ARTelevision

I worked as a journalist for 10 years. I have a lot of friends who are still writing and editing news for a living. All of my journalist friends are liberal. That's just anecdotal information.

The recent releases from the current Pew Research Center report are not a surprise. It's just plain absurd for newspeople to claim objectivity. The simple fact is their bias is everywhere evident.

...................................................
Newsroom conservatives are a rare breed
In national news outlets, only 7 percent of journalists call themselves conservative. Does that deepen a trust gap?

The Christian Science Monitor

If you'd like to check out an endangered species, don't bother with a trip to the zoo. Just drop by the newsroom of your favorite newspaper or TV station and ask to see the conservatives.

According to a new survey, only 12 percent of local reporters, editors, and media executives are self-described conservatives, while twice as many call themselves liberal. At national news organizations, the gap is even wider - 7 percent conservative vs. 34 percent liberal.

That gap, which has grown wider in the past decade, does not necessarily prove that America's mainstream journalism is biased, as conservatives have long complained. But the survey does confirm that US newsrooms do not mirror the political leanings of the nation at large.

But in an election year, and an era of growing partisanship on the airwaves, the question of alleged media bias has currency. Some editors contend that at the very least, media outlets should acknowledge that ideologically unbalanced newsrooms are bad for journalism and, in a time of declining circulation and viewership, bad for business, too.

"We should acknowledge that maybe the biggest problem is that most of us think too much alike and come from the same backgrounds," says David Yarnold, editor of the opinion pages at The (San Jose) Mercury News. "Find the pro-lifers in a newsroom. That's harder than finding Waldo."

Many editors and news executives argue that the goal of balanced reporting can be reached, and generally is, through professional ethics. Even those who are alarmed by the survey don't necessarily advocate a political litmus test in hiring.

Still, the survey shows a sharp disconnect in viewpoint between the press and the public. The nonpartisan Pew Research Center found the gap between journalists and other Americans particularly wide on social issues. The sample of 547 journalists and executives in a wide range of print and broadcast organizations, found that 88 percent of those surveyed at national media outlets think society should accept homosexuality; about half the general public agrees. And while about 60 percent of Americans say morality and a belief in God are inexorably linked, only 6 percent of national journalists and executives surveyed believe that.

But if editors and recruiters are thinking more about ideological balance, newsrooms remain distracted by budget cutbacks and continued embarrassment over the another gap: a severe shortage of minorities relative to the general population. To make things more complicated, no one wants to put a "Bush or Kerry?" question on an application form, and some journalists assume conservatives simply aren't interested in joining their ranks.

Then there's the matter of changing attitudes in a profession that prides itself on the ability of reporters to set their personal views aside."Most journalists try to do a fair job and are quite careful to make sure that their personal point of view doesn't overwhelm the story," says Jeffrey Dvorkin, ombudsman at National Public Radio. "In talk radio and cable television, the goal is to be opinionated. But the majority of journalists feel opinion gets in the way of doing good journalism."

Indeed, the Pew study doesn't prove that news stories themselves are biased - although it found that most national journalists think the media are giving President Bush a free ride.

Some analysts also note that publishers and station owners are anything but icons of the left. "Journalism in general in the United States tends to be fairly conventional and traditional. Even if [reporters] individually see themselves as liberal, the framework in which they work isn't necessarily a liberal structure," says Aly Colón, head of the diversity program at the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank.

Still, many Americans say a liberal bias does exist. In a Gallup poll last fall, 45 percent of Americans said the news media are too liberal, while 14 percent said too conservative. (Some 20 percent of Americans now call themselves liberal, versus 33 percent who say they're conservative.)

Gallup also found TV news and daily papers near the bottom - on par with Congress and labor unions - in its ranking of public confidence in US institutions.

Mainstream US media outlets nowadays scrupulously try to avoid taking political stands outside editorial pages, unlike their newspaper ancestors in the 18th and 19th centuries or their contemporary European cousins.

Even so, reporters exert plenty of influence over their coverage, and some critics say they can't help missing parts of the big picture if they look at things the same way. And the trend toward a liberal viewpoint appears, if anything, to be rising. In 1995, 22 percent of journalists told Pew they were liberal, and 5 percent conservative. Now it's 34 and 7 percent, respectively.

Journalists are often blind to their bias, says Bill Cotterell, political editor at the Tallahassee [Fla.] Democrat. "It starts when we decide to cover one story and not another, and decide some people are kooks and not worth calling," says Mr. Cotterell, a registered Democrat. "I get the feeling that [journalists] don't think they're biased unless they sit down, hold a meeting and take a vote to support this side and oppose the other."

What to do? Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism, suggests that news organizations reach out to Christian colleges and woo people from other walks of life, like the military. "Just look around," he says.

Editors can also try to recruit reporters from different parts of the country and from a variety of backgrounds, says Peter Bhatia, executive editor of The [Portland] Oregonian. Mr. Yarnold, the San Jose opinion editor, adds that job interview questions can draw out whether applicants are ideologues or critical thinkers.

It may help that the news industry isn't a stranger to diversity campaigns. Through internships and other outreach programs, media outlets routinely make special efforts to hire minorities. The diversity efforts have had mixed success, however. According to a new survey by the American Society of Newspaper Editors, minorities hold only 13 percent of newsroom jobs at American newspapers surveyed, up from just 4 percent in 1978.

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apeman

interesting ...

are people more likely to become journalists if they're liberal, or does being a journailist tend to make you more liberal I wonder ...

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ARTelevision

Good question, apeman.


My journalist friends are good people. They just happen to be a part of a liberally educated cultural elite that does not publically acknowledge itself as a cultural elite. Privately however, they make it very clear that they consider themselves to be on a different level than their readers. They tend to believe that they have a broader perspective and are more socially aware than the rest of us. They are hypocritical to the extent that they have money and some power yet wish very much to see themselves as populists and friends of the common man and champions of the downtrodden. They are essentialy globalists who believe a more highly advanced form of allegiance than simply nationalism is the correct way of thinking. They espouse objectivity yet have very strong political opinions.

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Charlatan

That last paragraph suggests that The Christian Science Monitor supports affirmative action... I actually have no problem with this as it is good for new media in general.

That said, I can think of a number of conservatives who would have a problem with this...

two things:

One: Just because you are liberal in your personal politics does not mean you cannot or will not present the news in fashion that tries to present all points of view. Editorial content is another issue.

Two: If anything this underscores why the proliferation media outlets and ownership of those outlets is important. The more consolidation that occurs in the media the fewer the options. In an ideal world there would be a newspaper for all political walks of life (that has mostly fallen to magazines these days). As for Television, it's a tough one to call. Watching the big three cable and the big three networks I'd say there is a lot of coverage and none of it leans one way or the other (news story wise)... again editorially speaking it's another ball game.

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Yakk

From what I can tell, making shitloads of money is more ethically valued by conservatives than liberals. Journalism is a poor way to make shitloads of money.

As far as I can tell, this is affirmative action, right-wing style. Just as silly as the left-wing version. =)

I mean, did you know the vast majority of people who run the media companies are rich? Far richer on average than the general population?

This can't help but provide bias in the material they instruct journalists to cover... Same shit, different pile. The difference is, by claiming a bias in the part of the media, those who wish to push a "conservative" agenda can generate a generic broad-spectrum attack on those they can label as "liberals".

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onetime2

Definitely some interesting research. I am certain there will be cries of "but the conservatives make up for it in the talk radio segment" or that "the owners of the media outlets are conservative so it all balances out".

A very wise former boss of mine said, while discussing the obvious liberal bias in the media years ago, that it was a failure on the conservatives' part to populate such an influential industry.

I had never really thought of it that way but he is absolutely right. The talk radio segment has grown in an attempt to level the playing field but until conservatives see the field of reporting as an interesting career path the liberals will dominate mainstream media.

I still find it amazing in discussions with some of my more liberal colleagues that they don't see a problem with this level of conservative representation. Apparently being "representative" of the diversity within our society is only a priority in instances that suit them. (And no this isn't a dig on all liberals, just the ones I've discussed this topic with at length who claim there is no possibility of a liberal media bias). (and no I don't think there should be conservative "quotas" just that it surprises me that they don't stay intellectually honest in their stance)

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apeman

liberal people aren't really happy with the idea of there being an "elite" anyway, so they can't acknowledge their own existence.

it would be most interesting to get some figures for political affiliation in other occupations, no? I think we would find different ratios of lib/con in different professions.

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Redlemon

Just a quick question about this; how can someone be a "champion of the downtrodden" without having power? If you don't have power, you are just the crazy person on the corner preaching to no one.

Zeld2.0

Its an interesting question to ponder if journalism makes you liberal or bein liberal makes you a journalist.

I think though, it might be that being a journalist will make you MORE liberal but not necessarily A liberal because often times, in the job, you will have to be open to new information and change because that is often your job - to report such things

And that is the basic defenition of liberal - open to change and new things

ARTelevision

To my way of thinking, being a champion of the downtrodden while living one's entire life not at all in the midst of the downtrodden is nothing more than patronizing and nothing less then pandering. We're not talking about people who actually do anthing but pontificate. To talk the talk is not the same as walking the walk.

In brief, these folks do things because it makes them feel good about themselves.

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Sparhawk

I think there is an inherent liberal (in the old sense of the word) bent in journalism that has existed since the muckraking of the late 1800's. Conservatives, by and large attracted to the status quo and afraid of change aren't naturally suited for the journalistic world - one involves digging up dirt - from the local crime boss, to the greedy corporation, to the corrupt politician.

I don't see that modern-day liberalism in the newsroom. Now, on the editorial side of the house, I see it from time to time (LA Times, NY Times) but I find very little bias in the actual news presented.

As for the downtrodden, wealthy men with social consciences routinely make themselves "champions" even if they live their lives among the rich and powerful - take Bill and Melinda Gates, and their Foundation for one powerful example, that is neither patronizing or pandering.

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matthew330

"And that is the basic defenition of liberal - open to change and new things"

Yeah, when i think of liberals, i tend to think of "die-ins", or those that would defend the 5 cocksuckers that pulled a knife on me last year walking home from work, or that 12-13 year old little fuck that broke into my home 2 weeks ago. I tend to think of a young, idealistic, suburban white boy that hates who and what he is. Whenever i think of liberals, the last thing that comes to mind is "open to change." I think of people who use racism, sexism, ageism and poverty as fear tactics to promote their misguided political beliefs.

OFKU0

As i see it, I don't think anyone can be completely objective, let alone journalists. But it is the journalist and the personal opinions which add to the uncontrollable biases since the more " knowledgable " the reporters content appears to be, the more creedence that opinion receives, even if the content is nothing more than an unqualified personal opinion.

It just isn't any good to report the news anymore. We need to be sold on it. We need it broken down and spoon fed to us regardless of fact or fiction. We are lazy and we are accustomed to being entertained. Whether there are more liberals than conservatives who abide by these conventions is statistical. The more important factor for those so special is ego, for now someone recognizes them for what they want to be recognized for,..something they think they are. Liberal or conservative affiliation isn't worth much. It's simply a vehicle to, as Art stated,..pontificate.

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paulybrklynny

The statistics are inherentl flawed because the journalists are self-identified.

Doesn't matter what percentage of journalists call themselves liberal, the proof is in the newsprint.

East Germany called itself the German Democratic Republic, that didn't make it a democracy.

70% (or 75% or 95%) of journalists will vote for Kerry. So what? Kerry's no liberal.

I'm a self-identified liberal telling you Kerry's no liberal, take that for what you will.

The major media outlets in this country are owned/run by conservatives. Whether these be Bush-supporting conservatives, or Kerry-supporting conservatives they are conservatives. Conservatives may be defined as "those with a vested interest in maintaining the staus quo". I don't think that can really be controverted, and one of the things conservatives would like to maintain is their wealth, and power, and mostly, access to more wealth and power.

Are their employees more liberal then them? Sure, they're not millionaires (billionaires in many cases) with some vested interests to protect that the status quo duopoly party system in this county (the US) does a fine job of protecting.

Most journalists will tell you they're liberal, and admit thier bosses are not, then tell you that that's o.k., because they have never been censored.

Of course not.

If they were so liberal that they write things their bosses really hated they would never have reached that point in their careers in the first place. They would have been drummed out along the way.

Its no conspiracy, its business. Disagree with your boss enough times, no matter what your line of work and you will eventually be looking for a new line of work (or at least a new place to pursue it).

Try Eric Alterman's "What Liberal Media".

Or much better,though much tougher to get into Noam Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent"; or "Necessary Illusions".

Or, though I haven't read it, based upon reviews, a shorter, easier introduction to Chomsly's theories on how the media is used as the propoganda arm of the wealthy elites "Media Control: The Spectacular Achievments of Propaganda" looks to be worthwhile.

The point is sure, you can call the media liberal, but you've got conservatives defining what it means to be a liberal. In reality there is very little ideological difference between what is widely assumed to be the most liberal major media outlet (the New York Times) and the most conservative (FOX News). You'll find a little bit more diversity of thought if you move down to the small to medium sized media (NPR and the Village Voice on the slightly more left; Drudge & Rush on the slightly more right), but its really a very narrow spectrum of debate being covered.

The further afield you search, the more diversity of opinions you'll find, the BBC, to the Nation, to the Guardian, to Democracy Now to ZMag will get you further left.

National Review, then American Spectator, then NewsMax will get you further right. Can't really speculate much beyond that, I dont know what comes next as I haven't gone looking for it but the point I attempt to make here is that the "accepted" center that the media is accused of being left of, is actually pretty far right, so its not to hard to be left of it, and still be pretty conservative, but semantically be labelable as a liberal.

Anyway, think for yourselves.

Flame on.

hammer4all

Excellent reply Paulybrklynny.

I myself, always recommend the video documentary Manufacturing Consent - Noam Chomsky and the Media for those who wish to know more about how the media really operate and keep debate within a certain range of opinions.

To underscore the point, here is a recent study done by FAIR:

Watchdog Group Report: Most NPR Sources are Conservative

Just goes to show, so called "liberal" reporters do not necessarily make "liberal" news. It is the editors and executives who decide what gets published and who gets on the air.

almostaugust

Maybe you could ask this same question about people involved in the arts and entertainment. It seems that a great proportion of these people are 'liberal', or at least anti-war.

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Zeld2.0

Hey thanks for painting the brush and reminding us why you hate 'liberals'

Thanks, a lot, i suppose - that explains it all as to why your opinions are way way way tilted.

*sigh* to this where did this thread go

Zeld2.0

/rerail thread

Thanks for the great post paulybrklynny

I think its tough to say either side of the media is really biased by a simple study to be honest - and yes self identification plays a part.

I remember seeing studies and seeing how Americans once self identified themselves as 35% liberal, 34% conservative, an the rest moderate. Now of course when it comes down to it, that's not true or else those who identify thsemlves liberal would be winning.

And I remember seeing far fewer identify themselves as Republicans by a large % versus Democrats but who has been winning the elections?

It's tough in every way to identify what is liberal and conservative based upon people's own thoughts and ideas because everyone sees those definitions in their own light as well.

gondath

I find a bigger problem with most of the news channels being owned by the same giant corporations. The terms liberal and conservative are just lazy ways to loop huge groups of people together and claim they all vote, think, and act alike. Journalists are tending to become more and more biased on cable news especially.

apeman

yeah, the liberal / conservative argument is probably a distraction so that big business can take over the world while we're arguing about politics

*thinks* maybe i should go to tilted paranoia with this

now that's just crazy talk!

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roachboy

interesting thread--in general i agree with paulybrklynny....
hegemony--cultural domination--might be seen as control over the discursive frame of reference. over the past 20 years or so, the right has done an impressive job via the development of media inputs structured by the network of think tanks on the order of aei, brookings, cato, etc. in shifting the general frame of reference onto their grounds---if you wanted to do an analysis of "biais"---sort of a strange term in that it presupposes the idiotic notion of objectivity as a norm---it would make far more sense to actually examine the way in which arguments are framed--chomsky's propaganda model, mentioned above, makes this point---discourse analysis on the order of jean-pierre faye's work on fascist discourse, pierre bourdieu's work on heidegger, provides more precise data that can be seen as working in the same manner.

inidividuals can be asked to self-identify politically and it will tell you nothing about the frame of reference in terms of which they shape what they write, for example---like most conservative modes of trying to make social arguments without taking the social seriously, this self-idenitification tends to naturalize the frame of reference. if you wanted to do such an analysis, you could identify a series of terms that function as markers of ways of thinking structured by neoliberal or other rightwing ideologies, and simply count their occurances in televised or printed news stories (within the sample obviously). you would probably find that these terms operate consistently in the way reports frame their issues, and that there is little disagreement amongst individual reporters of different, vague political orientations about the neutrality of these terms and their utility.

there is extensive sociological work out there already on the social reproduction of journalism---of course the article at the beginning of this thread ignores all that. maybe it does not matter to readers of the christian socience monitor. i dont know.

insofar as matters of economic class are concerned---conservatives have real trouble with thinking about capitalism as a social system--i have never understood this, in that it makes coherent thinking about capitalism almost impossible---as such, there is little possibility of hearing arguments about the necessity of integrating the maringalised into the dominant order in the interest of long-term social stability--instead you get a fatuous moralizing understanding of poverty and a suicidal series of conclusions about how to deal with poverty deriving from them.

as for the matter of being a "champion of the downtrodden" and this somehow running into a contradiction because to be a champion means you have to be visible, which means you have to have some kind of cultural power, the problem seems to be framed in a manner that follows from the above---if you like capitalism as a system, then it is in your interest to think in systemic terms about it, to deal with the problems of marginalization/poverty as political issues and to argue for the redirection of resources to deal with these consequences of the unequal distribution of wealth as basic adjustments that are necessary for the ability of the wealthy to continue to extract wealth from the system, for the continued operation of the system at all---the notion of "champion of the downtrodden" functions to hide the matter of poverty, of the unequal distribution of wealth--it reduces the problems of an entire social sector to those of an individual, a spokesmodel--the social situation of that model then becomes an easy target, because in conservativeland it is always easier to shoot the messenger who mentions problems than it is to think about those problems. either way, if you are going to advance a political argument, you need to have access to the cultural sphere that shapes political debate. no access=no visibility=no position from which to argue. qed. unless the underlying point of attacking these figureheads is a desire to have no disruptions, no unpleasant arguments intruding on the manicured interior world of the television-watching petit bourgeois, in which case everything follows--but the critique refers more to an aesthetic position relative to politics than it does to politics.

and as for nationalism=it is a kind of collective mental disorder. the sooner that ideology implodes the better. "globalism" seems more a recognition of the reorganization of capital flows in the real world than it does a substitute for nationalism. fact is that if nationalism implodes, the right will be completely lost---problems for nationalism are problems that shake the entire foundation of conservative ideology--and its "liberal" variant as well.

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boatin

I, too, have a number of friends that are journalists. As far as I know, none of them consider themselves champions of the downtrodden - they consider themselves reporters and tv anchors. And they take the job of reporting pretty damn seriously. Perhaps as seriously as many people take their jobs. I don't find painting with such a broad brush all that useful in a conversation.

People run the same spectrum of performance in most any job. I'm sure there are people that pontificate, and are hypocrites. Show me a job where there aren't people like that.

And I'm sure you are right, Art. MOST people do things that make them feel good about themselves. Should we do things that make us miserable?

Steering the conversation to why the majority are self identified liberals seems to be the richest question in this thread. Any journalists watching that would care to explain why they got into Journalism???

gibingus

i'm a journalist, however i am not currently working directly in hard news. i got into it because i needed a job and i got one in media. i work for an outlet that has a right of center editorial bent. i take my responsibiliites to my company and my readership very seriously. my personal politics don't enter into my job, but i do have them because i am a citizen and it is my right. i know many colleagues who do not vote in primaries because that would require public declaration of a party affiliation, which they feel would compromise their objectivity to the readership.

art, you're overgeneralizing and pigeonholing the entire mediascape. it's too big for that, the information space is a free market after all and there is a flavor to suit every palate. the cultural elite you refer to are no more hypocritical than say a person who endorses and espouses conservative values while encouraging the very liberal free self-expression of the highly sexual and naked variety.

but we all tell ourselves little lies to help get us through the day. i generally tell myself i don't do it for the money, but i do.

*edit: oh yeah, i forgot to mention this: reporters tend to be of a liberal bent, because they have to ask questions and challenge the status quo to report on it. reporters must be skeptical, open-minded and accepting of multiple viewpoints in order to maintain the level of objectivity needed to do their job in a reasonably competent fashion.

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ARTelevision

gibingus, thanks. This bit says it all:

"*edit: oh yeah, i forgot to mention this: reporters tend to be of a liberal bent, because they have to ask questions and challenge the status quo to report on it. reporters must be skeptical, open-minded and accepting of multiple viewpoints in order to maintain the level of objectivity needed to do their job in a reasonably competent fashion."

I don't buy any of the reasons you give - they are rationalizations. But we agree - journalists tend to be liberal. We differ on our interpretations of why that is so.

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filtherton

I think that labeling the media liberal implies an agenda. Ok, the liberal media is on a mission to spread the gospel of liberality(?). Despite the allegedly constant bombardement of liberal ideologies america is confronted with, it seems to be moving steadily right. How does that work? Apparently the media is not only biased, but incompetent as well.

Just for an example about the "bias" of the liberal rag that is the new york times, they just recently apologized for giving bush a pass in the months leading up to the war. What kind of liberal bias gives a conservative target a pass on something as stealing-candy-from-a-babylike as the justification for this war?

What was the length of time between when you heard about the valerie plame incident and when you heard it mentioned by any national news organization? For me it had to be at least a week. It was on the internet, then a week later it was in the papers. Why did the "liberal" media wait so long to break the story? It couldn't have been because they lacked the insight to see that the story could advance the liberal cause, because that's just obvious. I think as an american institution the media is more market driven than ideological driven.

The funniest irony lies in the fact that some people think that they themselves are objective enough to call out other people for a lack of objectivity. "Everyone is biased, except me that is, my opinion on the bias of others is completely objective."

onetime2

I don't think that's true at all. A bias does not necessarily mean an agenda. Certainly there are forces that push reporters more towards the middle in their reporting (not the least of which is the fact that their audience has little stomach for extreme positions). Anytime you have a group of people who share common beliefs giving their opinions on what's happening some bias is bound to show through. It doesn't mean they all get together to conspire about pushing their agendas and it doesn't meant there was a concerted effort to stack the deck with liberal reporters. It just so happened that a generation of people with more liberal views were inspired to go into media (perhaps by the actions/success of Watergate reporters?). I don't think it was planned, it just turned out that way. There will be a push for conservatives to enter the media with the success of talk radio and some of the shows like Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, etc.

Not recognizing that some bias can seep through is irresponsible, IMO. I don't think it needs to be "fixed" by artificial means but knowing that so many in the industry label themselves as liberal is important information when considering their points of view.

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shakran

We do have a broader perspective and are more socially aware than most people. Why? Because most people, if they take in news at all, it's on shows like Fox News or (this one's crazy) The Daily Show. We on the other hand see stuff that doesn't even get published/broadcast. We spend our careers steeped in nothing but news. Is that a negative reflection on non-journalists? No. Airline pilots know a hell of a lot more about airplanes than I ever will. Why shouldn't a journalist know a hell of a lot more about the news than non-journalists ever will?

Yeah, you're correct in that most journalists that I've worked with lean toward the left in their personal politics. What exactly is your point? We strive to be fair and to present both sides. Quite frankly, Bush alone has pulled enough shenannigans that we could cover them wall to wall for a week and still not run out of material, yet we haven't done that. The media crucified Clinton for getting a blowjob, but any firestorm that boils up around Bush dissipates inside of a week. And yet people still have the gall to call us a liberal media. That's a joke.

As an aside, I'm not sure where you get the idea that journalists have money. Average starting salary for a television journalist is somewhere between $15,000 and $17,000. There are people at Burger King making more than that.

roachboy

again, trying to derive a political tilt to "the media" from the self-identification of individual journalists is absurd. the politics of information can be seen from the grid of assumptions that shape the questions that are asked, the way responses are shaped--the structuring of variables and rules for thinking about them. this grid--largely a conservative one at this sad, foul point in history--comes most to the fore in television as a function of its shorthand character--and as chomsky points out well, the debates amongst talking heads on the order of crossfire are fora within which the terms of legitimate debate are imposed, and quibbles amongst positions shaped by those terms staged.....

it seems that the right is offended by any critical distance. it seems that this readines to take offense at critique is of a piece with a basic contempt for democracy, even in its shallow american form. what they seem to argue for is an immediate identification of individuals with the nation with the Leader---all wrapped in the language of protestant fundamentalist ideology. you would think that the economic aspect of conservative ideology might inform their thinking about the press--maybe hayek when he talks about the elimination of competition (dissent) in a situation of concentration as the elimination of feedback loops that make possible any rational action on the part of the remaining firm. according to hayek, monopolies substitute fantasies structured by internal politics for information about the world when there is no friction. from this viewpoint, coming from a central figure in the history of rightwing economic theory, comes an argument the conclusion of which is that conservatives should be grateful for dissent. it might be annoying, but eliminating it would be a fiasco.

i would recommend that folk watch "network" again, particularly the speech that ned beatty's character gives to peter finch, that starts with "you have tampered with the forces of nature, and you will atone...."

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Sparhawk

^ Whew. That was a mental workout just reading through that post.

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ARTelevision

The journalists I know are connected to the international, national, and regional publications I've worked for. The big firms pay handsomely. And the regional ones pay quite well. The starting salaries referenced above are not representative of the range of middle-to-upper-middle-to-upper class salaries these folks pull in.

It would be a simple matter to just acknowledge this overwhelming bias and move on.

Spare us the old rhetorical saw of "objectivity."

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Sparhawk

ARTelevision's right, we're wrong, move along people, nothing to see here.

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"In Iraq, no doubt about it, it's tough. It's hard work. It's incredibly hard. It's - and it's hard work. I understand how hard it is. I get the casualty reports every day. I see on the TV screens how hard it is. But it's necessary work. We're making progress. It is hard work."

shakran

Yeah, something like that.

Hey Art? How do you explain Fox News Channel?

filtherton

If there's no agenda then what's the problem?

I don't know, but it seems that whenever i hear someone complaining about the "liberal media" they seem to be arguing from the perspective that the media is pursuing a liberal agenda.

Maybe i'm wrong, maybe they're just arguing about the liberal nature of journalists and could really care less whether their liberalness is being reflected in the new that gets reported. Probably not, though, since that sounds just a little silly.

The apparent implication of the initial post of this thread is that there is no disconnect between what journalists believe in and what they report, which is complete bullshit. No one can be objective, but to claim that there is demonstrable liberal bias that outweighs any demonstrable conservative bias seems somewhat tenuous in light of the lack of evidence, or even remotely objective criteria by which to make such observations. That is, journalists may be liberal, but the news is not.

boatin

I'm still curious how this has any bearing on anything:

I asked before, but I'll try again: should we all be doing things that make us miserable?

Gosh, aren't debates fun?

I would suspect that most reporters are near-perfectly objective ofabout 90% of what they report. On the issues that a reporter has strong opinions about, s/he probably differs in his/her ability to separate from that bias.

For you to paint a profession with such a broad brush is cynical at best.

This debate has been worked to death, and both sides have some pretty darn good points. For anyone to see it as one sided, and so clear, is an example to me of living at one end of the political spectrum.

Indeed.

ARTelevision

What's clear here is the refusal to accept the strong evidence that an overwhelming number of journalists label themselves "liberal" when compared to any other label.

What's moot is whether they are objective or not, given that bias.

Objectivity is a judgement call. We can debate that unverifiable subject forever and never come to a conclusion. I'm aware that endless debate on things is considered a fine and dandy way to proceed by some.

It does seem to me however that if journalists were in some way "objective" they would be classifying themselves as "non-partisan."

All these quotes out of context make for colorful posts.

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shakran

you still haven't answered my question, Art. And I'm intrigued by your debate tactics. You start a thread in which you state your opinion. When people disagree, rather than having a reasoned response you simply tell us to acknowledge what you say as the Truth and move on.

What exactly was the point of this thread? Just a soapbox?

filtherton

Journalist aren't robots. They are citizens who have the right to develop their own political ideologies. Objectivity doesn't exist in any form since, again, people aren't robots. So what's the point? They were asked about their personal beliefs not the beliefs they disseminate in their reporting.

ARTelevision

Yes, absolutely. I'm satisfied with this statement. Quite satisfied, actually:

"Objectivity doesn't exist in any form since, again, people aren't robots."

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Kadath

The fact that the overwhelming majority of editors and program directors are conservative might help to balance the scale.

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paulybrklynny

thanks all for the kind praise of my post.

roachboy makes some important points, most important one is the fact that this is not just a beer-fueled message board debate, but a respeted field of study.

Media studies is a field of study which doesn't seem to carry much weight. I am not an avid watcher of tele-journalism, so I could be wrong when I make this statemnent, but I beleive there is no a single program on any of the major network or cable news outlets dedicated to media criticism.

This is an incredible failing on the part of television. Even mainstream newsprint publications will often carry columns (or at least op-eds) critiquing the media, its biases, its methods, etc. Television (where the overwhelming percentage of Americans get their news) refusing to do so, refusing to even entertain the notion that they may be an instituion, weilding enough power and influence imperfectly to be worthy of some oversight, raises many questions.

Media studies is generally dismissed. The entire field of study being defined as "liberal", and thus apparently not worthy of respect or recognition. The fact is any cultural force as pervasive and powerful as the media should be open to, and interested in criticism. Not only the fact that it isn't open to this review, but that the review is generally veiwed as originating with a leftwing agenda identifies the true biases of the media.

Rather than aswering ciritics, the media instead attempts to erode their credibility by dismissing them as proponents of some liberal agenda. This is really brilliant on their part, they avoid criticism but critiquing the critics, common practice amongst the right.

To paraphrase Chomsky, it is actually within the power-elites interest to have a media establishment recognized as left leaning. This insulates them from criticism from the true left. If the editorial page of the New York Times or commentators on CBS or CNN can be dismissed by those in power of having leftwing biases where does that leave the true left in this country?

If Dan Rather is "a liberal", that frames the debate so that anyone who views Rather as a mainstream mouthpiece of the status quo can only be defineable as a wackjob, or at best a radical. The goal of the mainstream media in this country is to carry on a debate within a very narrow ideological focus at deafening volumes so as to drown out any voices beyond the accepted spectrum.

The obvious reason for this is, of course, money. Conservatives (those interested in maintaining the status quo in which they are rich, be they Republicans or Democrats), are the ones who buy commercial time. It is thus not in the interest of the media to piss off their customers by broadcasting too much news that is unflatering to them.

Again, this is not conspiracy, no-one is censured, not overtly. Reporters know what stories, regardless of their veracity will not make it past their editors, thus they dont bther to pursue them. Or, even more likely, they have no interest in them in the first place, their ideological leanings and inherent biases do not stretch to the point where they would write things that would piss their bosses enough to need to kill their story.