Media bias

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Media bias refers to a real or perceived tendency of journalists and news producers within the mass media to approach both the presentation of particular stories, and the selection of which stories to cover, with a perspective which is unblanced due to political affliation. In essence, the accusation of "media bias" generally refers to either censorship or propagandism as it may be carried out by particular news sources and media outlets. Proponents of media bias generally allege that such content is framed in the light of a preconceived political agenda, although it is equally true that accusations of media bias may often be employed for their rhetorical effect. In this case, journalists may be pressured to give equal weight to minority or unpopular views.

Some categories of bias which have been identified are:

  • Ethnic or racial bias: Including nationalism and regionalism.
  • Corporate bias: Which may Include advertising, coverage of political campaigns, and the reporting of issues to favor a station's corporate economic interests.
  • Class bias: Bias towards one social class, and ignoring social or class divisions,
  • Political bias: Bias towards one tendency or wing of the political spectrum,
  • Sensationalism: A category which tends to supersede other biases, whereby news may be over-emphasised, distorted or even manufactured to boost commercial ratings.

History of bias in the mass media

Political bias has a long history in the mass media, dating back to the early days of the printing press and the birth of modern mass media. The expense of early printing equipment meant that the technical and monetary resources necessary for media production were only within reach of a limited number of people, and that these people could be expected to serve as the representatives of large or powerful social groupings. Furthermore, the idea of a free press is also something of a modern invention, and early media sources could expect a pronounced degree of lobbying, interference and even censorship from powerful interests. For these reasons, the printing press was often used as a tool of political advocacy. The vast majority of newspapers were openly partisan in nature, with editorializing deeply integrated with the reporting of current events.

Not until the nineteenth century did notions of unbiased reporting and neutral point of view begin to assume their status as an integral part of journalistic ethics. Even today, however, the individuals considered to be journalism's most objective and balanced reporters cannot completely avoid accusations of bias.

Like newspapers, the broadcast media (radio and television) have been used as a mechanism for propaganda from their earliest days, a tendency made more pronounced by the initial ownership of broadcast spectrum by national governments. Although a process of media deregulation has placed the majority of the western broadcast media in private hands, there still exists strong government presence, and even monopoly, in the broadcast media of many countries across the globe.

Role of language in media bias

Mass media, despite its ability to project worldwide, is limited in its cross-ethnic compatibility by one simple attribute -- language. Ethnicity, being largely developed by a divergence in geography, language, culture, and similarly, point of view, has the potential to be countered by a common source of information. Therefore, language differences could be seen to represent, to a large extent, the only real barrier to a world community of debate and opinion, although it is also true that media within any given society may be split on class, political or regional lines, and there is no reason that these splits would not be mirrored on a large scale.

Language may also be seen as a political factor in mass media, particularly in instances where a society, as in the case of India, is characterized by a large number of languages spoken amongst its population. The choice of language of mass media may represent a bias towards the group most likely to speak that language, and may be seen to limit the participation in public life of those who do not speak the language. On the other hand, there have also been attempts to use a common-language mass media to reach out to a large, geographically dispersed population, such as the case of the Arabic language news channel Al Jazeera.

Many media theorists concerned with language and media bias point towards the media of the United States, a large country where English is spoken by the vast majority of the population. Some theorists argue that the common language is not homogenizing; and that there still remain strong differences expressed within the mass media. This viewpoint asserts that moderate views are bolstered by drawing influences from the extremes of the political spectrum. In the United States, the national news therefore contributes to a sense of cohesion within the society, proceeding from a similarly informed population. According to this model, most views within society are freely expressed, and the mass media is accounyable to the peopple and tends to reflect the spectrum of opinion.

Critics often point out that, alongside a common language, the US mass media may be characterised by an unusually small concentration of ownership, with the large majority of media sources owned by a small number of large firms.

Study and theories of media bias

Media bias is studied at schools of journalism, university departments (including Media studies, Cultural studies and Peace studies) and by many independent watchdog groups from various parts of the political spectrum. These are most numerous in focussing on issues of a conservative/liberal balance in the media of the United States, but many others pursue a broader focus on international differences in reporting.

These studies may take into account the examination of commercial pressures of Advertising, as well as political sponsorship and campaigning, special interests and the representation of minorities. Critical thinkers often point out that mass media is the single most powerful device for controlling and appeasing the masses, and it is naturally exploited in any number of ways for its persuasive power.

Studies of media bias may prove useful when examining a society as a whole as, despite the process of globalisation nad the international ownership of many mass media sources, mass media is rarely an international phenomenon. In this sense, the "wide spectrum" of views which the mass media must cater to is, in practice, limited to the political spectrum of a given nation. International media organizations, despite being cosmopolitan, will often still shape their output on a regional scale, changing presentations to fit different regions, and perceptions in that region.

Liberal versus conservative bias in the United States

Liberal media bias

In the United States, some claim that a liberal media bias exists. People who believe in a leftist media biased often also believe that most individual journalists and news producers hold left-wing or liberal political views.

To argue that the views have been pushed, those who believe in a liberal media bias say that the media has a tendency to inflame stories which suggest that guns in the hands of private citizens are responsible for crimes (and ignore when a gun has been used for positive purposes in law enforcement or self-protection). Some have argued that the media tends to portray Republican leaders as less intelligent, compared to their Democratic counterparts. Some argue that even asking politicians about their plans to solve social issues is a form of liberal bias, since such a question is based on the liberal assumption that government has a role in solving social or economic problems.

The editorial pages of many large U.S. newspapers such as The New York Times, the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle, are perceived by some as typically arguing from a liberal point-of-view.

Conservative media bias

On the other hand, liberal journalists could try so hard to avoid any hint of liberal bias in their work, that some claim that their work ends up having a conservative bias. A study from Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) claims that journalists actually are not particularly liberal on most issues anyway[1]. FAIR (and others) have also argued that accusations of liberal media bias are part of a conservative strategy, noting an article in the 8/20/92 Washington Post in which Republican party chair Rich Bond compared journalists to referees in a sporting match: "If you watch any great coach, what they try to do is 'work the refs.' Maybe the ref will cut you a little slack next time."

Conservative media bias is said to exist for two reasons. First, the owners of media corporations are alleged to be conservative, like many business owners. As owners, they can dictate editorial and hiring policies. The second reason traces media concentration. The mass media are owned by a small number of very large diversified media corporations. Such a uniformity of ownership means that stories which do not somehow benefit these large corporations may not be run. Examples of conservative media bias might include the media's failure to cover, for example, many of the early anti-globalization demonstrations or to depict the protesters as troublemakers and prone to violence.

Conservative bias is perceived by some in the editorial stance of several major newspapers such as the Washington Times, New York Post, Wall Street Journal, and Chicago Sun-Times.

Hostile media effect

Accusations of conservative media bias tend to differ from accusations of liberal media bias in the sense that the "conservative bias" is said to be fundamentally economic in tone, while the "liberal" biases deal more with social and cultural issues. It is therefore possible that there can be some overlap within these alleged biases, for it could be possible for a news producer to be economically conservative, yet still favor liberal social policy.

In either case, however, it should be noted that it has been found that partisans consistently perceive media coverage as being biased against their side. This has been called the hostile media effect by psychology researchers.

National and ethnic viewpoint

Many news organizations reflect or are percieved to reflect in some way the viewpoint of the geographic, ethnic, and national population that they primarily serve. Media within countries is sometimes seen as being "boosteristic" or unquestioning about the country's government.

Western media is often criticized in the rest of the world (including eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East) as being pro-Western with regard to a variety of political, cultural and economic issues. Al-Jazeera has been frequently criticized in the West about its coverage of Arab world issues.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict and wider Arab-Israeli issues are a particularly controversial area, and almost most coverage of any kind generates accusation of bias from one or both sides.

Other influences

We might also consider another form of media bias, which is not specifically political in nature. The news media tend to cover stories which give higher ratings, which means that stories that are important are neglected in favor of the latest sensational mass school shooting, celebrity wedding, plane crash, or similarly glamorous or shocking story. Millions of people can die at the hands of some African dictator with hardly a moment of notice by the news, but the shooting of 5 people with a handgun in a high school is analyzed endlessly. The reason may not be political, it is said, but simply a function of what the public wants to watch. Nonetheless, this is a form of bias if the function of the media is regarded as the presentation of a relatively balanced and factual explanation of the state of the world.

Bias has also been claimed in instances referred to as conflict of interest, whereby the owners of media outlets have vested interests in other commercial enterprises. In such a case, it has from time to time been observed that stories which favor the commercial interests of the media owners or are detrimental to their competitors and opponents have not only been favored, but even at times invented whole-cloth from manufactured evidence. The conflict of interest here is between the perceived interest of the media in impartially informing the public, and the hidden interest of someone who controls a media organ in misleading the public to his own benefit.

Conservative bias

Conservative bias in media is demonstrated with factually substantiated examples of reportage and editorials which demonstrate bias in favor of conservative or right wing views. Non-partisans, liberals and progressives reference conservative bias by citing examples from such sources as Media Matters for America, Fair, Pipa and other media watchdog groups; blogs, such as Talking Points Memo by Josh Marshal and reports from Air America Radio and journalists such as Salon.com's Joe Conason. In some cases the owership of the media outlets is called into question, such as Rupert Murdoch's Fox Network, other times reference is made to Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and other such popular rightist pundits. At times reporters are mentioned, such as Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Judith Miller of the New York Times who made exensive use of unnamed sources when reporting on President Bush's arguments in favor of military action against Iraq, in his assertions that Iraq possessed Weapons of mass distruction which posed an immediate threat to the U.S. and Europe. Some observers of conservative bias cite examples of press coverage from the terms of president Bill Clinton with that of, for example, Ronald Reagan who as known as the Teflon president[2]. Critics of conservative bias in media often point, explicitly or by example, to right wing pundits' and reports' deviations from Journalistic ethics and standards.

Contast with Liberal bias, Advocacy journalism

Liberal bias

"Liberal bias" is a common phrase used in American political discourse to express the view that the American media generally has a liberal bias. The expression is frequently used by critics of the network news stations of CBS, ABC, and NBC, as well as major newspapers and newswires, especially the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post, as well as the Associated Press and others. Others seriously dispute this, with some claiming that there is, instead, a conservative bias. Still others say that what is often labeled as "liberal bias" is more accurately termed sensationalism, not necessarily anything biased in favor of liberalism.

Claims of "liberal biases" prevail mainly in the United States; however, some prominent figures on the right-wing in Britain have also claimed that the British media is left-wing, especially the publicly funded BBC. Conservative critics in Canada have similarly attacked the state-funded CBC, as Australian conservatives have done to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

Contrast with Conservative bias

History

Bernard Goldberg's Bias
File:Journalistic Fraud.jpg
Bob Kohn's Journalistic Fraud
File:Slander.jpg
Ann Coulter's Slander

One of the earliest claims that liberal bias dominates the media dates back to November 1969, when Spiro Agnew, then Vice President under Richard Nixon made a landmark speech denouncing media influence on politics.1 From the 1990s onwards, some American conservatives have increasingly voiced their perception that liberals dominate the American mass media and present a liberal point of view.

Several authors have written books on liberal bias in the media. Some examples include:

Allegations

People who use the phrase "liberal bias" believe that liberal biases are evident in both the choice (what stories are favored, or "played," over others) and coverage (how stories are researched, portrayed, and presented). According to their perceptions, there is a "slant" or "spin" in the news that tends to promote a left-wing agenda.

The specific criticisms of proponents of the theory tend to be two-fold. First, the objectivity of anchors and newswriters is called into question, and second, the priorities and focus of the media network stations and corporations in general is disputed.

Conservative critics often accuse prominent anchors such as Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather, and Peter Jennings as being rather "open" liberals instead of political neutrals, and point to various speeches and comments they've made that illustrate their views. Other anchors may be criticised for their past, non-media careers, in which they may have been supporters, campaigners, or fundraisers of left-wing political candidates. Surveys have been done which indicate that by a rather large margin journalists in the United States tend to vote overwhelmingly Democratic in federal elections. Conservatives argue that when news anchors and producers have private, politically-active backgrounds, it inevitably skews their outlook when delivering the news or holding interviews. They also accuse a majority of the channels (most often CBS, NBC, ABC, and CNN) of having an extreme liberal bias.

Such allegations of pre-existing political biases lead into the other main criticism, which is that mainstream news covers events in a way that supports the liberal perspective while minimizing the conservative counterarguments. Conservatives claim that issues such as abortion or the PATRIOT Act are examples of issues in which conservative counter-arguments to liberal opposition are rarely given much time or positive consideration on the news.

Another main allegation is that the media routinely portrays Republicans in an unflattering light, pointing to media coverage of Ronald Reagan, Dan Quayle, and George W. Bush as examples. Republicans, they argue, are routinely portrayed as stupid, incompetent, fanatical, or worse due to the media's focus on an alleged number of tactics, such as selective quoting, "gotcha" tactics, or excessively emotionally-driven coverage.

The breaking of the Lewinsky scandal by Matt Drudge, instead of Newsweek, who originally had the story and held onto it, is often cited as an example of liberal media bias.

Another allegation of liberal bias is a tendency to inflame stories which suggest that guns in the hands of private citizens are responsible for crimes (and ignore when a gun in the hand of a private citizen apprehended the same criminals[3]),

More recently a news story by CBS, presented in 2004, claimed the existence of documents supposedly written by George W. Bush's commanding officer during a period of military service that reflected poorly on him. The documents used in constructing the story were later revealed to be total fabrications by independent analysis, which CBS later confirmed. Those who believe in a Liberal bias see this as an example of the media purposely misleading the public, while those who dismiss such a premise either ignore the story or insist that it was an unfortunate but honest mistake.

A very common criticism of the media is that it has covered the "bad news" in Afghanistan and Iraq (Where American lead coalition forces are currently engaged in controversial military action) while ignoring the "good news." Critics point to a perceived obsession with the coalition and civilian body counts, threats of a draft, and allegations of war crimes, abuse and mismanagement. Progress, such as economic development, political reform, and increasing numbers of local police and defense forces is rarely covered. Soldiers have often been quoted as saying the Iraq where they serve is not the Iraq shown on TV, and that Afghanistan isn't shown at all. Some outspoken critics of the media have gone so far as to claim that this is a sign of an Anti-American bias, and a deliberate attempt to diminish public support, with the ultimate goal of forcing a total withdrawal of American forces.

Some individuals attribute such stories to intellectual laziness, rather than a coherent bias.

Opposing views

Mainstream media organizations accused of slanted reporting often go to great lengths to defend their objectivity. In addition, some individuals maintain that there exists in the media the precise opposite -- a conservative bias.

Critics of the concept of liberal bias argue that it is largely an invention of the conservative right. Many of these critics also say that most media outlets are owned by wealthy individuals, many if not most of whom are on the right (for example, Rupert Murdoch, the owner of FOX News; FOX is often a target of those who charge conservative bias). Moreover, they say, both the print and broadcast media survive from advertising revenues, which makes the media rely to an extent on corporations; they thus claim that these media are less likely to present information that could harm potential advertisers.

However, those who claim there exists widespread liberal bias argue that a number of these wealthy business owners are liberals, so great wealth does not necessarily entail conservatism. They point to Ted Turner, the founder of CNN, as well as other left-leaning figures who are multimillionaires such as George Soros, John Kerry, Jesse Jackson, Ted Kennedy, John Edwards and many Hollywood stars.

Critics also point to the worldwide perception that US media is more right-wing than in most other democracies, and less likely to challenge an official position than most other countries' media.

Certain neoconservatives, such as Irving Kristol, have said that the charge of "liberal bias" has been exaggerated for rhetorical purposes.

Eric Alterman, author of What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News is one of those who argues against any significant liberal bias. Reviewer John Moe sums up Alterman's views:

"The conservatives in the newspapers, television, talk radio, and the Republican party are lying about liberal bias and repeating the same lies long enough that they've taken on a patina of truth. Further, the perception of such a bias has cowed many media outlets into presenting more conservative opinions to counterbalance a bias, which does not, in fact, exist." [4]

The article 'spiking' contains an account by film critic Roger Ebert in which a reporter from NBC approached a story with preconceived conservative bias.

It can often be seen that foreign news agencies break stories before the domestic press when the contents might be unfavorable to an American right-wing point of view. For example, when the BBC ran revelations that the state of Florida had been over-aggressive about removing alleged criminals from the voter register, no US news agency ran the story.

The Propaganda model by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky deems possible bias of the journalists themselves to be an insignificant matter, but claims that structural and economic causes filter the type of news published. It has been argued that any political slant is overwhelmed by the media organization's drive to report the stories that will sell newspapers and draw viewers, and to report them in the most eye-catching way they can. This is often called sensationalist bias.

The acronym SCLM is sometimes used to refer to the "so-called liberal media" to reflect this disconnect between how the media is perceived.


See also

Examples/Sources

  1. Extracts from Agnew's talk here
  2. Lichter, S.R., Lichter, L.S. and Rothman, S., 1992. Watching America: What Television Tells Us About Our Lives.
  • Eric Alterman, author of What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News is one of those who argues against any significant liberal bias. Reviewer John Moe sums up Alterman's views:
"The conservatives in the newspapers, television, talk radio, and the Republican party are lying about liberal bias and repeating the same lies long enough that they've taken on a patina of truth. Further, the perception of such a bias has cowed many media outlets into presenting more conservative opinions to counterbalance a bias, which does not, in fact, exist." [5]
  • Media Imperialism is a critical theory regarding the perceived effects of globalization on the world's media. It is closely tied to the similar theory of cultural imperialism.
"As multinational media conglomerates grow larger and more powerful many believe that it will become increasingly difficult for small, local media outlets to survive. A new type of imperialism will thus occur, making many nations subsidiary to the media products of some of the most powerful countries or companies. Significant writers and thinkers in this area include Ben Bagdikian, Noam Chomsky, Edward S. Herman and Robert McChesney."
..."the pressure to create a stable, profitable business invariably distorts the kinds of news items reported, as well as the manner and emphasis in which they are reported. This occurs not as a result of conscious design but simply as a consequence of market selection: those businesses who happen to favor profits over news quality survive, while those that present a more accurate picture of the world tend to become marginalized."

Organizations monitoring bias

Liberal

Conservative

Further reading

Non-partisan
Progressive
Conservative
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