I want to start my blog out by posting about my overall opinion of the media. I don't think the media benefits the people as it should. I feel that it has become such a commercialized industry that we only hear what they want us to hear, or what the highest bidder wants them to say. When concerning politics the media has control over the outcome of the election. If they refuse to cover a certain politician then he/she will fall between the cracks and no matter how good he/she may be, people won't know about them. That holds power. Being discussed by the news media is free publicity that can help get your name known. The problem is making sure you have GOOD publicity.
In my opinion Fox News is the most bias of all the news networks, but that can be contributed to the number of conservative viewers they have. Fox merely caters to what the people want to hear, not what they need to hear. In an article found here they discuss the news ratings different networks have. I found the article interesting because it shows a reason why the networks report what they do. A liberal network will report what liberals want to hear, the same with conservative networks. Fox is a highly conservative network, so they will and do report to reflect that. I simply disagree with that mentality. I want to hear the facts uncolored by bias.
I was not as cynical about the news media until watching the 2008 presidential election. I would change the channels and the differences in the way information is portrayed was amazing to me. One network would be praising what a candidate said and the next would be ripping it apart. If a person only watched one network, they would only hear that point of view.
I do understand that the media is all about ratings. They want people to watch their network or read their paper, so I understand catering to the masses to a degree. However, I don't agree with the level of bias we have. I just wish the media would show all sides of a story. Leave the debating and analyzing to the experts. The news needs to be unbiased.
I totally agree with you. My opinion of the media changed dramatically after the 2008 elections. Fox News was really disappointing in their covergage, but then again, what do you expect from a network whos owner donated millions to the RNC? The news has got to be biased, right? Look forward to reading your blog!
ReplyDeleteI also agree with what you say. Some of the information that is given (natural disasters, war coverage) is made to keep us informed about the world. The sad thing is that these same news outlets also give us political mumbo-jumbo that leaves many Americans, including myself, turned off from the news in general. In other words, it's a disappointment when the televised duel of Deal and Barnes turns me off from the same network that would've informed me about the Pakistani floods. With more of this type of non-sense, the news will be put into many Americans genre of 'trash tv'.
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