Posts Tagged ‘media bias’

The creation of media bias

Posted: June 9, 2020 by chrisharper in Uncomfortable Truths
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By Christopher Harper

While taking an online course created by the University of Texas and the Knight Foundation, I hoped to learn more about reporting on the Covid-19 crisis.

Instead, I got an informative look at the creation and propagation of media bias throughout the world.

Had the class involved only a few students, the result would have been a small group of individuals subjected to an anti-Trump bias. Instead, nearly 10,000 people from countries throughout the world received examples of how NOT to report.

The instructor, science reporter Maryn McKenna, barely cloaked her bias throughout the four-week class.

In the first week, the class got the bias of writer Sonia Shah.

“[W]hat really surprised me about the way this pandemic is unfolding is the huge political failure in the United States. I think that really was not expected. You know, I think we’ve all been kind of confused about the U.S. response and, you know, the political moment we’re in where we have all of these right-wing populist leaders around the world,” she opined.

That would run counter to recent studies that found the U.S. lockdown may have saved 60 million Americans from contracting the disease.

In the second week, the class read one of the instructor’s articles in The New Republic, an avowedly leftist publication, entitled “The Plague Years: How the rise of right-wing nationalism is jeopardizing the world’s health.” 

“Nationalism, xenophobia, the new right-wing populism in Europe and the United States, are raising our risk,” said Ronald Klain, who was the White House Ebola response coordinator for President Barack Obama, told her. 

The article is a classic example of confirmation bias, where she sought out sources to confirm her beliefs.

In the third week, the instructor blamed President Trump and Fox News for saying hydroxychloroquine might help people to recover from Covid-19. Her criticism was based on a study that has been subsequently found to have had numerous errors. See https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/04/health/coronavirus-hydroxychloroquine.html

McKenna also highlighted an obvious piece of propaganda from a student from China:

“China’s President Xi Jinping…pledged to make any potential vaccine developed by China a ‘global public good’ once it was put into use. This move would be China’s contribution to achieving accessibility and affordability of a vaccine in developing countries as well.”

Moreover, the instructor makes a particular point to forecast that it would take 10 to 15 years to discover a vaccine.

Then the coup de grace in the final week. In rapid succession, the instructor interviewed the head of the CDC under Obama, who criticized the current U.S. policies. But, ahem, she failed to ask him about Obama’s and his failures during the H1N1 pandemic.

Then, you can’t make this stuff up, came fiction writer Annalee Newitz.

“We’re seeing our political institutions become more unstable. We’re seeing environmental problems exacerbated as regulations over environmental waste. We’re seeing more problems around climate change because environmental regulations are being relaxed during these difficult times. … We’re facing starvation in California, even though we have plenty of food, but lots of people are now undernourished and malnourished and aren’t able to eat,” Newitz told the instructor, who didn’t question this nonsense.

Famine?

I repeatedly tried to contact the instructor, who apparently ignored my emails.

One of the organizers, University of Texas professor Rosental Alves, responded to my complaints.  

Alves said: “This is the only complaint I have received from anyone among the nearly 9,000 people registered in this MOOC. It’s also the first time I’ve received a political bias complaint since I started our distance learning program for journalists 17 years ago. I will look into it.” 

I’ve heard nothing more.

I declined my certificate of completion of the class on reporting about Covid-19. Instead, I might ask for a certificate in watching media bias unfold to nearly 10,000 people, who, unlike me, may have limited backgrounds in assessing how the media can suborn the truth and propagate the false. 

NPR Charlie Sheen and parental fealty

Posted: March 9, 2011 by datechguy in media, opinion/news
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I couple of days ago I saw this post from a Chinese site concerning Charlie Sheen. It from a Chinese view concerning Sheen actions in terms of parental fealty (that is respect for one’s parents and family name) Sicilians are very big into this so the article interested me. The author talked about how media influences behavior:

How many young people have been led astray by Sheen’s boasts about his substance abuse and freewheeling sex life? And that was when he was in character on national television, as a randy bachelor in Two and a Half Men.

The author then talked about the difference between how such a situation would be handled in a Chinese culture rather than an American one.

Take Edison Chen, who humbly apologized and slipped away to Canada. Or Li Gang’s father, who wept as he sought forgiveness on his son’s behalf.

The fact that Sheen continues to embarrass himself unabated, becoming even a hero to many, points to the vast differences in cultures.

Now there is a lot of talk about how TV really doesn’t have an influence and it doesn’t really matter. It is to those people that I direct the next line:

He ignored his own father’s advice to keep quiet, who was once the president of the US. emphasis mine Sheen is a disgrace, unfilial to his father and his fatherland.

You are likely laughing right now. Look at this guy who doesn’t know the difference between West Wing and reality, what a maroon. Consider how many years West Wing was on, how many people who don’t pay attention to this kind of thing, or lived overseas with no other point of reference actually believed what they saw?

Which brings us to NPR.

One of the things that makes institutional bias the “media template” so insidious is the effect of a false background message on people who do not pay attention to what is going on. True or false it becomes what “everybody knows”.

When a person or a group has an acknowledged bias (For example I am unapologetic conservative Catholic) those biases are out there and people can make an informed decision on what to believe or not. When you have a large company supported by tax dollars feeding biases such as shown in the NPR videos you are simply providing propaganda to a particular side, and to those who are either not paying attention regularly or to those listening overseas it becomes what “everybody knows”.

I don’t think this is a bug, I think NPR considers this a feature. How many people have a false impression of the Tea Party, a position that would be moot if they attended a meeting or two?

And that is why government funding doesn’t belong, if people or groups want to give their money to support a point of view that’s one thing, its a free country. To use public funds, particularly when we have a deficit, to do so that’s another.

Update: Fealty was misspelled in the Chinese article and I copied that misspelling, corrected.

Update 2: The damage control keeps up first Ron Schiller, then Vivian Schiller now Ron again

Aspen Institute communications director Jim Spiegelman says in an e-mail: “Ron Schiller has informed us that, in light of the controversy surrounding his recent statements, he does not feel that it’s in the best interests of the Aspen Institute for him to come work here.”

That half minute news story keeps getting longer doesn’t it?

The NPR executive caught on video bashing the Tea Party and saying that NPR didn’t need federal funding will not be heading to the Aspen Institute. Ron Schiller had been scheduled to start his new position as director of the Aspen Institute Arts Program and Harman-Eisner Artist-in-Residence April 1, according to a glowing press release distributed last week.

But now Aspen Institute communications director Jim Spiegelman says that Schiller will not be working there.

Rush is now reporting that Ron Schiller is claiming his statements do not reflect the views of NPR or his own. Say WHAT?

If you want to know what is actually happening in Wisconsin…

Posted: March 4, 2011 by datechguy in media, opinion/news
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You need to be reading Ann Althouse these days.

And don’t miss this exchange on Bloggerheads TV

Watch the whole exchange, this particular quote is spot on:

There is no comparison between the rhetoric of the tea party and the rhetoric of these protesters. This is 100 times worse, I mean you have to look around to find anything amongst the tea parties maybe you know maybe there’s some guy with a sign that’s over the top but basically its all over the place here.

Listen to the different between her and Tim Noah he makes general assertions on the tea party based on a single visit to a single rally. Ann has been to multiple Tea Party Rallies and has covered the Wisconsin protests in-depth. Who’s opinion would you trust more?

Am I actually seeing Morning Joe reporting on the media difference?

Posted: March 3, 2011 by datechguy in blogs, media, opinion/news
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The difference in Wisconsin coverage that is, why yes, Politico wrote about the double standard concerning “signs”:

“The mainstream media’s professed concern with uncivil engages only when it is practiced by conservatives,” asserted the Washington Post’s conservative blogger Jennifer Rubin.

And conservative blogger Michelle Malkin, who has made her blog something of a clearinghouse of alleged union misdeeds, boasts she is doing “the reporting the tea party-bashing national media won’t do on the rabid outbreak of progressive incivility and violence at Big Labor protests across the country.”

and Morning Joe is talking about the double standard in the Wisconsin coverage.

They are not touching on the PHYSICAL stuff, nor did they show any extended clip with the union folks actually saying what they are saying but they did do a whole segment on the double standard and objected loudly to it.

It’s interesting to note they Politico didn’t embed any of the actual video, and Morning Joe didn’t play any of the audio.

This is very revealing, this means that the video and audio can’t be hidden, it means that it has spread on social networking sites and blog and getting out there. It means that Politico, forced to cover the story has decided to make it one about the media double standard. (a very valid story) instead of what the Unions and their supports are actually doing.

Even funnier is their defense of the media pointing to a single blog post at the NYT online:

In fact, the New York Times’ Michael Shear did write a blog post about the Wisconsin GOP’s slickly produced video, calling it “striking” for its juxtaposition of incendiary rhetoric from union protestors with liberal accusations about angry conservative rhetoric.

As I mentioned before, look at the actions to see what is happening, this story and Morning Joe’s coverage of it tells you an awful lot about who is actually winning this debate.

Update: It’s worth noting that they only touched on this in the 6 a.m. hour then dropped it like a hot potato.

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