From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.news-media,talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: CNN Anchor Admits Pro-Clinton Bias
Date: 10 Sep 92 00:31:45 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <BuA18H.511@apollo.hp.com> nelson_p@apollo.hp.com (Peter Nelson) writes:
>In article <1992Sep8.172004.20621@ncar.ucar.edu> gary@colossus.cgd.ucar.edu (Gary Strand) writes:
>>pn> Peter Nelson
>>
>>pn> I don't understand why some people seem to have a problem with journalists,
>>pn> editors, and newspapers and TV stations having opinions which are expressed
>>pn> in their reporting.  The idea of "objective journalism" is naive nonsense
>>pn> anyway and we should all grow up and stop demanding or expecting it.
>>
>>  What's your opinion, then, on the constant bleating by journalists that they
>>  *are* being objective? Perhaps they've fallen into the trap of believing 
>>  their own propaganda, a common fault of libertarians, as you often say. 
>
>  I'm sure that's part of it.  I'm sure that another part is that these are
>  pro-forma statements that nobody, or at least nobody with any reasonable
>  knowledge of the world, is expected to believe, i.e., PR statements like 
>  those issued by politicians, religions, and corporations all the time.
>
>  
>>  I don't think it's out of line to demand objectivity, since we as consumers
>>  of the media have the power to force it to accomodate our wishes.
>
>  I disagree that objectivity is *possible*.  Reporters, editors, photo-
>  graphers, etc are human beings with inevitable biases, prejudices, 
>  and a whole bunch of built-in cultural assumptions.   I agree we as
>  consumers have a great deal of power to control media content.  One
>  argument (which I've been making here lately) is that we actually DO
>  exercise this power routinely and the result is what we're getting.
>  But if we don't/aren't then I would claim the best we could hope for is
>  to create journalistic organs which are not objective, but which merely
>  reflect OUR particular prejudices.   And we already do this as well, which
>  is why I make sure to read National Review *and* the Utne Reader, among
>  other publications when considering an issue.

Well it's time someone from the media lent an authoritative word to
this debate. The media is biased. Individual reporters are biased,
fewer in the liberal direction than you would think. And corporate
officers are biased, and dictate that *their* bias be the one represented
on the air. I've worked in broadcasting for 25 years. I see the raw
unedited stories. I hear the reporters complain that they aren't allowed
to tell the truth. I hear the producers quote the party line. I talk
to anchors who wince when they have to read the scripts that pass for
reality.

The news media in this country is basically in the hands of a few
corporations. Their editorial policy is what has to be followed
or you don't work in the business. Such things are unwritten,
but made quite clear to those who decide what sees daylight, and
what gets twisted or buried. GE/NBC is the most blatant, but Time
Warner and the others are not far behind. The agendas of these
corporations are quite similar, which should not be surprising
when you realize that their corporate officers are interchangeable.
Most are of the same age. Many come from the same schools, even
having learned from the same teachers, attend the same parties, 
and deal with the same insular group of movers and shakers day
to day. It's not surprising that their cocktail liberal ideologies
are similar, nor that it differs dramatically from that of their
troops in the streets, many of whom are very disillusioned of
liberal solutions to the issues they see up close every day.

In daily news reporting, there are few choices. Most towns now
have only one paper, and it's owned by one of the megamedia companies.
Most towns have interchangeable TV news programs who compete to see
who can use the most special effects in a newscast, content is strictly
secondary to flash. Read or watch a story about an issue of which you
have personal knowledge. Then note the distortions and spin applied
to it by the media. Now consider that the same distortions and spin
are being placed on stories where you have no personal knowledge to
direct you. It can be frightening. We're not really living in the
world we think we are.

There are a few good independent papers out there that let their
reporters tell things the way they see them, through their own
personal biases. At least you get a diversity of opinion from
those papers. A few magazines also have agendas that differ from
the giant conglomerates. But no one is telling you the objective
truth. That's probably impossible, even eye witnesses disagree
on what they see. If you are depending on one or more of the 
big chains for all your news, however, you are getting one sided
coverage that's all slanted the same way.

I'd also note that editorial slant is almost never an issue when
questions about circulation or ratings are discussed. What's
discussed in those meetings is how to change the *style* of
the paper or broadcast to increase it's appeal, no voice is
ever raised to change the slant of the content, that's a given
that can't be altered. The hairstyle of the anchor, the typeface, 
or color comics are the big issues of the day in circulation 
and ratings meetings. The broadcast business is obscenely 
profitable by the standards of most industries. They know
they can feed the public nearly anything and get away with
it. They know they have a lock on their advertising customers
who have nowhere else to go. They think it's their duty to *shape* 
public opinion, to be *leaders*. It's just arrogance of course,
but there's no one to tell them no.

Gary