Nobody is saying that people are not getting killed Iraq or that it is as good as gumdrops over there. Nobody is saying that the media should not report the explosions and killings. However the U.S. television news media and its defenders have thrown these red herrings out on the table in defense of the accusation that they are biasing their coverage of the war in Iraq.
What the critics are actually charging is a media behavior that is much more subtle than simply showing too many explosions and not enough happy things. The real point of contention is that the media takes the explosions and mixes them with their own opinions to form a larger picture. That picture is that the outlook in Iraq is hopeless because Bush took us into a war that was unjust, and then he mismanaged it to boot.
The television media are constantly stating what the Iraqis think about this or that, as if they can legitimately speak for the entire population. Then to reinforce their credibility, they ask an Iraqi or two on the scene who then give an opinion that confirms what the media is suggesting about what the Iraqi people think.
The reality is that they probably asked ten Iraqis what they thought when doing that segment, and then in the final editing, picked the one or two that best supported the overall perception that that media was trying to convey in the piece. Invariably, that perception is that the war is going badly for the U.S.
There are no clear battle lines in Iraq by which to gauge the progress of the war. The assessment of who is winning is solely a matter of perception, so perception is reality. Therefore, the tools of perception are as effective of a weapon as the guns and bombs. The media have clearly taken sides and are using that weapon of perception. Their objective is to defeat Bush or, and in the largest focus, to defeat political conservatism. The actual outcome in Iraq is completely beside the point except for the discredit to Bush that results if the war is lost.
Of course, the critics of the war vehemently deny any media bias in the coverage. Although it is possible that they simply don’t see it because of their position, the more likely explanation is that acknowledging the bias would defeat its purpose. Anyone who is being undermined by the effect of this bias, however, can see right through it in a heartbeat. They don’t need the approval of the deniers to recognize the obvious.
DKLillee said this in post #2 : so is Fox News right-wing media bias?
One of the most common misconceptions is that Fox is biased to the right. At one time, they distinguished themselves be being about one quarter inch to the right of NBC, ABC, and CBS. But now Fox has become as indistinguishable from those alphabet networks as they are from each other.
Those who use Fox as a measure of right wing media bias do not understand the concept of right and left. They are just repeating a fashionable cliche that is popular with the left.
Talk radio is the home of right wing or conservative politics. It is not bias, however, because conservative talk radio admits its right wing slant. It is conservative, politically oriented commentary and opinion that is identified as such. ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, NPR, BBC, and FOX are leftist oriented, liberal, but do not admit it. They contend that they are objective. It is also apparent that the networks actually believe they are objective, so their bias cannot be considered dishonest. You cannot be dishonest if you are not aware of what you are doing.
EUCLID said this in post #3 :
Those who use Fox as a measure of right wing media bias do not understand the concept of right and left.
News is a business. By it's nature it's consevative and self-serving. If a lean to the left was the flavour of the day/month/year then the networks would gladly promote left-wing ideology. But since the sixities and seventies Western media has simply gone with the flow - and that's to the right.
Also the majority of people, when not being apathetic, are clueless as to how the world works because there's no vested interest for the media corporations to tell them, and unless most people are spoon fed information, it's just to much effort.
Fox supports who ever it thinks will be beneficial to fox (or in other words if it's good for Rupert Murdoch's empire he'll back it - which explains why he was an apologist for Saddam Hussein during the 80's when actually carried out his worse attrocities - and by doing so was helpful to Bush 1).
DKLillee said this in post #2 : so is Fox News right-wing media bias?
Depending on who you ask... yes, I think it is. Murdoch is no liberal, that's for sure. And showcasing right wingers like O'Reily and Hannity kind of hammers the point home.
Unless you listen to talk radio or read right wing blogs, you get no exposure to a conservative viewpoint. If you truly were exposed to that viewpoint, you would realize that it is just splitting hairs to differentiate one TV network from another in terms of ideology.
TV is a one-way street of liberalism. That bias is the reason talk radio was born. By the 1980s, AM radio was a dead medium. Radio was seen as obsolete given the fact that it lacked the visual dimension available with TV. Radio was only viable for music since there is no visual dimension. However, FM is superior to AM, so there was not apparent use for AM radio.
However, since the TV networks had moved so far to the left, there was a natural response to find an outlet for the right. Since AM was not being used for much, it was natural to pick it up and turn it into the information tool to balance the ideological slant of the TV networks. So talk radio became the other one way street going in the opposite direction of TV.
The claim that all media is biased to the right because it is all owned by big business, which is all conservative, is another fashionable cliche of the left. There are two factors that render that belief to be silly:
1) It is not a fundamental truth that all business is conservative. It is true that the principles of business and conservatism go together, but there are plenty of liberal corporations. Take Google for instance.
2) It is shear folly to contend that all media is conservative because it is owned by supposed conservatives when all you have to do is look at the broadcast product of TV to see that it is anything but conservative.
EUCLID, even you can see that FOX News teeters far more right than left, it's painfully obvious on a daily basis. 'Liberal' media is nothing more than a trumped up war cry for pee'd off neocons.
HECK said this in post #7 : EUCLID, even you can see that FOX News teeters far more right than left, it's painfully obvious on a daily basis. 'Liberal' media is nothing more than a trumped up war cry for pee'd off neocons.
-HECK!
I really don't see it at all. Take Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace for instance. How is it different from its counterparts on ABC, CBS, and NBC on Sunday morning? I don't see a shred of difference. Each of them has liberal and conservative viewpoints to some extent. But they all boil down to the same assessment, and they even cover nearly identical subjects each Sunday.
The local Fox News outlet here could not possibly be more liberal in every way they express themselves and their stories.
I have friends who only watch TV to learn what's happening. They often have no idea that there are two sides to many issues. If you only watch TV, you will never see liberal bias. You will have no background against which a liberal bias can be recognized.
The next thing you know, you will be trying to tell me that Bush is conservative.
I really don't see it at all. Take Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace for instance. How is it different from its counterparts on ABC, CBS, and NBC on Sunday morning? I don't see a shred of difference. Each of them has liberal and conservative viewpoints to some extent. But they all boil down to the same assessment, and they even cover nearly identical subjects each Sunday.
The local Fox News outlet here could not possibly be more liberal in every way they express themselves and their stories.
I'm not sure what you mean by liberal. TV news is incredibly conservative, safe, toothless, and ultimately self-serving. Didn't you notice how the media was neutred by Bush's zeolous patriotic flag waving and threat that you're either "with us or with the terrorist" crap.
Because Murdoch owns Fox, he decides who's going to get editorial control and who produces his TV output. Murdoch CHOSE to support the invasion of Iraq, which meant amonst other things, asking NO questions about WMD, links to terror, links to 9/11 etc. So Murdoch CHOSE to fully, unquestioningly support Bush's "war on terror" and the attack on Iraq.
Just like when Murdoch CHOSE to defend Saddam Hussein's gas attack on the Kurds as self defense when they actually happened. 20 years later Murdoch was claiming the gas attacks were proof that Saddam was the most dangerous man in the world. Why? Because Murdoch will support whatever government policy he thinks will eventually lead to pay-off that benefits his ambitions and expanding empire.
Does Murdoch attack the appalling human rights record of China, the lack of democracy, the lack of workers rights, the lack of free speech? Of course not. What does he care - he has TV to sell.
03-26-2006 09:01 PM
