering what it was supposed to be about. It used to be the rule that the article would tell the reader everything essential in the first paragraph of the story, now, if they aren't completely confusing as to what they're writing about, they mention it maybe at the very end. And of course they go with the first news of a major story, almost always getting it wrong, usually filtering it through whatever ideological lens they have. Then, they never retract their previous mess up and rarely even bother to correct it. Just sloppy work all around. Also, in the US media, the rest of the world mostly doesn't exist. So you must go to foreign media like BBC, NHK, DW, France 24, and others if you want to learn about anything happening outside the US.

[babyblob]

What bugs me is how The News or at least the local news tries to use scare tactics to get people to watch.

Here in the Cincy area we get snow every year. Nothing major it hasnt been more then 6 or so inches but once in like the last 5 or 6 years. Over night we got less then a half an inch.

But what were the headlines on the local news? Now "A little snow coming." it was "Is this our first major winter storm of the season? Tune in to fine out." then the weather came on "Is this our first major storm of the season? Well no we really are not getting anything." But they used scare tactics to get people to tune in.

[Kirby101]

What bugs me is how The News or at least the local news tries to use scare tactics to get people to watch.

Here in the Cincy area we get snow every year. Nothing major it hasnt been more then 6 or so inches but once in like the last 5 or 6 years. Over night we got less then a half an inch.

But what were the headlines on the local news? Now "A little snow coming." it was "Is this our first major winter storm of the season? Tune in to fine out." then the weather came on "Is this our first major storm of the season? Well no we really are not getting anything." But they used scare tactics to get people to tune in.

Local News has been going by the adage "If it bleeds, it leads" for decades. Rarely does local News tackle actual local problems. The report on corruption only after some pol is arrested. They concentrate on crime because it is "sexier". Outside of weather and traffic, they don't report anything useful.

[Mister Mets]

I have to make a point about late term abortions. IMO it is an event that is largely misunderstood. First of all, this is not done on a whim or as a matter of convenience. Even the Roe vs Wade ruling was very cautionary about limiting third semester abortions in the case of the mother's health being threatened. But tragically there are times when the parents are faced with terrible choices dealing with a life threatening situation for the mother or several fetal abnormalities that have been detected, like the total absence of a brain in the development of the fetus. Thankfully 3rd semester abortions only account for about 1 percent of those performed. It is not something that I think the government should interfere with. This decision is done with extreme cases and I think the physician and parents should be the ones making the decision, not the courts.

If this procedure is "unpopular" with Republicans then they can just take a long walk off a short pier as far as I am concerned.

The majority of what is colloquially referred to as late-term abortions are not due to fetal abnormalities or risk to the life of the mother. The proposed laws by Democrats are not limited to those exceptions (or others like rape and incest.) This is relevant to any honest and unbiased discussion of the topic.

I don't care about the media being critical of Democrats as long as it's fair. The problem is that they really starts to dig in when Democrats are trying to do things like BBB. When they're doing something that's the antithesis of that it doesn't get criticized or brought up. The media is on the side of their corporate overlords. And the only bias the "liberal media" has is towards the status quo.

There are so many more alternatives to the corporate-controlled media today. I am curious as to what concessions you feel major institutions make to corporate overlords. How does the New York Times, for example, compromise its values?

Do you feel that there's a status quo bias on social issues? Has the media been against the expansion of gay marriage, or laws protecting trans rights?

They also refuse to fact-check police reports, and instead report it as fact without scrutiny. That's definitely intentional too, since they're very cosy with police departments. Because for local reporters on the crime beat their law enforcement sources are their daily bread & butter. Regardless though, they have to treat them like any other source & actually fact check. But they rarely do, likely do to fear of losing access. There's also probably pressure from up top too.

It's a fair point that the media relies a lot on police for crime reporting. The alternative is very expensive, and that may get to one of the major problems with media reform efforts- some of the solutions will be costly. How should the media recoup expenses?

[Catlady in training]

The majority of what is colloquially referred to as late-term abortions are not due to fetal abnormalities or risk to the life of the mother.

What? That would be news to me, do you have any source on that? What I know and what has been the general consensus as far as I remember is just as Iron Maiden said, due to health reasons on woman's side or the fetus'.

[Kirby101]

Some clarity, and "late term abortion" is not used in medicine.
https://www.kff.org/womens-health-po...-in-pregnancy/

And we are talking about 1% of abortions. But the anti-abortion side has used this to ban all abortions. And the fact that the MSM continues to use this non-medical term is another example of how the GOP controls their narrative.

[Mister Mets]

What? That would be news to me, do you have any source on that? What I know and what has been the general consensus as far as I remember is just as Iron Maiden said, due to health reasons on woman's side or the fetus'.

The congressional research service looked into this question.

https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R45161.pdf

There are some caveats, but the expert consensus is that fetal anomalies and situations where the mother's health is at risk are a small minority of abortions at or over twenty weeks.

[Mister Mets]

I think this is an important meta-question worthy of its own thread, as it's more evergreen than much of the political discussion, when tends to be dominated by recent developments.

It does not seem plausible that the main problem with the American press is that they go too easy on Republicans. This is a comment mainly from people who want the media to reflect their own views, which tend to be left-wing. The cliche they may use is that reality has a left-wing bias, but they'll make all sorts of selective arguments. For example, they'll suggest that aspects of a massive piece of legislation are popular without polling the entirety of it. Benefits poll well. Spending does not.

There was a recent study (mentioned in Tendrin's twitter link) that suggested the media was harsher on Biden. But a lot of it was bullshit.

Nate Silver noted that they viewed analysis of bad poll numbers as being biased against Biden. The algorithm also coded certain words as positive or negative, when the story was more nuanced or in some cases didn't match the coding. For example, the word "high" is considered favorable, even in the context of "high taxes."

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/st...56792390668292

There are of course unpopular things Democrats do and fight for. Their preferences on immigration or late-term abortion do not poll well. There are also all sorts of media stories defending unpopular left-wing arguments (riots are fine, defund the police, etc.) or critical of mainstream positions.

It is a fair point that there are non-partisan biases. For example, a study of middle eastern coverage showed that there was a bias of favorable coverage towards whichever side advocated for peace at a given point, but that tends to be based on military strength and temporary advantage rather than human rights or which side is the aggressor.

A major factor is going to be that the American media is largely staffed by people who are left of center, and live in liberal enclaves like coastal cities, regularly hanging out with people who have similar backgrounds. So they're more likely to be left-wing. That said, actual journalists will need to talk to Republicans on occasion, and will get an understanding of their position, which will confuse people from the same circles who follow the media but don't need to interact with Republicans. This may be why some of the most embarrassing left-wing media pieces come from people who aren't standard journalists, but are ostensibly writing about something else.

If that’s true the training must be feeble beyond belief!

Think how tough it must be for journalists in countries where the state routinely uses its full power to intimidate the media…by any method needed, including imposing jail.

By comparison life for US journalists is cushty. And they should be doing everything they can to support democracy by exposing any politician that lies.

This is true. Lies should be exposed. Voters should be given the information necessary to make up their own minds.

However, this can get difficult. Voters don't like being told that things they like don't work, so there are financial incentives against this. And there are all sorts of grey areas where you can understand how reasonable people may disagree, or even be unable to understand how someone else can believe something.

[Iron Maiden]

I think this is an important meta-question worthy of its own thread, as it's more evergreen than much of the political discussion, when tends to be dominated by recent developments.

It does not seem plausible that the main problem with the American press is that they go too easy on Republicans. This is a comment mainly from people who want the media to reflect their own views, which tend to be left-wing. The cliche they may use is that reality has a left-wing bias, but they'll make all sorts of selective arguments. For example, they'll suggest that aspects of a massive piece of legislation are popular without polling the entirety of it. Benefits poll well. Spending does not.

There was a recent study (mentioned in Tendrin's twitter link) that suggested the media was harsher on Biden. But a lot of it was bullshit.

Nate Silver noted that they viewed analysis of bad poll numbers as being biased against Biden. The algorithm also coded certain words as positive or negative, when the story was more nuanced or in some cases didn't match the coding. For example, the word "high" is considered favorable, even in the context of "high taxes."

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/st...56792390668292

There are of course unpopular things Democrats do and fight for. Their preferences on immigration or late-term abortion do not poll well. There are also all sorts of media stories defending unpopular left-wing arguments (riots are fine, defund the police, etc.) or critical of mainstream positions.

It is a fair point that there are non-partisan biases. For example, a study of middle eastern coverage showed that there was a bias of favorable coverage towards whichever side advocated for peace at a given point, but that tends to be based on military strength and temporary advantage rather than human rights or which side is the aggressor.

A major factor is going to be that the American media is largely staffed by people who are left of center, and live in liberal enclaves like coastal cities, regularly hanging out with people who have similar backgrounds. So they're more likely to be left-wing. That said, actual journalists will need to talk to Republicans on occasion, and will get an understanding of their position, which will confuse people from the same circles who follow the media but don't need to interact with Republicans. This may be why some of the most embarrassing left-wing media pieces come from people who aren't standard journalists, but are ostensibly writing about something else.

This is true. Lies should be exposed. Voters should be given the information necessary to make up their own minds.

However, this can get difficult. Voters don't like being told that things they like don't work, so there are financial incentives against this. And there are all sorts of grey areas where you can understand how reasonable people may disagree, or even be unable to understand how someone else can believe something.

I have to make a point about late term abortions. IMO it is an event that is largely misunderstood. First of all, this is not done on a whim or as a matter of convenience. Even the Roe vs Wade ruling was very cautionary about limiting third semester abortions in the case of the mother's health being threatened. But tragically there are times when the parents are faced with terrible choices dealing with a life threatening situation for the mother or several fetal abnormalities that have been detected, like the total absence of a brain in the development of the fetus. Thankfully 3rd semester abortions only account for about 1 percent of those performed. It is not something that I think the government should interfere with. This decision is done with extreme cases and I think the physician and parents should be the ones making the decision, not the courts.

If this procedure is "unpopular" with Republicans then they can just take a long walk off a short pier as far as I am concerned.

[Totoro Man]

I feel like the news media is a big part of the public being ignorant about things. And frankly speaking, I think it's mostly intentional. I agree with Dana Milbank when he said...

“I don’t think anything in our training or experience as journalists prepared us for a moment in which one of the two major political parties is no longer cooperating with the democratic process."

I feel like before the Republicans became whatever they are now it was easy for the news media to just sell political horse races and "both side-isms". But now that Republicans went full blown fascists the news media is kinda forced to be real journalists now. But even still I see them kinda weaseling out of doing that.

For instance, Punchbowl News be like “I don’t think it’s incumbent on us to say, a person is a liar" If you are planning on reporting FACTS, that is indeed your job, it's probably your MAIN job ffs . If you wish to explain motivations for lying, well that's branching into opinion is it not? I mean the mental gymnastics of that statement.

I feel like people don't criticize the news media enough for the type of inviroment we're in. They're so concerned about looking partisan they forget to do their jobs.

why would they suddenly be "forced to be real journalists" now? what are we talking about when we discuss journalists? I hold journalists responsible for Trump becoming a political figure and running for political office. if anything, journalists seem to be a big part of the political 'problem' we have now.

as for calling out people for being liars... there's this problem with calling people a liar. it's slander - and you can get fired, or even sued over it. you don't even have to be a journalist. as a journalist you're not allowed to directly CALL a person a liar. you have to use direct quotes, written documents, and provide irrefutable evidence that a person IS lying. it's a laudable act when a journalism thoroughly documents a persons collected public statements and can prove that they're lying to everybody. but it still might not make a difference.

journalists, as far as I've personally interacted with them, tend to be very progressive or liberal in their political leanings. even editors tend to skew towards the Left side of the political spectrum. PUBLISHERS and OWNERS, however, have a lot more money at stake and tend to be 'conservative'. and by that, I mean they are anxious to resist and thwart major socio-political and economic changes that might negatively impact their lives.

I don't read a lot of news articles. I'm not the newshound political junky that my parents are. when I do bother reading the news, I usually end up reading at least three to six different articles to see what differences I can find. I also find it interesting to try and read international coverage of important events as well as domestic coverage.

last year or so I read an article (at Vox, and a few other places) explaining that conservatives were over 30 times more likely to repost fake news than liberals. one of the researchers interviewed explained that they tried getting liberals to retweet fake news, but it "didn't work". the implication in the article was that liberals and progressives didn't retweet fake news. and yet, if the headline was to be true... these liberal retweets of fake news HAD TO EXIST. I'm not the world's greatest mathematician, but I DO KNOW that 30x0=0.

but, what made it strange is that most of the articles talked about this as if it were actual news. and yet, if and when they spoke with professional analysts, they all said that the numbers were not statistically significant... and yet, every journalist camped out on this idea for several hundred words.

I actually saw the same pattern in a half-dozen different articles. but what I found so puzzling is that almost NOBODY provided the actual numbers. I found myself thinking "well, show me the numbers... so, I can make an informed opinion." I finally found an article (it was the seventh or eighth article) that provided some totals.

out of something like 43 million tweets it turned out that roughly 48,000 of them were retweets of fake news. so, that would have left us with roughly 1600 fake news retweets being posted by 'liberals' and the other 46,400 fake news retweets being from 'conservatives'. they could also prove that about 3,000 of those fake news tweets were from spam robots...

their click bait strategy certainly worked on me. when they said that conservatives retweet fake news 30 times more than liberals, I was genuinely curious. and yet, when you look at the percentage of the fake news retweets as part of the total body of tweets being studied, we're still talking about MICROSCOPICALLY SMALL FRACTIONS OF A SINGLE PERCENTAGE POINT.

0.000966666667
0.0000333333333

it wasn't until I read a ninth article where writers pointed out that the vast majority of those retweets were from retired people over 60 years old who had voted for Donald Trump.

so, for people who believe that the media is simply acting on behalf of big business "conservatives", how would you classify that journalism approach? is it speaking truth to power? is it political spin? would it even qualify as journalism or real news if all they did was pull a couple of quotes from a statistical summary and then NOT include the raw data points to help people make an informed opinion of the study results?

I've seen this growing trend in journalism that says we shouldn't try to be 'objective' or look at 'both sides' because that plays into the hands of powerful people with money (which apparently can only be Republicans). but if ALL journalists are supposed to become activists fighting for a righteous cause... that doesn't make them journalists in my opinion. that makes them propagandists working on behalf of political organizations.

journalists still have to do legitimate research, ask questions, verify the truth of what is being reported to the best of their ability, and provide vital information in a timely manner.

now, before people get too excited... even Joseph Goebbels believed that effective propaganda has to be based on something that can be proven to be true. the key is to eliminate context and take the details out of context. so, by this line of thinking, I would argue that the Vox article doesn't qualify as journalism at all. it's political propaganda.

ah, here's the article
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-polit...-than-liberals