Re: virus: News Bias and Sources

From: joedees@bellsouth.net
Date: Sat Aug 03 2002 - 13:35:42 MDT


On 3 Aug 2002 at 13:17, Hermit wrote:

>
> Casey, no news is "unbiased," and indeed I'm not sure it should
> attempt to be, because that results in a news source that lies
> continually in the assertion that it is even handed - sometimes
> actively (as in US TV news) - and sometimes passively (as in the case
> of most newspapers and magazines).
>
> Simply selecting which stories get chosen (are perceives as
> "interesting" or "important") for distribution is also a form of bias
> (e.g. a Jewish death is much more likely to be reported than a
> Palestinian death by NPR). What I think is required - and look for -
> is that bias be explicit, and that a news distributor differentiates
> between opinion, surmise and fact. This allows me to determine the
> perspective of the author and seems to be beyond any American based
> news source (outside perhaps of the excellent Declan McCullogh but
> then, he has a very narrow focus of interest). Perhaps this explains
> the lamentable lack of capability on the part of most US consumers to
> differentiate between fact and opinion (or propaganda), or to realize
> that there are usually more than "two sides" to a story.
>
> All of this should go some why towards explaining why I read a wide
> range of sources whose biases I know - but I tend to quote principally
> from The Guardian - on the grounds that they do a more than adequate
> job of presenting a broad range of global news offering both facts and
> a good analysis of the same while differentiating between them. Where
> they differ most from American sources (and many British sources too),
> is that they understand the nuances caused by the fact that each
> country has its own peculiarities and slants, and do an excellent job
> of conveying "the feeling on the ground" along with the news. Their
> bias is quite clear, and using them continuously allows one to become
> used to it. They speak from a center liberal perspective and,
> refreshingly or infuriatingly (apparently), dare to analyze issues
> which appear sacrosanct to American sources and consumers. For a
> quick, generally fair opinion, when time is constrained, they are
> probably the best English language news source.
>
People here might benefit from perusing the site of the universally
acknowledged 'King of the Bloggers", Andrew Sullivan. It is to be found
at:
>
http://www.andrewsullivan.com/
>
> Regards
>
> Hermit
>
> ----
> This message was posted by Hermit to the Virus 2002 board on Church of
> Virus BBS.
> <http://virus.lucifer.com/bbs/index.php?board=51;action=display;thread
> id=25928>



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