We all have biases, based on our experiences, on our goals. We like to think we are open-minded about everything, but we are more comfortable when we are surrounded by people, and media, that support our views.
The above chart, by Ad Fontes Media, is based on a detailed analysis they do of many media sources - you can check out their methodology on their site. I’ve always been somewhat left of centre, and two of my main media choices are the Guardian Weekly and the Washington Post. In fact, I pay for both of them. They both are rated as a slightly left bias, and with reliable, analysis/fact reporting. I have other sources, including a TweetDeck selection of favourite journalists, but they all tend to be from the same area of the chart. One popular site for many, Fox News, rates as right bias, and only generally reliable on some issues and/or extremism. Yes, I could try to be ‘balanced’ by spending equal time off over there in right field, but the farther I goes, it seems to me they are less about facts (except for #alternatefacts) and more about rhetoric and opinion, as short, easily remembered and repeated sound bites. What I call “Bumper Sticker Politics”. But for many people, especially on the right, politics, like religion, is a belief system. They believe certain ‘truths’ about it, as beliefs, without the necessity of facts, so don’t miss the absence of supporting data. I can see the comfort in that.
However, trying to be balanced brings us to ‘bothsideism”. Wikipedia says of this, “False balance, also bothsidesism, is a media bias in which journalists [or others] present an issue as being more balanced between opposing viewpoints than the evidence supports. . . . [It’s] an attempt to avoid bias and gives unsupported or dubious positions an illusion of respectability. It creates a public perception that some issues are scientifically contentious, though in reality they may not be, therefore creating doubt about the scientific state of research, and can be exploited by interest groups.”
We saw this in many COVID discussions. For example, to discuss the science behind a decision, someone would be introduced as a medical graduate with several specialties, many peer-reviewed publications and a number of years of relevant experience. Then, for the other ‘side’, we would be presented with someone whose qualifications included a list of self-published books, many social media sites and hundreds of thousands of followers. They really should be introduced with, "And here is so and so, not a medical graduate, with no peer-reviewed publications and no years of relevant experience, to present their views on this.”
But that would not sell clicks and advertising.
Trump gave us a great example of this phenomenon after the violent protests in Charlottesville, where someone from the right(?) had rammed their car into protestors. Possibly inspired by Trump’s rhetoric. Trump said of this, “You also had people that were very fine people, on both sides.”
We rely on the media to dig into all parts of an issue, but we also expect them to act like refs on the playing field, to throw down a red flag when someone breaks the rules. Not to try to explain it away.
The New Republic (Bias: -18.05, Reliability: 34.16) recently published a piece on this “bothsideism”, entitled “CNN, Politico Want to Give Authoritarianism a Fair Shake -Are these outlets truly ignorant of the threats facing our democracy, or are they looking to profit from its fall?”
A rhetorical question, as profits are the name of the game. And power. Especially for those that enabled Trump and “The Big Lie”. PBS has a great documentary on this, via Youtube. It’s almost 2 hours long, and you need US access, but do check it out. And if you’re up here in Canada, well we’re not there. Yet.
OK, there I go, being depressing and cynical again. I hope you enjoyed my thoughts, and have some comments. Time to look for something more uplifting. Here’s a quote and a picture.
“Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them and you have their shoes.” —Jack Handey
Email from a friend, Patty - The idea of balanced journalism is a good one as long as there are two equal sources. In the early days of newspapers and broadsheets all reporting was one-sided. Usually it reflected the POV of the owner and/or writer. This so-called 'yellow journalism' often concentrated on scandals and stirred controversy. The idea of balance developed in early US journalism schools and 'newspapers of record' in the second half of the 20th century. When I took journalism courses in the 1980s we were told that stories could have multiple points of view, or only one, depending on the story.
We were allowed to use our research (and bias) to weigh whether an opinion was based on some truth, or part of the real story. But then we were Canadians, mostly learning about newspapers, newsmagazines and radio.
A major component of media bias is the information they choose not to cover, or to actively suppress. There are many recent examples, such as the (true) Hunter Biden laptop story which broke in the NY Post just before the last U.S. election. The "media bias report" you highlight does not even try to measure this effect, but it would tend to move every media outlet that is on or left of their center line further to the left. I think (I could be wrong) that the outlets to the right of center do less outright censorship of information, and more analysis of it to fit their worldview.