Media Folly: Over- and Under-informed in the West [Archive] - The Dancing Lawn

Parthian King

05-14-2007, 10:57 PM

I just read what I considered perhaps the most absurd use of bandwidth ever perpetrated on a "news" website: A piece on the future of our galaxy (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18665052/). This gem explains what will (might?) happen to our solar system in five billion years.

Before anyone jumps on me for an anti-intellectual dearth of curiosity in relation to the created order, let me bring up a little factoid I came by this past week. Recently a leftist president (Correa) has been elected in Ecuador. He is enormously popular (about 80% approval rating) and is aggressively moving to rewrite the nation's constitution, reform the congress, and tighten his grip on everything from freedom of the press to foreign debt and banking relations. Among his agenda items is the expulsion of U.S. military forces (by 2009) from the Pacific penninsula which (most significantly) monitor drug and illegal human traffic out of both Colombia and Peru. Now, this information has received some coverage for those who would look for it. What has not been explained, and I only learned by corresponding with a missionary friend who still lives in Ecuador (I lived there some 7 years), is that Correa's vendetta against the U.S. is grounded in a childhood memory: His father was busted for drug smuggling by U.S. DEA personnel in Panama when he was a boy.

My question is this: Why must I, a relatively interested and curious reader, find out via the back door and by sheer happenstance (instead of proper news channels) something so significant as this about a foreign head of state whose motivations and actions could have such a powerful impact on the U.S. and its security? Why is the American public fed with speculation about the 5 billion year hence history of the universe or the current state of Britney's rehab, while what we need to hear is left out?

Much has been said about the "liberal media" and its agenda. I am beginning to think the Enemy doesn't want to turn us into pseudo-intellectual liberals so much as blatantly moronic lunatics.

Olórin the Wise

05-14-2007, 11:35 PM

I agree completely, PK. The media is, in my opinion, one of the worst things that ever happened to my country. Take the Iraq war, for instance. Personally, I think that it was a necessary evil but let's not get into that right now. With the Iraq war, the media has been taking every death, every wound, every tiny scratch that's happened to the US forces in Iraq, and reporting it individually. I don't know what their motives are, but whatever they might be, the media is smoothly convincing this country that not only is the war in Iraq a terrible thing, but that war is ALWAYS, without exception, the WRONG choice - that there is no such thing as a just war. I heard a quote somewhere - it went something like this: "War is an evil thing, but not the evilest of things. A society so decadent that it would never go to war - that it had nothing left that it felt was worth fighting for - that would be worse than war." And it's exactly the opposite of that which the media is feeding to the masses right now. Sometimes it just makes me sick.

PrinceOfTheWest

05-15-2007, 03:38 AM

As I look at the stuff the media is pushing these days, I'm reminded of nothing so much as a stage magician, who keeps his audience distracted with meaningless activity done with one hand while he does the real trick with the other. For instance, people are encouraged to get all worked up about the possibility of climate change (what climate doesn't change?), while masking the fact that in laboratories around the world, humans are being created for the explicit purpose of being torn apart and experimented upon.

"They have an engine called the Press, by which the people are deceived."
C.S. Lewis

EveningStar

05-15-2007, 07:04 AM

The media has stepped out of its role as an independent observer. It has ceased to become the eyes and ears of an informed electorate and mutated into yet another source of propaganda.

We are treated like children to be shaped and molded by an older mentor who knows what's good for us. Thing is, the "ideal world" that journalists want to build for us is by and large free of such "burdens" as sexual mores and religious convictions. Boiled down to the Reader's Digest version: "If everyone just did whatever came naturally and didn't worry about some old man in a nightgown in the sky, we'd all be better off..." Uh huh....

That, ladies and gentlemen, is why it is important to consider what will happen to this world in five million years, for that's how long it will take to straighten out the mess they're creating.

Copperfox

05-15-2007, 08:02 AM

As for the excesses of misguided pacifism:

One of the most terrible of all sensations is powerlessness--the inability to affect events that affect you. When you can't actually do something that makes a difference--or can't do it without risk and exertion that you're unwilling to take on--it's a temptation to deceive yourself that something easily within your power will make a difference. This is sometimes referred to as "neurotic magic." (Atheists would accuse Christians of practicing neurotic magic in every aspect of our faith.)

If we admit that the threat of terrorism and tyranny is the fault of terrorists and tyrants, then we have to face the grim reality of needing to fight those terrorists and tyrants (or at least, in the case of the better sort of pacifist, being prepared to be martyred by them). Therefore, a cowardly self-deceiver will choose to make himself believe that it's all the fault of the free nations...because, if it's all the fault of the free nations, those free nations will permit protest, and then the coward can convince himself that protest will solve everything. The self-deceiver then comes under the description offered by Mr. Lewis (from "The Abolition of Man") of those who think that "--peace matters more than honor, and is to be achieved by jeering at colonels and reading newspapers."

Parthian King

05-15-2007, 09:39 AM

That, ladies and gentlemen, is why it is important to consider what will happen to this world in five million years, for that's how long it will take to straighten out the mess they're creating.

Ahem, that's five billion (with a "b"), Magister. And aside from the eschaton, not even that long would be enough pull us from this sin-induced morass.

Olórin the Wise

05-15-2007, 10:19 AM

I was kinda hoping the End of Time would come before that... :rolleyes:

jesslaugh

05-15-2007, 11:50 AM

I guess it depends on what you see the role of the media as being. Ideally, it should be to spread the news about things that effect us. In reality, the media sees its own role as one of profit (like any business in a capitalist society). They push stories that sell subscriptions. And, honestly, our society doesn't care much about a liberal president in Ecuador. So, from a profit standpoint, the media is selling us garbage stories because we're all buying garbage stories. Supply and demand.

inkspot

05-15-2007, 12:01 PM

Welcome to the discussion, Jess. I didn't see you post before. I agree with you about supply and demand. The reason our news has become entertainment is that we are idiots who demand to be entertained.

In Miracles, I believe, CS Lewis talks of a society which rejects sages and seers (philsophers, statesmen and clergy). At that point, there are two directions the society can go: everyone can become a sage and a seer in his own right, or everyone can become a moron. It's clear which direction the USA, anyway, si going: we won't listen to the smart people and the spiritual people, and we won't become smart and spiritual ourselves, so we are becoming morons.

jesslaugh

05-15-2007, 12:21 PM

Hello inkspot! I agree with a lot of what you said, but I actually think that our society has become sages and seers. Most people in our society would say they are "spiritual" is some sense. Everyone thinks they are in touch with some spiritual part of nature/themselves/the world/the universe. We don't need religion because we are "spiritual" already.

I'm not sure how this effects the media. I guess it spurs lots of stories about yoga and exercise and eating right and being healthy. But, since spirituality is an individual thing, it's not something the media can push generally.

Parthian King

05-15-2007, 03:26 PM

I'm not sure I buy into the trend of the discussion. The media is a business, granted, and functions within a market like other businesses. However, other businesses do not generally feel they have a moral mandate to shape society like the modern media does. Starbucks, Shell Oil, and American Airlines all just do business to make money--and media is up to a whole lot more than that (as imprtant as that is). A review of trends and "groundbreaking" shows over the history of television alone will reveal that "trendsetters" (like those who created shows such as "All in the Family," "Three's Company," "Will and Grace," and a plethora of others) deliberately chose to sell something no one was buying because they felt the public should buy it. In other words, a very, very few made a moral choice for everyone else and built into their plan the storms they knew were inevitable. After the frog quit twitching over that rise in temperature, they set something else out, if you follow me.

So the modern, Western media has a bit of an identity crisis. It wants to be a business, yes. It wants to be entertainment (even the most "serious" outlets of it). It wants to play the classic historical role of the press, keeping the public informed and the powers that be responsible. And it actively wants change according to a less than transparent agenda pushed by its operators (even through the most frivolous of its outlets). That, friends, is a potent stew. It is also why we get almost no pertinent international information (I hear this complaint from anyone who has lived internationally, whatever their political leanings) while at the same time we deal with articles the lack of which would harm us not a whit (shucks, we can't tell the weather a week out, and they're telling us what'll go down in 5 billion years?).

The observation that most don't care about what a leftist (not just "liberal," Jess) president in a South American country does or says--though it will certainly affect our lives rather directly here--is a symptom of all this, a result of it and not merely a market reality that sets the trend.

Adanedhel

05-15-2007, 03:32 PM

PrinceOfTheWest

05-15-2007, 04:09 PM

If you want some really good thinking on this, pick up Amusing Ourselves to Death by the late Neal Postman. Great stuff.

Another interesting thing to notice: talk to anyone who's been close to some event reported in the media and ask what they thought of the coverage. Nine times out of ten you'll find that some important things were missed, or words got twisted, or somewhere along the line someone else's perspective slipped into the reporting. This happened to me just recently in a local paper article: I was interviewed about something and I gave careful details, but when the article showed up the next day, I wouldn't have known myself. The editors had twisted my words to give a totally different perspective - the one they wanted to push.

PK's dead right (as was Lewis). They're pushing an agenda and are not to be trusted.

inkspot

05-15-2007, 04:11 PM

What is Skype?

PK, I agree with you "the media" in general has an agenda; I was thinking only of the news. If you are talking TV in general and Hollywood and alll print media, then I agree there is an agenda.

But I also think important stories are not breached in the US news in particular because people are too ignorant or too shallow to care. The politics of another country is boring to us. We would rather see Britney's shaved head or another story on what killed Anna Nicole. I think our educational system has turned to mush, and we are just ignorant of what's really important.

Which is also my response to Jess ... some people say they are "spiritual without being religious," but that is nonsense. That kind of spirituality is rubbish and I would not count such people as seers or sages. If you embrace a faith with a real God and real actions required of Him, even if it isn't the God I serve, it's more authentic than embracing a soporific "spirituality" which can be anything you define it to be ...

I will stand by my first assertion: people have become idiots and are happy to stay that way. If it were not so, we would revolt against the media which continually shunts us down this tunnel to imbecility.

~Sunnyromance~

05-15-2007, 05:43 PM

I think the media is showing all the wrong news. As has been said before. I mean for an example: Here in my country they spent five minuets talking about the detah of US soldiers in Iraq and Prince Harry going there. Later on the mention for like 30 seconds that there had been a natural disaster in some country which caused harm to a lot of people. I mean ain´t that a bit weird?
Also in the media they only tlak about all the bad stuff teen´s do. There are not many times where I´ve seen articles about all the positive things teens do like sports, music, communtiy work or somehting like that. it´s all just drugs, alchohols and so on. I hate that cause it portrays teen´s badly when there are lots of teens that are doing great things.

jesslaugh

05-15-2007, 05:56 PM

I think the religion embraced, largely, is the religion of self. People worship their own spirituality. They feel connected to the universe, and see themselves as part of the universe; and when they appeal to the powers of the universe, they appeal to themselves. In their own unique and quirky way, they are their own sages. At the same time, I agree with you because I think those people are idiots. So, either way, it comes down to the same truth.

Maybe some media companies or powerful people in the media would like to see societal change, and they can influence our society because the nature of the media is to reach everyone. It's not "The Media". Like PK said, it's a few people in the media. I really do think that the media reflects our society. I don't think that the media is out to make society reflect the media.

When we look back at previous decades, we don't say "look at what the media did to the soiety", but we look at the media of the time to get a feel of what the society must've been like. At least, I do.:D

I just don't think you can show any intention by the media, in general, to change society. I could be wrong, but I don't see it.

Doffen

05-15-2007, 06:03 PM

Skype is a free calling program where you can call people online who has the same program as you. You can also call directly to cell phones or house phones, though that costs money.

The one thing that strikes me when I watch American news (CNN and such) is how frightened some Americans must be. Atleast from what I've seen, the US has ALOT of war, murdering and crimes in their media. I just watched a documentary on guns and how possible it was to get them in the US ... They took up this with fear in the media, and how the press is trying to scare or intimidate Americans.

Parthian King

05-15-2007, 08:27 PM

I just don't think you can show any intention by the media, in general, to change society. I could be wrong, but I don't see it.

What if they say it's their intention?

Olórin the Wise

05-15-2007, 08:37 PM

The one thing that strikes me when I watch American news (CNN and such) is how frightened some Americans must be. Atleast from what I've seen, the US has ALOT of war, murdering and crimes in their media. I just watched a documentary on guns and how possible it was to get them in the US ... They took up this with fear in the media, and how the press is trying to scare or intimidate Americans.

It would, but for the Internet. Since the Internet came into wide usage, the media became a much less potent evil. Granted, it's still pretty powerful, but now that you can go to your favorite news web site (which is usually one that shares your views), you don't have to bother with the junk on TV as much. Another thing is that the media - most of the media, anyway - tends to focus on the negative things in our society. Even if you look at the supermarket tabloid headlines (which I don't generally prefer to do) you see, "So-and-so is dumping such-and-such", or "Is So-and-so cheating on thus-and-such?" A few media channels have made an active effort to combat this negativity - Fox5, I believe, is one - but the majority remain focused on the murders, the horrendous catastrophes, the terrible crimes, but very few of the nicer stuff.

inkspot

05-15-2007, 09:38 PM

I just don't think you can show any intention by the media, in general, to change society. I could be wrong, but I don't see it.

If the news media had no "intentions," their coverage would be, as much as possible, unbiased. But consider a couple things:

Example 1: On election night in Texas when voters overwhelmingly passed a law to protect traditional marriage, the TV news featured one family "frightened of what this could mean to their future ..." It was a beautiful lesbian woman (featured in the story) and her somewhat less beautiful partner (seen only briefly) and their two beautiful children. Their love and their family wasn't news, and the law had NOTHING to do with children of any marriage or any union. The whole gist of the story was, how mean of Texas to pass a marriage law when these lesbian moms are so nice.

Clearly it was a conscious effort to play up one viewpoint and discourage another.

Example #2: The Republican Congressman Mark Foley scandal late last year. In the first few days after the scandal about Foley broke, the three major network news outlets (ABC, NBC and CBS) ran 152 stories on the subject. Compare this with the paltry 19 stories the three combined ran on Democrat Conregssman Mel Reynolds who was arrested and convicted on 12 counts of sexual assault against a minor, obstruction of justice, and solicitation of child pornography.

(Stats courtesy of the Media Research Center.)

There's really hardly any way to explain the press' blasé overlooking of Reynolds compared to their mad dash to sully Foley's name, unless it is was some kind of agenda. (And as it broke days before national elections, the agenda is clear.)

I truly believe the media in the USA has an agenda. And I think because most people watching the TV news are gullible, the media gets away with it, because no one holds them accountable.

Olórin the Wise

05-15-2007, 10:47 PM

*nostalgic sigh* Ah, the beauty of a group of people who are all vehemently agreeing with one another...

Except for Jess. She's spoiling it all. :mad: *frowns at Jess*

(hehe only kidding Jess :D)

Parthian King

05-16-2007, 12:49 AM

Though some of this stuff has been mentioned before in another thread, somethings bear repeating. Here is a simple truth: There is no such thing as ideological objectivity. Even within secular philosophical circles, the very concept of objectivity in discussions is a dinosaur. The fact is, everyone is an interested party when it comes to matters of morality. Why? Because we are all moral (and, through sin, immoral) beings. There is no way to take such discussions lying down, as if we all didn't have some personal stake in the matter.

Now, I don't care if you went to journalism school, or have climbed the ladder at the Times, or cut a figure worthy of a pithy character in a black and white Hollywood flick. You have a chip in the game when it comes to the direction society takes. At the center of your (corrupt) heart, there is the bent to put a spin on things, to cover for yourself and make a way for more sinfulness.

On what basis do I say this? The Bible. Ah, you say, but that makes you interested too! Indeed, it does. As a Christian, I hold that the only cure for the deperately wicked heart of man is the grace of God through Christ (btw, Lewis thought so too, as is evident in his writings). The difference between the confessing Christian and their message and the faithless member of the media is just that: Confession. I admit that I am a man of faith. They pretend to be voices of cool objectivity--and through that Trojan Horse continue to push their agenda. Yet they have as much faith (or as I would say, anti-faith) as any Christian.

Bu my assertions aren't so much political as they are theological. Politics are also a Trojan Horse. I'm with POTW (surprise, surprise): The issue, the agenda is sin, which makes us criminals and victims at the same time. When a story pushes a sinful agenda to the destruction of a moral society, that's sinful man being a criminal. When it wastes resources on sheer idiocy (where it might have done real good) in the name of "wisdom," that shows how we've become victims of our own folly.

Charn_Tim

05-16-2007, 02:09 AM

ink, wow, those are a couple of ridiculous stories!...I definitely concur with the majority opinion here that the media unfortunately has an agenda they're trying to push as others have very eloquently argued.

jesslaugh

05-16-2007, 02:41 PM

EveningStar

05-16-2007, 02:54 PM

Yes, however you don't take into consideration that the sudden RISE in terrorist activity right before elections is an attempt to hijack our electoral process. The press becomes the unwitting tool of radical factions. Terrorists detonate the bomb, the media rubs our nose in it, then we have regime change in the world's remaining superpower while we spent billions trying to overthrow the government of a sand pile the size of Alabama?

In those circumstances, the media...especially with an agenda...becomes a subversive thing rather than the watchdog of democracy.

Parthian King

05-16-2007, 03:01 PM

I'm not sure that "The Media" can state their intentions. The problem is that we talk about "The Media" like it is one entity that has many heads, like the Hydra, but one mind. "The Media" doesn't issue statements or make announcements as a unified body. You might be able to find a news network that has stated intentions to make our society more socially liberal. And I might be able to find a statement from Fox News stating that they was to make our society more socially conservative. But "The Media" doesn't speak.

The last line is semantics, really. When Norman Lear sits down and consciously discusses what the American public is "ready for," and what words, phrases, and subject matter, in what order will be brought up with an end to breaking down social mores (or "hangups," as they would put it) so that at a macrolevel the show "All in the Family" can be a lever to push societal trends in a certain direction--well, that's "the Media" speaking as far as I am concerned. When Sam Donaldson says that Evangelical Christians are a malevolent and hostile force ina free society and all resources at hand should be used to marginalize them and limit their influence, that "the Media" talking as well. Frame it how you like it, but there it is. And poll after poll reveals that the Media (as long as we are using caps) is 90+% of a particular ideological bent. No wondering which one, eh?

Every story has two sides, but most news stories focus only on one side. When a law is passed in Texas to protect the sanctity of marriage, they interiew someone who could be effected by that law. That law has very little (if any) effect on heterosexuals, but heavily impacts homosexuals. That's normal. Not outrageous. And when terrorists blow-up a train in Spain, they don't interview terrorist sympathizers.

I wasn't aware that the framework for offering perspective on social matters was one size fits all (new math proponents/opponents; heterosexuals/homosexuals; terrorist sympathizers/slaughtered victims, etc.). Jess, the very fact that one-sided reporting (i.e., built-in editorial comment) is "normal" to you, a college educated young woman, is indicative of our dilemma and rather makes the point in the discussion that several of us are attempting. And as an aside, how do you conclude that a law protecting traditional marriage has no effect on those who choose one and desire one for their children?

Mark Foley got a lot more coverage than Mel Reynolds, but they were a dozen years apart and under different situations. The main reason Foley got so much attention was that it was around election time. It's about timing, and 99% of the timing is not the media's fault. When the Democratic Party has damaging information and leaks it to the press right before the elections, you can't blame the media. Also, look at how much coverage Gary Condit got, and he was a Democrat.

Yes, the different situations are that Reynolds was engaged in physical contact, while Foley was engaged in conversation via internet. Seriously, you act as if the Media has no choice in the matter--as if it's all gravity or something. The "scandal" is self-fulfilling. In my view, Foley was a schmuck and was given too much slack for too long. But the fact that you calmly accept the hypocrisy is, once again, symptomatic of the state of affairs we are discussing.

inkspot

05-16-2007, 03:17 PM

It's pretty clear the Media is prodding US society ever, socially and morally, in one direction ...

When a law is passed in Texas to protect the sanctity of marriage, they interiew someone who could be effected by that law. That law has very little (if any) effect on heterosexuals, but heavily impacts homosexuals.
Maybe I didn't make clear: the focus of the story was on these perfectly nice ladies' fear that their children would be taken from them. The law said nothing about children at all. The ladies were not, of course, married to one another, so they were not to be affected by the law any more than anyone else would. Their fears were in no way "news" as regards the law. If, for some reason, the news had wanted to fairly investigate how this law might possibly affect the children of homosexual couples, they could as reasonably have interviewed two gay men with a child and investigated the statistics which show almost all sexual abuse of boys is homosexual abuse. It would not have been any more relevant to the passage of the law than the lesbian story was, but it would have made as much sense, and it would have had at least a bit of newsworthiness in that it might somehow have been stretched to mean protection for boys at risk rather than the destruction of gay families.

But, it would not have reflected the ideology which the media constantly wants to put forth.

Another case in point: there is a ton of research which shows that abortion has disastrous effects on the expectant mom, physical and emotional, and which links things like depression and suicide to women who have had abortions. Yet in women's magazines like Marie Claire and others, you will find only articles telling women how to make sure to protect their right to an abortion and who is threatening their reproductive rights. Not a word will you find about the horrifying after-effects of abortion.

Clearly, the Mainstream Media (may I call it that?) has an agenda, and it is an anti-faith, anti-absolutes one.

~Grateful * Surrender~

05-16-2007, 03:35 PM

I won't say much but I must say that the Media is an hand pushing the agendas that it wants on our society instead of what our society needs to hear. Take the abortion "fight" for instance. I have talked personally to woman who have had abortions and they can't even begin to talk about it without tears rolling down their faces. “There is a place missing at our table. it will always be empty and I know that is my fault." that is a quote from a young woman that had an abortion that I had the privilege of talking to. That is only a fraction of the emotional side. Like inky said women fight suicide, depression, hysteria, and even mental breakdowns because of the choice to have an abortion. Does the news cover that? No. The only thing they cover is how radical fundamentalists are trying to stop the right for women to make their own choices and how women must stand by their rights. They cover a fraction of what is out there and I am waiting for the day that some reporter, some paper, some magazine out there stands up and writes the whole story.

jesslaugh

05-16-2007, 05:52 PM

Yes, however you don't take into consideration that the sudden RISE in terrorist activity right before elections is an attempt to hijack our electoral process. The press becomes the unwitting tool of radical factions.
Yes, the media is a tool for political parties and powerful people/groups with various ideologies. That tool can be used to promote liberal agendas or conservative agendas... and it is. But there's no conspiracy by the media to change society in one particular way.

When Norman Lear sits down and consciously discusses what the American public is "ready for," and what words, phrases, and subject matter, in what order will be brought up with an end to breaking down social mores (or "hangups," as they would put it) so that at a macrolevel the show "All in the Family" can be a lever to push societal trends in a certain direction--well, that's "the Media" speaking as far as I am concerned.
You see that as "The Media" pushing an agenda and trying to change our society. I see that as Norman Lear (one man) using his company as a means to push his own agenda and shape our society.

We see the same thing, but you (most of you, it seems) are willing to generalize it and attribute it to "The Media". I use the capitals and the quotes to show that you are generalizing and taking a conglomeration of things and making them one big bad entity that we can blame, like "The Boogeyman". It would be the same as me saying that the teachers of America are pushing a liberal political agenda, just because some (and some teacher associations) do.

The thing about reporting is that the story itself gives us one side. For example, when a marriage protection law is passed, the law itself is a reflection of one side of the story. The other side, the side primarily effected by the law, gets interviewed. If it was the opposite, and a law was passed forbidding the "protection of marriage", the law would reflect one side and the interview would be given to those who want to protect marriage.

And as an aside, how do you conclude that a law protecting traditional marriage has no effect on those who choose one and desire one for their children?
Because that is a law protecting the status quo. It doesn't change things any more than passing a law saying that we'll keep doing what we've been doing.

But the fact that you calmly accept the hypocrisy is, once again, symptomatic of the state of affairs we are discussing.
Since I evidently missed the hypocrisy, maybe you couple point me in the right direction? A Democrat does something bad in 1994 and it gets covered, but not much. A Republican does something bad 12 years later and it gets covered, a lot. I don't think this has to do with Republicans and Democrats. I think it shows a shift in our society toward caring more about these issues. Why do I think that? Because Gary Condit was a Democrat and got a lot of coverage for his actions, in 2001, also. And, like I said before, the Mark Foley scandal came out at a sensitive political time. Around the election, people want to hear about politics, and people wanted to hear about Mark Foley. The people demanded it, so the media supplied it. The media didn't supply it, hoping the market would buy it. That's not how business works; and, like you said, the media is a business.

]It's pretty clear the Media is prodding US society ever, socially and morally, in one direction ... and Jess' inability to see it, as PK says, is perjorative edited out!.
I think that my age provides me a somewhat unique perspective around here. I don't know for sure, but it seems like the people who are strongly disagreeing are... large, rooted, grand-ole oak trees. Those roots make it hard to see what things are like on the other side of the farm. As a "seedling" (which comes across pejorative, with the rest of it), I am not stuck in one position to watch life race by while I scoff at how things have changed. Not only can I see the forest, but I can go over to the forest and see what it's like. If I've been spoon-fed a certain ideology full of propaganda from the media, what things would I believe and how should I be living my life? That is an honest question that I hope to have answered, friend.

Whoa. That is a long posting. :rolleyes: I hope not to offend anyone, and I don't mean to be a pain. I think the hub of the issue is that you can't show some intention on behalf of the media (as a whole) to change society one particular way. I think the media reflects society's changes. Media stories focus on garbage because society wants garbage. I don't think society wants garbage because the media has been pushing a covert agenda to brainwash us into liking garbage. I think they call it Ockham's Razor. The simplest theory that explains things is probably right. I think a media conspiracy is kinda complicated. I'm fine with people disagreeing with me, but calling me a seedling and saying that I can't see what's all around me and stuff like that isn't necessary or constructive... even though I am sure you are all very nice. :)

Parthian King

05-16-2007, 06:49 PM

You see that as "The Media" pushing an agenda and trying to change our society. I see that as Norman Lear (one man) using his company as a means to push his own agenda and shape our society.

Jess, Norman Lear was a producer who worked in conjunction with a broadcasting network. Do you really think they didn't know what he was up to, that they weren't in on it? That is hardly "one man," though this individual gave vision and voice to the very agenda we are speaking of (which you so eloquently admit with the words "push his own agenda and shape our society"). If television isn't media, what is? I am not sure what your point is here. You said there is no proof the media has an agenda. When I give proof of it, you say that wasn't the media, but a man in the media. What do you think we mean when we say "the Media"?

We see the same thing, but you (most of you, it seems) are willing to generalize it and attribute it to "The Media". I use the capitals and the quotes to show that you are generalizing and taking a conglomeration of things and making them one big bad entity that we can blame, like "The Boogeyman". It would be the same as me saying that the teachers of America are pushing a liberal political agenda, just because some (and some teacher associations) do.

Now, when you use the "Boogeyman" illustration, you caricature your opposition and muddy the rhetorical waters. From what I can see, it is rather you who are generalizing, and we (or most of us, it seems) who see these as a group of fallen individuals with specific ideologies, preconceptions, and personal agendas who are no longer even attempting to separate their own personal views from the task of informing the public. Now, if you want to say, "Don't say 'The Media', because that is unfairly generalizing. Use statistics and/or adjectives to define the matter," I would reply and say, "Alright, I refer to CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, NPR, MTV, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Fransisco Chronicle, the Chicago Tribune, the Louisville Courier-Journal, the Springfield News-Leader (a liberal newspaper in arguably the most Republican county in the country), Newsweek, Time, and any number of others--these have a liberal, anti-faith, anti-traditional family, anti-absolutes agenda. On the other side, you have Fox (which is politically conservative but whose entertainment network dishes out some of the most virulently anti-family stuff going) and some talk radio shows. There, I've been specific."

The thing about reporting is that the story itself gives us one side. For example, when a marriage protection law is passed, the law itself is a reflection of one side of the story. The other side, the side primarily effected by the law, gets interviewed. If it was the opposite, and a law was passed forbidding the "protection of marriage", the law would reflect one side and the interview would be given to those who want to protect marriage.

Because that is a law protecting the status quo. It doesn't change things any more than passing a law saying that we'll keep doing what we've been doing.

This, I simply don't buy. First, it doesn't play out. If it did, when the Supreme Court and various appellate courts have consistently upheld abortion rights, you would have had TV spots about women who have been devastated by abortion, or highlights on social ills that might have been solved by children that are unfortunately too dead to help, or how Social Security is going bankrupt because we have slaughtered our future donors. Do we get those spots showing "the other side of the story" when the "status quo" that is maintained is part of the liberal platform? Nice try...

Furthermore, I don't get what you are saying here in regard to the example Ink gave about the "sanctity of marriage" law. First you say that the lesbian couple will be "affected"--indicating change. Then you say the law is merely maintaining the status quo--indicating absence of change. Which is it? Does the media tell the story when change is affected, or when it is not affected? In other words, following your paradigm, when does the media step up and tell a story?

Since I evidently missed the hypocrisy, maybe you couple point me in the right direction? A Democrat does something bad in 1994 and it gets covered, but not much. A Republican does something bad 12 years later and it gets covered, a lot. I don't think this has to do with Republicans and Democrats. I think it shows a shift in our society toward caring more about these issues. Why do I think that? Because Gary Condit was a Democrat and got a lot of coverage for his actions, in 2001, also. And, like I said before, the Mark Foley scandal came out at a sensitive political time. Around the election, people want to hear about politics, and people wanted to hear about Mark Foley. The people demanded it, so the media supplied it. The media didn't supply it, hoping the market would buy it. That's not how business works; and, like you said, the media is a business.

Now, this would be a fairly legitimate argument on purely conceptual grounds (i.e., people care more about morality now than they did then), except for a couple of items. First, will you seriously argue that the country is more sensitive about homosexual freedom now than then--so much so that dirty talk over the internet with a minor is seen as exponentially (if we count news coverage) more egregious than sexual acts with a minor? Even in philosophy, there comes a point where the participants may say, "Well, that argument kind of works in a technical way, but it simply isn't believable. Period." That's where I am on that one, Jess.

Next, by pure happenstance, the Democrat in question died right in the middel of the Foley scandal. Yet all he got was pure eulogy from the media (via quotes of prominent Dems), even though he was a felon. Now, you might say, "Well, come on, he's dead..." Right. He's also a sex predator and a felon.

But I guess it's my old age that makes me so sensitive to those things...;)

inkspot

05-16-2007, 07:10 PM

I think that my age provides me a somewhat unique perspective around here. I don't know for sure, but it seems like the people who are strongly disagreeing are... large, rooted, grand-ole oak trees. Those roots make it hard to see what things are like on the other side of the farm. As a "seedling" (which comes across pejorative, with the rest of it), I am not stuck in one position to watch life race by while I scoff at how things have changed.LOL, never been called anything as grand as an oak before. I fixed the seedling thing, didn't mean it to be a swipe at you, darlin'. And you haven't offended anyone at all. We are all used to robust debate and take it in stride unless someone starts with the name-calling. Once EveningStar smacked PK with a mackerel.

Anyway, I'm not scoffing about how things have changed, I am sick about how things have changed! And I don't think I'm letting life race by, but it does have a way of doing it, no matter how many rings in your trunk ...

So, how would your perceptions be different if you had not grown up with a media which is radically left-swinging? For one, you would not be denying that they are radically left-swinging.

A Republican does something bad 12 years later and it gets covered, a lot. I don't think this has to do with Republicans and Democrats. I think it shows a shift in our society toward caring more about these issues.

You say the difference between Foley and Reynolds is that in the intervening decade, the public's attitude changed so they are apt to get much more worked up about a scandal like that. But if you will ... In that intervening decade, a left-swinging president was caught in a similar scandal, lied about it to the Grand Jury which would land any of us in deep trouble, and the public could barely manage a yawn at his impeachment hearings and have encapsulated the whole silly episode into a couple of pithy catch-phrases which rather champion the scandal than demand a reckoning for it: Clinton lied, and no one died, etc.

So, are you saying the public's attitude changed in the intervening decade so that they are more focused only on the scandals of conservatives in the public eye? Because that's just silly. And yet, if you are saying the public's attitude changed so that they are focused more on scandals now than back in Reynolds' day, the Clinton tempest in a teapot proves the fallacy of that.

The last national elections give their own evidence of this. The Bogeyman Media rushed to air all the scandal they could about President Bush's military career without ever documenting the facts; the bloggers pointed out the documents were faked long before the mainstream media ever did ... and at the same time the mainstream media by and large ignored the seemingly legitimate facts of John Kerry's military career and characterize the vets who brought up the facts as wackos. Is it, again, that the public is only interested in scandals about Republicans?

The public is not clamoring for the Media to keep championing the left. The public, in fact, is clamoring for more objectivity, which is why news sites like World Net Daily on the web have become some of the internet's most visited sites. So, this is not case of giving the public what they want. It's the case of an industry (The Bogeyman Media) dominated by people with a certain ideology and presenting, as much as they can, only their side to the public.

Even an aging oak like me can see it from where I'm planted!
:)

EveningStar

05-16-2007, 07:32 PM

Jesslaugh, I say this as kindly as I can... You're telling us oldsters that because you have not experienced history, you are best equipped to take a fresh look....

If you were a doctor or computer scientist, I'd say yes. You wouldn't have to unlearn the old habits to adopt the new. But this isn't medical science or PC Repair.

We all need to step away from "conventional wisdom" which I always admit is more conventional than wise. I try not to pay much heed to the timeworn pat answers of either side in a debate. Even so, it's easy to underestimate the power of the media to give us "what's good for us" rather than the simple truth and to do it in the guise of "reporting".

William Randolph Hearst owned most of the big newspapers in the United States during the early 20th century. With a nasty crisis in Cuba due after the mysterious destruction of the USS Maine, he once quipped to someone, "You supply the newsprint, I'LL supply the war." Thereafter his vehemient articles about how the Maine was destroyed deliberately by a mine convicted the Spanish in the American court of public opinion and Congress was forced to declare war or tender a resignation. Ironically the latest reviews of the wreckage suggest there was a fire that led to detonation of explosives inside the ship.

Thomas Nast was the most influential editorial cartoonist of the late 19th century. He almost singlehandedly took down the Tammany Hall political machine that dominated New York politics with his constant portrayal of "Boss" Tweed as a Caesar that fed Lady Liberty to the tigers in the Colosseum. Problem is he was not content to root out corruption in government. His unbelievably vituperous anti-catholic beliefs led him to do a number of cartoons depicting the Pope on the roof of St. Peter's with a telescope trying to take over the world, or bishops in mitre hats looking like snapping crocodiles crawling out of the river Ganges to snatch away innocent children to Catholic schools. He helped fuel the ugliest forms of anti-Catholic movements in 19th century America, and found no anti-Irish cartoon too low a blow.

For you to deny that the press has an axe to grind is, as politely as I can put it, a sign that a little more history and a little less naivete might sharpen your perception.

Jesslaugh, you have a very clever and cogent way of expressing yourself. For your own sake (since posts in this forum don't really change the world) I hope you will be a wise consumer in your choices of news and entertainment and not be lulled into a conventional wisdom packaged in a veneer of "enlightenment."

PrinceOfTheWest

05-17-2007, 09:33 AM

Magister, your post illustrates beautifully one of the biggest problems with having a de facto monolithic media: what I call "the illusion of importance". One of the biggest powers the media has is that by playing up or playing down (or ignoring) certain stories, it can effectively influence what the public thinks important. This is the elusive and undefinable concept of "newsworthiness", which is a critical aspect of how the media deceives the people. I run into it in the pro-life movement all the time. For example, the number of AIDS deaths each year pales in comparison to the number of abortions - but what gets more coverage? For that matter, the number of people who attack abortionists and abortion facilities is trivial compared to the number of women maimed and killed by "safe, legal" abortion - but what gets the press? And therefore which does the public deem the more urgent issue?

To dismiss the idea of concerted effort by scoffing at the suggestion of an active, conscious conspiracy (what I call the "smoke-filled room" image) is overly simplistic. There need be no clandestine meetings or secret handshakes for there to be a climate that promotes certain outlooks while discouraging others. It need merely be understood that to "get ahead" in this field, one must adopt certain attitudes and support certain stands on things. This is by no means restricted to the media (how many pro-life tenured public university professors have you met?), but it is certainly prevalent there. In fact, I have a friend who for many years was involved in an organization of Christian journalists. By itself this is nothing remarkable - various fields are full of people who band together under many banners - but what's telling about this organization is that it is effectively underground. Conferences dates and locations are not published, people who attend are known by their first names only and do not tell where they work, and if members run into each other outside the conferences, they do not acknowledge the fact that they belong to this group. The reason for all these precautions? Because for many journalists, it could mean their job if it were to become known that they were practicing Christian believers.

That's the working environment of the Western media. If you've got a situation like that, you don't need conspiracies in smoke-filled rooms. You own the environment and dictate the terms - which includes what you report and how you report it.

inkspot

05-17-2007, 10:31 AM

Very true. You can see this in the AIDS debate, too, where the media is concerned that people embrace safe sex rather than abstinence. Everyone acknowledges Africa has the worst AIDS problem, and in Uganda, they were moving up toward 20% HIV positive population. Then the nation began to promote abstinence on a large scale, and the AIDS rate has fallen to below 4%. This is one of the few places in the world where AIDS rates have been so dramatically reduced, and certainly far the best success of AIDS reduction in Africa ... but the media is very ho-hum about it, because they don't want anyone to know that the abstinence thing is a real, possible solution. They've made everyone believe abstinence is just not a plausible plan, so they won't show anyone a real success story. If they had seen this kind of success with condom use in Africa, you can believe the media would be trumpeting it from the tree-tops. As it were.
:)

~Grateful * Surrender~

05-17-2007, 11:05 AM

jesslaugh

05-17-2007, 12:25 PM

I'm not a fan of arguments. I like discussions. I like conversations. Debates are healthy. Arguments... not so much. And when people start pointing to something I'm doing and say "look at the argument", I know it's time to stop.

But before I do, I just have a couple things to say.

Jess, Norman Lear was a producer who worked in conjunction with a broadcasting network. Do you really think they didn't know what he was up to, that they weren't in on it? That is hardly "one man," though this individual gave vision and voice to the very agenda we are speaking of (which you so eloquently admit with the words "push his own agenda and shape our society"). If television isn't media, what is?
Television is media. Newspapers are media. Radio is media. But the idea that you can generalize all the different media outlets and organizations by saying "The Media", is wrong. Like saying "The Teachers are against conservatives", is wrong because of the generalization. My point is that "The Media" isn't one thing, it's a combination of many things (newspapers, radio stations, TV networks, internet sites, etc... and all the individual outlets within those groups); and to say that "The Media" has an agenda (a single agenda shared by it's members) would have to be a conspiracy due to the necessary cooperation of so many individuals and competing companies. And I don't see any evidence of a conspiracy.

Jesslaugh, I say this as kindly as I can... You're telling us oldsters that because you have not experienced history, you are best equipped to take a fresh look....
Yes, and even though you say it as if it is ridiculous, it still rings true. A fresh view is hard to achieve when you've been looking at something from the same position for a long time. Wouldn't you agree? We don't invade countries without going over there and having a look around, even though we could simply use satellites. Mobility is an added bonus of being a seedling. And, for clarification, this tangent happened purely in response to being criticized for being young.

In summary, I'm very sorry this turned out the way it did. I'm sure you all are used to this kind of arguing, even though it's a family oriented site, but I'm not. I know I'm the lone sheep, so I blame myself for what happened. And we've long overlooked the fact that we generally agree about something pretty powerful: we're being fed garbage by the media, and we (as a society) like garbage. We disagree because I think the media feeds us garbage because we like garbage; and you think we like garbage because the media tells us to. My explanation matches supply and demand, Ockham's razor, and avoids a conspiracy theory... but won't convince any of you, which is how I know to stop (even if it hadn't escalated into an argument).

Parthian King

05-17-2007, 12:46 PM

Oh, come, come, Jess. As POTW has pointed out many times, many who love Lewis (and Tolkien) but contend that arguments are somehow out of bounds don't know the men. Lewis was brutally argumentative, often mercilessly shredding his counterpart's views. He might, in fact, be chided by we mods were he to somehow, across the ages through a portal of his own imagining, manifest himself here under pseudonym.

Now, as for your substance, you say you don't like argument, but you have admirably engaged in it. Some of what you say is legitimate, while some of it is downright silly. You were doing pretty well until you hopped in with this "fresh outlook of youth" balderdash. Arguments (and I use the word in the forensic and academic sense) stand on their merits, and the relative youth of the proponent is ancillary (though as ES has pointed, knowledge is not). How old or young the participants in a discussion is really off the subject, pace both you and Inkspot. There are posters younger still than you that do in fact hold that the media is by and large biased and abusive. Is their view fresher still than yours, and therefore more legitimate? Or do you somehow hold that your view with its "fresh wisdom" somehow materialized ontologically out the mere essence of your age--meaning without external influences no older than yourself? Are you suggesting your education had nothing to do with how you formed your views--and education facilitated by people older than you? The entire proposition is patently untenable. Not only so, it is a claim to high ground based on something entirely off subject.

As for the matter itself, I must discard your recent rebuttal because you simply brand my position as "wrong" without answering specifics. You did nothing to reply to POTW's excellent post, which essentially cuts the feet out from under the caricature you made by implication, i.e., that by suggesting that the media has an agenda there must therefore be a "smoke filled room"--something no one at any point stated.

And, on that note, I'd like the gently remind concerning the nature of this thread. POTW, in fact, brought the matter back on target: The question is, does the media (even motives aside, if you will) grossly underinform the public is claims to serve on critical issues, while overinforming on others that are comically absurd? A corollary question would be, if yes, what might be the motives behind such a tendency, or are such motives quite nearly self-evident?

inkspot

05-17-2007, 01:10 PM

I'm very sorry this turned out the way it did. I'm sure you all are used to this kind of arguing, even though it's a family oriented site, but I'm not. I know I'm the lone sheep, so I blame myself for what happened.
It hasn't turned out any way at all. What awful thing do you think has come of this discussion? All I can see is that we've been having a rigorous debate, alá the Inklings at the Eagle & Child ... what is there to apologize for, or reason to leave the debate? I'm not clear on what you think has gone so wrong?
nd when people start pointing to something I'm doing and say "look at the argument", I know it's time to stop.
I don't know what you are talking about here. If you are referring to the way we quote each other in our responses, that is just a way to show what specifically we are responding to. No one is holding anyone else's opinion up for ridicule. But if you wade into these debates, you have to be ready to defend your position and accept that someone might disagree, point out what they see are the deficiencies, and then ask you to respond.

You seem to be responding to the idea of a conspiracy theory, as if we are saying a bunch of people got together and decided to send the media spiraling away to the left.

But I think you misunderstood. PK said polls say 90%, and I said that "most" of the people at work in the news media, have values far left of mainstream America and therefore present positive stories about left-leaning events and issues and negative ones about right-leaning events and issues.

This in no way implies any conspiracy at all; it implies the media people are not objective but are putting forth their own agenda.

Anyway, you don't have to be sorry, or blame yourself, Jess, for anything. You've not done anything offensive in the least, and if you're just sorry that this is an issue on which we all don't agree, well, that's rather the point. If we alll agree, then there's very little to say ... like the Duffers.

What you should do, rather than withdrawing, is address the substance of some of the posts with which you disagree, rather than tilting at a straw man such as there being a conspiracy or the idea that the Media is too vague a term to use ... Here are some idea starters...

one of the biggest problems with having a de facto monolithic media: what I call "the illusion of importance". One of the biggest powers the media has is that by playing up or playing down (or ignoring) certain stories, it can effectively influence what the public thinks important. This is the elusive and undefinable concept of "newsworthiness", which is a critical aspect of how the media deceives the people.

You said there is no proof the media has an agenda. When I give proof of it, you say that wasn't the media, but a man in the media. What do you think we mean when we say "the Media"?

Now, if you want to say, "Don't say 'The Media', because that is unfairly generalizing. Use statistics and/or adjectives to define the matter," I would reply and say, "Alright, I refer to CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, NPR, MTV, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Fransisco Chronicle, the Chicago Tribune, the Louisville Courier-Journal, the Springfield News-Leader (a liberal newspaper in arguably the most Republican county in the country), Newsweek, Time, and any number of others--these have a liberal, anti-faith, anti-traditional family, anti-absolutes agenda. On the other side, you have Fox (which is politically conservative but whose entertainment network dishes out some of the most virulently anti-family stuff going) and some talk radio shows. There, I've been specific."

The question is, does the media (even motives aside, if you will) grossly underinform the public is claims to serve on critical issues, while overinforming on others that are comically absurd? A corollary question would be, if yes, what might be the motives behind such a tendency, or are such motives quite nearly self-evident?

What say?
:)

EveningStar

05-17-2007, 01:19 PM

Gang, the question is a bit too simple to take in the evidence.

SOME of the media is taste driven. They give people what they want, for money.

SOME of the media seeks to drive taste, much the way fashion designers invent new fashions simply to keep eager consumers one step behind being "with it" and part fools and their money.

In this sense the media, taste wise, is both proactive and reactive, playing us at both ends.

I think a great deal of our discomfort with the media these days is not a new trend to stir the pot but rather the direction its being stirred.

Look at late 18th century American newspapers. They were bully pulpits to stir up people. At first the American colonists just wanted the same rights that other Englishmen enjoyed. The Crown felt that after the major expense of the French and Indian War that Americans should consider living in the wilderness an expensive privilege rather than a free right and decided to raise taxes. No one griped when the Crown spent millions to drive off the French and their Indian allies. They only griped when they had to pay the money back. Once it was clear the new taxes were not going to go away, suddenly nobody wanted to be an Englishman anymore because the English were BAD people and Americans were SONS OF LIBERTY. They didn't want to be LIKE other Englishmen, they wanted to be BETTER. The newspapers really keyed into this and ran with it.

Now rather than defending the traditional American viewpoint, the media defend the weakening of tradition.

Perhaps we should have become angry at the press back when it began targeting people in general, not when it began targeting the "wrong people." Thing is now Christian conservatives are finding out how King George III felt because THEY are on the getting end.

John

jesslaugh

05-17-2007, 01:35 PM

I'm no CS Lewis, and I don't pretend to be. I wouldn't fit in at the Eagle &Child. I'm not comfortable with the agressive posturing and arguing. I'm just not. And I don't think it's fair of you to criticize me for it.

Some of what you say is legitimate, while some of it is downright silly. You were doing pretty well until you hopped in with this "fresh outlook of youth" balderdash.
If you need an example of the aggression that I don't like, here it is. But thx for the back-handed compliment. The age thing was a tangent is response to being criticized for my youth. Nothing more. I was defending myself against what I saw as an attack. And now I'm criticized for my defense. Sorry.

As for the matter itself, I must discard your recent rebuttal because you simply brand my position as "wrong" without answering specifics. You did nothing to reply to POTW's excellent post, which essentially cuts the feet out from under the caricature you made by implication, i.e., that by suggesting that the media has an agenda there must therefore be a "smoke filled room"--something no one at any point stated.
I didn't think I needed to point out (again:rolleyes: ) that Norman Lear is one man using the media as a tool. You're blaming the tool. And I responded to POTW by explaining that the nature of a media agenda would require a conspiracy that I don't see proof of.

Like I said before, I don't have a desire to argue. I don't think any of you intend on being hostile, but it still comes across. Discussions and debates are more productive than arguing, anyway. :D

You are all used to this kind of arguing. You think it's normal. I'm not used to it. It makes me uncomfortable. :( You all seem to have forgotten that I agree that we are underinformed about critical issues and overinformed about garbage. The question is why, and I'll leave that to you.

Parthian King

05-17-2007, 01:57 PM

You are indeed young, Jess. And you are indeed unused to discussion of this kind, which is evident in your misinterpretation of a term like "argument" and thinking that robust analysis of your line of reasoning (or ours) is evidence of hostile aggression. And my compliment was genuine, not backhanded. Perhaps this is another case of the standards of the postmodern age cropping up: Many simply cannot separate critique of their position and their person. For what it's worth, I regret that you have taken any of this personally, because in a forum where words are the order of the day (especially strong words when it comes to strong themes), offense is not intended.

Back to substance, I am genuinely surprised that you continue to identify Norman Lear not only as an individual man (which he was) but also as a sort of Lone Ranger who manipulated television to his own ends (by your implication) in some sort of bubble whereby, after the fact, it is only legitimate to hold him responsible for his actions instead of the network that aired his show for years. This reasoning alone is so completely untenable that I find it indicative of how you unpack data and form an understanding of reality--severely compromising your otherwise engaging stance and interesting writing style.

And on a final point, my redirect was meant to elicit the clarification you gave, i.e., that we are under- and over-informed. Now, if you don't feel that it has to do with an ideological agenda, what do you feel it has to do with? Before you seemed to state that it had to do with money (business). Is that what you still hold? I consider that to be an entirely legitmate stand (I'd better, because I think that's in the mix as well--in a big way).

inkspot

05-17-2007, 02:00 PM

Discussions and debates are more productive than arguing, anyway
I guess I'm not getting how this is "an argument" instead of a discussion or debate? What would be said differently if we were debating instead of arguing?

And honestly, "posturing" is not something I've ever been accused of before, either. :(

Oh well, if you are uncomfortable, of course you can't stay. But it's a shame, because I would like to see your actual response to the substance of some of the ideas.

Again you say there can be no agenda without a conspiracy, but what it your basis for that? If 90% of the people in the Media believe a certain way, and the Media tends to reflect that as the right way, there needs no conspiracy to make it so. Each person with an agenda can carry out their part of it without ever consulting with anyone else ... why do you believe this is not possible?

Oh, of course, if you're not comfortable here, you can't answer, so I guess we'll never know.

But honestly, we're not picking on you, and as a delicate flower myself, I can speak for each of the fellows here, I know, they would never want to hurt your feelings or scare you. They are true gentlemen and brothers in Christ. :)

If you can face intellectual honesty and criticism of faulty logic, you can play here, no problems. You're welcome to stay. :)

~Grateful * Surrender~

05-17-2007, 03:11 PM

Like I said before, I don't have a desire to argue. I don't think any of you intend on being hostile, but it still comes across. Discussions and debates are more productive than arguing, anyway. :D

Please correct me if I am wrong but it seems that you’re defining line between arguing and debate is only the matter of being apposed. I don't see this turning into an argument at all but you are bowing out because others are calling you on what may turn to be faulty logic. I am saying this not as a slight , Jess, so please don't take it as one. To you what is the difference between arguing and debate? Because I am failing to see the cross over.

EveningStar

05-17-2007, 03:18 PM

In debate you get a nifty podium with a picture of Aslan on it and you have to say "Thank you Mr. Speaker" before you yak.... :D

The impression I get is that she doesn't like sentences with "you", "your" or "her" in it. She'd rather talk about "it", "them", and "those people". And I can see the subtle but important difference in telling someone in a library, "people may not chew gum in the reading area" and "you aren't allowed to chew gum here."

Maybe I just stuck my paw on it...the problem, not the wad of gum. I HATE those things...ugh....

inkspot

05-17-2007, 03:54 PM

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As has been clearly demonstrated, when one places their paw in a wad of gum, the only acceptable response is dippping said paw in mineral spirits.

** red light flashes **

Opposing side may now respond.

Olórin the Wise

05-17-2007, 03:58 PM

~Grateful * Surrender~

05-17-2007, 04:39 PM

If ya go back to the first page, Jess, you'll see that my opions match those of the 'old oak trees'... not being an old oak tree myself, mind you. :D

Actually as I stated before there are a few of us here that agree with the "Oaks" that are actually young sprouts ourselves. But let us not belabor that point for it has been made and now honestly I that horse had been beet to death.

Parthian King

05-17-2007, 05:53 PM

Oh, if only we hadn't lost the Entwives, then there'd be more of these saplings running about!:( :D

jesslaugh

05-17-2007, 06:12 PM

It's better when you are polite. Thx!:)

I believe the media is mostly reactive because that's how economics works. Pushing a supply when there's no demand doesn't work.

Norman Lear was an individual man with an agenda. He is rsponsible for his agenda. His network is responsible for the shows they play, but they are not responsible for Norman Lear's agenda. It's like saying "America is conservative" because President Bush is conservative.

I always question statistics because I heard that 80% of statistics are wrong. ;) I'd like to see this 90% poll. And I bet I can find a poll that says about 90% of Americans are liberal. Maybe. But polls don't mean much to me. And I don't consider them enough to base a position on.

Who has accused me of having faulty logic? I've taken courses in rhetorical and symbolic logic so, if anything is wrong, it's not my logic.:) But, since we're talking about faulty logic, I never said that only oak trees have those opinions. I didn't even say that all oak trees have those opinions. The oak tree vs seedling stuff was just illustrating the lack of mobility some people have due to their roots.

And I don't have a problem with being opposed. It's the way I'm opposed that matters.

I think that hostile aggression is evidence of an argument, not the other way around, David. :) And I know the difference between having my position attacked and being personally attacked. It's a "you" vs "your" thing.

The media is a business. They do what businesses do: make money. If we want garbage information, they give it to us. If we want to hear about the poor lesbians who are afraid of losing their kids, they tell us about it. You tell me to look at MSNBC, and I tell you to look at Fox News. Both have agendas, it seems, but not the same agenda. You tell me to look at Air America, and I tell you to look at Clear Channel. By saying that "The Media" has an agenda to change society you do three things:
1. Ignore the rules of supply and demand economics.
2. Over-generalize.
3. Appeal to a conspiracy theory that Ockham's razor would slice apart.

Into the Wardrobe

05-17-2007, 06:23 PM

PrinceOfTheWest

05-17-2007, 06:23 PM

As both a student of philosophy and of C.S. Lewis, I'd submit that the following statement:
I've taken courses in rhetorical and symbolic logic so, if anything is wrong, it's not my logic.is a textbook example of a logic flaw. In what way does it follow that taking courses eliminates flaws, whether you're talking about logic or anything else? Does the fact that I've taken calculus classes mean I can no longer make mathematical errors? Or that because I've taken English classes, my grammar is consequently flawless? I sure wish that because I've taken programming classes, my code would therefore be bug-free!

Also, the old oak/sapling metaphor seems to be of very limited value in this case. Though it could be argued that younger people are more capable of learning than older ones, and thus seem more "flexible" in that regard, it has been my experience that younger people tend to be more dogmatic and swift to jump to conclusions. In this regard that are more "rigid" than people who've had more life experience and have seen things from more perspectives. (Think about it - if you were involved in a lawsuit that involved several complex and nuanced circumstances, who would you like on the jury? A bunch of highly intelligent twenty-somethings? Or less intelligent but more seasoned fifty-somethings?) I remember when I was young - I was much more dogmatic and adamant about things, and I couldn't understand why all these old folk were saying things like "give it time" and "you might want to think on that for a while". I've seen this pattern repeated through my entire life with most young people I've dealt with, including my own children.

jesslaugh

05-17-2007, 06:56 PM

As both a student of philosophy and of C.S. Lewis, I'd submit that the following statement:
is a textbook example of a logic flaw. In what way does it follow that taking courses eliminates flaws, whether you're talking about logic or anything else? Does the fact that I've taken calculus classes mean I can no longer make mathematical errors?
You can consider this a classic piece of irony. I was simply pointing out that what people often mistakenly call "logic" (like, I think you're wrong, so you have faulty logic) isn't really logic at all. And I was saying that what I had said is most likely free of logical errors. :) Beautiful irony. But I still hold that I haven't made any logical errors in my explanation of the media situation.

Also, the old oak/sapling metaphor seems to be of very limited value in this case.
Yes, and I've said that it was simply a defense of my youth. It was never meant to be something discussed so much. If felt criticized for my youth, so I wanted to show that youth can be beneficial.

Question...when you give the oak/seedling analogy...are you talking merely about the perspectives/opinions being set vs mobile, or are you talking about the idea of older people being ingraned in a job, house, and the like as opposed to young people traveling, going elsewhere for college and thus supposedly seeing more of the world...just wanted clarification on that one a bit more.
Neither. Older people have deeper roots, it seems. That makes them less able to chane their ideological and philosophical positions, even if they're wrong (see: grandmas and grandpa who are still racist). It has nothing to do with actual physical movement. It's called an analogy. I'm also not saying that older people have branches and leaves.:)

EveningStar

05-17-2007, 07:27 PM

I don't know but I think she just accused me of having root rot. Last guy that did that ended up a weeping willow. :D

Parthian King

05-17-2007, 07:36 PM

:p :p :p

As Ink would say, "Yah..."

I have (as an old oak ;)) been around the block with various threads on this forum before to know when I'll be beating my head against the wall. The last two posts by Jess (particularly the penultimate) pretty much lets me know that will be the case. I (and, it seems, a fair number of others) are on one wavelength of reasoning and discussion protocol, while Jess is on another.

Not only, Jess, do you consistently not respond to your counterparts' reasonings with much more than a repetition of the antecedent statement that they have taken apart (if that), but you, if effect, confirm them by your continued inconsistencies.

What is most interesting to me is that this experience mirrors what I have experienced on many previous occasions: People of a basically conservative bent say the media has a liberal agenda. People with a basically liberal worldview say, "That's ridiculous! The media doesn't have an agenda!" Now, why does it always play that way?

Copperfox

05-17-2007, 07:48 PM

PK, the reason they deny having an agenda is that they sort of carry their own perceived ideal point around with them--like a baseball player picking up home plate and carrying it with him as soon as he hits the ball, so that he can claim at any time to have completed a home run.

What I mean is that the hard left, having a dogma of denying dogmas, refuses to recognize any eternal standards; their standard, accordingly, is WHATEVER their glands are feeling at the moment. They are the norm in their own minds, and thus do not consider themselves to be trying to REACH the norm. Anything they do is, in their view, the natural, obvious, logical, centerline thing to do. They can claim to be centrists because they move the center as they please.

Parthian King

05-17-2007, 07:56 PM

There you are, CF! Como uno dice, a los tiempos que te veo, amigo!

Copperfox

05-17-2007, 08:03 PM

And greetings back to you, PK.

The left wing's disregard for objective truth has been displayed by Geraldo Rivera just this week. In his crusade to eliminate ALL control over immigration, he was championing the cause of a Haitian man who was about to be deported from the United States. The Haitian man himself HAD JUST ADMITTED IN GERALDO'S HEARING that the reason he was being deported was that he had spent eleven years in prison for drug dealing. But Geraldo, going into willful-cognitive-dissonance mode, acted as if the man had not just admitted being an ex-convict, and spoke of him as having done "nothing but good" in America!

Into the Wardrobe

05-17-2007, 08:04 PM

Question...when you give the oak/seedling analogy...are you talking merely about the perspectives/opinions being set vs mobile, or are you talking about the idea of older people being ingraned in a job, house, and the like as opposed to young people traveling, going elsewhere for college and thus supposedly seeing more of the world...just wanted clarification on that one a bit more.

Neither. Older people have deeper roots, it seems. That makes them less able to chane their ideological and philosophical positions, even if they're wrong (see: grandmas and grandpa who are still racist). It has nothing to do with actual physical movement. It's called an analogy. I'm also not saying that older people have branches and leaves.:)

I got that....

I'd say you're right PK.

Parthian King

05-17-2007, 08:45 PM

[EDIT: Jess' deletion of her post makes what had been my introductory paragraph unnecessary. I allow what follows to remain as it is still germane to the subject.]

I guess what makes this all the more moot is that you have essentially said in reference to the aforementioned sex scandals that "media is business," and in the case of Mark Foley the election year context set the stage for the frenzy. Though no one has ever adequately explained how "supply and demand" works in such a case (as if people wouldn't watch the news if the Foley case would have been covered, say, half as much), even so this makes my original point in another way. The media over- and under-informs us, and in spite of all the soapboxing it does about itself as an agent for change, for responsible government, and for public accountability, that's all a bunch of hooey. By your own admission, it isn't about any of that--it's about money. So the Mark Foley thing is not evidence (as you said elsewhere) of a "deeper concern" over moral issues, or even what is best for our government. It was about money. So, um, at the end of the day how is that so different from what I am arguing? In a way, for me to brand the media as out of control ideologues is to place them on a higher pedestal than you afford these people. For you, they are unprincipled, money grubbing monsters. (OK, OK, I guess I'm a "both/and" kinda guy on this one...)

Charn_Tim

05-18-2007, 02:06 AM

I've been following this discussion pretty closely over the last couple days, but have refrained from posting, largely because it seems like most of you all on here know a lot more about this subject than I do. Having said that, I did want to make a couple comments.

1) Regarding the sapling/oak tree thing: I guess I qualify as a sapling myself, but (at the risk of coming across like I'm trying to kiss up) I am honestly unequivocally grateful for the wisdom and intellectual stimulation, and spiritual insights I have received on this site from PK, inkspot, POTW, EveningStar, and others even though I do not always 100 % agree with their thoughts on all subjects.

Jess, I definitely feel where you're coming from with your example of grandparents' racism and bigotry, and I have seen that from certain great aunts and uncles and grandparents at times as well, but I have honestly never felt like the perspective of any of these particular "oak trees" resembles the prejudice and cynicism that you probably have in mind. :)

2) As far as the present discussion is concerned, it seems like there is more agreement on both sides of the debate than it appears at first glance. I think a big reason for this is how we define "The Media." It seems to me like PK (and others) are using "The Media" to refer to the majority of people in the media, and attributing motivations and actions to the majority view (probably vast majority) in the Media. And it seems like Jess is saying wait, but that's not how everyone in the media acts. It seems like she would be more confortable saying "Most people in the Media" are pushing an agenda or have a certain slant they want to put on reporting, etc. Whereas it seems like PK, inkspot, POTW, ES, and others are willing to generalize the opinion of the majority in the media to the media as a whole, by just referring to it as "The Media." However, I will say that they have been very clear that when they refer to the Media, they are referring to the majority view of individuals in the media, not literally everyone in the media.

Furthermore, Jess (very correctly to a large extent I believe) points out that a big part of the reason that the media reports on what it does is because we want to hear the given stories (supply and demand), and at least PK agreed that it was part of the issue.

Does my synopsis make any sense? Please correct me if I've incorrectly attributed a belief that you do not espouse, or have put words in your mouth.

3) Now judging from the way the media (generally speaking) handles one subject that I do know a little about and follow in great detail-science-it seems to me that the media does a pretty lousy job at objective reporting of true scientific discoveries. And I do feel that there is an agenda (materialist or at least anti-christian) being pushed here as a whole as well. You can't read a popular science magazine without them bringing up "parallel universes", "multi-universes", etc. How are these philosophical, speculative, metaphysical ideas anything resembling science? But that's what is heard more than almost anything. Why? To a large extent, things like the anthropic principle (the many ways in which the universe must be fine tuned in order to support life in any conceivable way*) and other scientific discoveries are being ignored. For example, quick, what was the last nobel prize handed out for? How about any noble prize in the last 10 years? It kind of bothers me that parallel universes (which are completely metaphysical to the highest degree possible) get FAR more press in the "scientific media outlets" than nobel prize winning work. And I could also go on and on about the over-reporting of speculative scientific research that has to do with evolution or any theological implications rather than the legitimate scientific discoveries that are taking place.

So I guess I also agree that to a large extent the Media pushes an agenda although there is definitely an element of giving us what we want to hear (supply and demand) mixed in.

*If you have no idea what I'm talking about, check out Lee Strobel's The Case for a Creator, or parts of The Case For Faith, or almost any of Hugh Ross' books.

Parthian King

05-18-2007, 03:12 AM

Thanks, Tim. Un voix de raison, as always.

As a quick follow up, I wanted to provide some links regarding the polls I cited. It appears I have indeed overstated, or rather misstated an important statistic. I earlier wrote that the media were some 90% admittedly liberal. That cipher applies to a number of issues (certain election results, key issues like abortion and gay rights, etc.), but cannot be universally applied (as in some cases the percentage actually exceeds 90%!). My apologies.

These articles, one from mediaresearch.org (http://www.mediaresearch.org/SpecialReports/2004/report063004_p1.asp) and another from the weekly standard (http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/143lkblo.asp) statisticaly confirm the overall thesis that those who provide the American people with their news are indeed much further to the left than the rest of the populace (left and right being, of course, relative terms that describe core beliefs, etc.). The media research article is more expansive and contains many more data, much collected by the very media outlets we have referred to here. It is a most enlightening article, and I highly recommend it.

So, Jess rightly questioned the willy-nilly use of percentages, at least in the manner that I used them. However, a skirmish does not a war win, and in this case the evidence is overwhelming that, by their own admission, those who control and embody the media are liberal ideologues. And to repeat Ink's point, any reference to a conspiracy theory is a strawman, a caricature of what many are saying here. There need be no coordinated conspiracy, but rather simply a culture that arises out of an overwhelming majority.

jesslaugh

05-18-2007, 12:44 PM

I'm sorry, Into the Wardrobe. I was getting used to posts that ignored what I had said, so when I got to your post I went by it too quickly and must've skipped a line... I had very little time, so I rushed. The answer is (as you guessed) that the analogy described ideologies, not physical movement.

And, thank you, Tim. I do think that many people in the media have ideologies that lean to the left. And many of those people would like to use their positions in the media to effect social change. But I just feel like it's a giant leap to go from there to saying that the media (as a general whole) is pushing a single agenda to make our society more liberal. In fact, I think the most obvious cases of the media pushing an agenda can be found in Fox News and Clear Channel... and they push a hardline conservative agenda. But, I also agree that we're all agreeing on more than we might think. I just don't think there's a singular media agenda against conservativism.

I had posted a reply to David regarding the accusation that I've been dodging issues and simply repeating myself. It was a little snotty, and I'm sorry about that. I sometimes repeat myself because the same answer can answer the latest question/concern.

The thing about polls and things of that nature is that they can be manipulated to get specific desired responses. Mediaresearch.org is a conservative non-profit organization. The University of North Carolina annually publishes reports that say cigarette smoke is not dangerous to your health. Really? Yes, and they still do. Because those research studies are funded by the cigarette companies. You have to look at the source, and in this case, I'd suggest looking at the mediaresearch.org homepage before you believe anything they say. But, even so, the report seems to indicate that about 70% of media workers are somewhat liberal. And the reports says that in 2001 about 35% of the public identifies itself as conservative, which leaves 65% of the population to be "leaning left". Can there be an agenda to change society if the media and public numbers are so close?

I still contend that there are three reasons (previously stated, so I won't repeat myself ;) ) why the media agenda idea doesn't make sense.

Olórin the Wise

05-18-2007, 01:06 PM

Jess, are 'conservative' and 'leaning left' the only options available to the public? After all, it is possible (however unlikely) that there are some people who are evenly balanced as regards conservative and liberal.

EveningStar

05-18-2007, 01:26 PM

Olorin, I would take that a step further. There are literally thousands of things we have opinions about, from how we dress ourselves to how much risk we take in extreme sports. In each and every one of those things we could grade ourselves on degrees of liberal/conservative leanings. And in each and every one of those things is a middle ground. Such as someone who does not support abortion on demand or after the first trimester. Such as someone who believes the only gambling that is OK is a state lottery to fund higher education. They don't mind profanity in a movie as long as it doesn't involve bodily functions..or particularly sexual functions. Or they don't support gun ban laws but think it's ok to ban all weapons from a national park.

Copperfox

05-18-2007, 02:22 PM

Or they strongly defend the normal family, but at the same time advocate a welfare state which they don't realize is hurtful to the family. The lefts and rights can be compartmentalized within one person.

jesslaugh

05-18-2007, 02:28 PM

Yes, I agree. There are options other than liberal and conservative. What I was saying is that if you start with conservatives, on the political spectrum, most positions are to the left of conservativism. Therefore, almost all the non-conservatives can be said to be "leaning left", that is, to the left of being conservative.

Maybe an illustration would help (this may turn out looking horrible, but let's hope not).

Political spectrum:

|-------Liberalism-------------------------------------Conservativism----------|

If you say that 35% of the public is conservative, then chances are pretty good that almost all of the remaining 65% are "to the left" of the conservatives. That includes moderates. And conservatives often see people with moderate positions as being "liberal".

And, I just want to say that I hope it's clear how important it is to actually read the report/poll and look into who wrote/funded the thing. We end up talking about the report instead of just taking it as truth. Yay for us!:D

Parthian King

05-18-2007, 02:31 PM

Here's the problem with your response, Jess. You obviously did not read the entire Media Research report, or you read it but don't want to address the specifics in it. Furthermore, statements like this:

And the reports says that in 2001 about 35% of the public identifies itself as conservative, which leaves 65% of the population to be "leaning left".

...show that to the extent you did read it, you didn't understand it (which is a more courteous assertion than that you understood it but deliberately chose to distort it.) Now, not only does you statement not address the point of this thread (media bias and misinformation), instead chasing the rabbit of what the makeup of the population is, it actually distorts the data itself. Your analysis shows how completely flawed your thinking is, since those statistical percentages never added up to 100%--there is a core "middle ground" which was assumed. Now, this is not only blatant error (i.e., just plain shoddy handling of the data), but it betrays your mindset as one that is willing to throw out whatever comes to mind to keep your stand alive for the moment.

The original quote was as follows:

“Only a tiny fraction of the media identifies itself as either Republican (4 percent) or conservative (6 percent). This is in direct contrast to the public, which identifies itself as 28 percent Republican and 35 percent conservative.”

Now, the other percentages of the overall populace were never given, and were irrelevant for the writer's point. His point was to compare how many identify themselves as conservative in the populace v. how many do so in the media. The statement above speaks for itself as to what the writer was truly asserting.

Of course, the most egregious flaw is the overall logic here vis-a-vis the "source" of this information. You cannot simply say, "Consider the source," because in philosophy that is a logical error known as the "genetic fallacy." Those who commit the genetic fallacy disregard something based on its origins, not on the merit of the data itself. It is the flip side of the erroneous statement "I have taken classes in rhetoric and logic, so the problem doesn't lie with me," or, "I am younger (or older), so I have a clearer vision on this score." Until you grapple with the information proper, and demonstrate why it is flawed, skewed, or otherwise false, it stands like an oak (sorry) in your rhetorical path.

Now, to explain why I think you are not responding to what is being put to you, let me say this:

*Although you have asserted that your youth gives you a special vantage point, you have entirely ignored the rebuttals of those your age and younger who disagree with you.

*You have not adequately explained why you felt at any point that this was an argument rather than a debate (the former being something you abhor, the latter something you relish), in spite of the repeated bewilderment of several posters.

*You have never responded to the retort to your caricature of our position (i.e., "conspiracy theory") made by Inkspot, POTW, and myself that no coordinated conspiracy is necessary, but rather merely a tendency based on the ideological constitution of the media elite.

*Although POTW has pointedly stated that your training gives no points to your stance, you make a statement about irony and saying it applied to what you had said (though I am at a loss as to what you think we concluded you applied that assertion to) then reaffirm that declaration--missing his point entirely.

*You have not addressed the point I raised concerning the influence of money in the media, which (by your own admission) also distorts how we get news, sustain gthe opening thesis of the thread.

That's enough for now.

jesslaugh

05-18-2007, 05:58 PM

Here's the problem with your response, Jess. You obviously did not read the entire Media Research report, or you read it but don't want to address the specifics in it.
Here's the problem, David, you like to ignore the force of what I say and focus on some insignificant part. And it's not just you, it's just about everyone that I've noticed. That's why the "oak tree" stuff has lasted so long, even though I kept saying that it wasn't important.

Now, not only does you statement not address the point of this thread (media bias and misinformation), instead chasing the rabbit of what the makeup of the population is, it actually distorts the data itself.
And your statement all address the point of this thread. I'll try to be more like you, David. And, the make-up of the population is crucial to the idea that the media is pushing a liberal agenda to change society. Because if the media's liberal-to-conservative ratio is proportional to that of the population, the idea of a liberal agenda to change us is a simulacrum.

Your analysis shows how completely flawed your thinking is, since those statistical percentages never added up to 100%--there is a core "middle ground" which was assumed.
Where does the report say that there is an assumed middle ground? Please support this.

Of course, the most egregious flaw is the overall logic here vis-a-vis the "source" of this information. You cannot simply say, "Consider the source," because in philosophy that is a logical error known as the "genetic fallacy." Those who commit the genetic fallacy disregard something based on its origins, not on the merit of the data itself.
Ah, but I didn't say that we should disregard the report because of its source. I said that we have to be critical of any report or poll that is produced or funded by a highly biased source. The report is certainly not "wrong" simply because mediaresearch.org did it. But that report does not provide links or access to the actual polls used, so the only response is to question the reports based on it's source. They have something to gain, which means they lose some credibility.

Here's my least favorite part:
*Although you have asserted that your youth gives you a special vantage point, you have entirely ignored the rebuttals of those your age and younger who disagree with you.
I wish there were I nicer way to say this, but... you're wrong. You could try to show me one or two instances where I've ignored someone my age. I don't think you can, but even if you do, you've only gone a fraction of the way to being right since your statement is so sweeping.

*You have not adequately explained why you felt at any point that this was an argument rather than a debate (the former being something you abhor, the latter something you relish), in spite of the repeated bewilderment of several posters.
Again, I want this to come across as kindly as possible... the "repeated bewilderment of several posters"? I tried to make it clear that the difference between an argument and a debate is largely subjective, and in my mind, this was an argument. And I let John's explanation of the difference do most of the talking, only referring to it briefly by saying "it's the difference between 'you' and 'your'". Is that not good enough for you? Does this line of thought even matter to the point of the topic, which you seem very concerned about (see above)?

*You have never responded to the retort to your caricature of our position (i.e., "conspiracy theory") made by Inkspot, POTW, and myself that no coordinated conspiracy is necessary, but rather merely a tendency based on the ideological constitution of the media elite.
I am responding to that by adjusting to the change in the discussion. I agree that if an overwhelming majority of the media has their own individual agendas to change society, then you could say there is a media agenda. That's why I asked for the poll information, which turned out to be not true. But I still think that there are enough conservatives (with agendas) in the media to make the idea of a singular "media agenda" empty. And, moreover, I think there are a significant number of liberals in the media who try to be objective and not push an agenda. Polls won't show you this.

*Although POTW has pointedly stated that your training gives no points to your stance, you make a statement about irony and saying it applied to what you had said (though I am at a loss as to what you think we concluded you applied that assertion to) then reaffirm that declaration--missing his point entirely.
Huh? Irony, in this case, was demonstrating something by doing the opposite. I was saying that I'm fairly certain that I have not made any logical errors. I still hold this to be true, and you haven't shown me to be wrong about that, other than grasping into the wind.

*You have not addressed the point I raised concerning the influence of money in the media, which (by your own admission) also distorts how we get news, sustain gthe opening thesis of the thread.
That's funny considering I'm pretty sure that I raised the point about money and the media. Anyway, I have addressed the issue. Many times (where have you been?). The media is money driven, and they sell subscriptions and get views and listeners by giving people what they want.

I've been defending my stance a lot, and often against empty concerns like "you never..." that could be answered by reading. There is only one of me, and I do the best I can to defend myself and my position, but there are many of you and a lot of my more thoughtful points are never mentioned. I say that your explanation has three faults, and I list the faults, a defense has only been attempted on one of them. But then you'll criticize me for not answering all your questions. I refuse to play that game. So I'd like some answers, if it's not too much to ask.

How do you reconcile your explanation with the two remaining faults I listed?
If I have been spoon-fed ideological propaganda my whole life (as you claim), what should my life look like right now?
How is saying "Norman Lear is the media" different from saying "President Bush is America"?
Do you recognize the obvious logical flaw by even saying that "Norman Lear is the media", and how do you explain that?
Do you agree that the statement "Teachers are against conservatives", is flawed because it over-generalizes?
Where have I made a logical flaw in supporting my explanation that a socio-political agenda can't be attributed to "The Media"?
What evidence do you have that I am "liberal" (since one of you has more-or-less stated that I'm liberal)?
What proof/evidence do you have that the media has an agenda to change society a certain way?
Do you have any evidence that the liberal members of the media are not trying to report the news without pushing a liberal agenda?
Do you believe the media deliberately hides truth from us?

Doffen

05-18-2007, 06:16 PM

What proof/evidence do you have that the media has an agenda to change society a certain way?

The second world war? I mean.. Why did Germans start hating Jews in the national scale as they did? I would most likely say the media, which was controled by the Nazi regime. In a few years, the nazi regime had a whole nation crawling before them because of the media and the speculations on the jews. Media made Germans literally hate jews. Isn't that a power? Didn't they change the German people somehow? Hitler didn't do this all by himself. He used the media as a tool to apeal to the whole nation. True? Do you really speculate on that?

EveningStar

05-18-2007, 06:44 PM

News journalists and newspaper editors are usually not the Mom and Pop operation with a dream and a GI Loan. These days big conglomerates own media outlets and they manage them closely.

When CBS News makes a statement, you'd better believe if it's harmful to CBS, Inc., it won't get prime coverage.

Ultimately big news conglomerates will cooperate even with cutthroat competitors if they feel a lack of discression by one will harm the whole industry.

jesslaugh

05-18-2007, 06:54 PM

The second world war? I mean.. Why did Germans start hating Jews in the national scale as they did? I would most likely say the media, which was controled by the Nazi regime. In a few years, the nazi regime had a whole nation crawling before them because of the media and the speculations on the jews. Media made Germans literally hate jews. Isn't that a power? Didn't they change the German people somehow? Hitler didn't do this all by himself. He used the media as a tool to apeal to the whole nation. True? Do you really speculate on that?
Hi, Doffen! First, I'm pretty sure we've been talking about the current American media. Anyway, you said yourself that Hitler was using the media as a tool. If that's true, is it the media's fault, or Hitler's fault? Do you blame the tool or the user?

PrinceOfTheWest

05-18-2007, 06:57 PM

In answer to the question of "where's the proof", there was at least one instance where one outlet of the mainstream media flat out admitted it. It was on the ABC News website, and it was quickly yanked, but not before I made a copy. Here's the entire piece:

(verbatim excerpt from http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/TheNote/TheNote.html, Tue 10 Feb 2004)
Like every other institution, the Washington and political press corps operate with a good number of biases and predilections.
They include, but are not limited to, a near-universal shared sense that liberal political positions on social issues like gun control, homosexuality, abortion, and religion are the default, while more conservative positions are "conservative positions."
They include a belief that government is a mechanism to solve the nation's problems; that more taxes on corporations and the wealthy are good ways to cut the deficit and raise money for social spending and don't have a negative affect on economic growth; and that emotional examples of suffering (provided by unions or consumer groups) are good ways to illustrate economic statistic stories.
More systematically, the press believes that fluid narratives in coverage are better than static storylines; that new things are more interesting than old things; that close races are preferable to loose ones; and that incumbents are destined for dethroning, somehow.
The press, by and large, does not accept President Bush's justifications for the Iraq war -- in any of its WMD, imminent threat, or evil-doer formulations. It does not understand how educated, sensible people could possibly be wary of multilateral institutions or friendly, sophisticated European allies.
It does not accept the proposition that the Bush tax cuts helped the economy by stimulating summer spending.
It remains fixated on the unemployment rate.
It believes President Bush is "walking a fine line" with regards to the gay marriage issue, choosing between "tolerance" and his "right-wing base."
It still has a hard time understanding how, despite the drumbeat of conservative grass-top complaints about overspending and deficits, President Bush's base remains extremely and loyally devoted to him -- and it looks for every opportunity to find cracks in that base.
Of course, the swirling Joe Wilson and National Guard stories play right to the press's scandal bias -- not to mention the bias towards process stories (grand juries produce ENDLESS process!).
The worldview of the dominant media can be seen in every frame of video and every print word choice that is currently being produced about the presidential race.

Parthian King

05-18-2007, 09:41 PM

Remarkable stuff, POTW. Amazing.

Jess: The “force of what you say” rather than some “insignificant part”? In spite of your stated preference for debate, you seem unfamiliar with its protocols. Words are the warp and the woof of rhetoric, the DNA of the matter. For you, after the fact, to say, “You’re taking issue with ‘insignificant parts’ of what I say; the real stuff still stands on the ‘force’ with which I stated it” is sheer nonsense. It is indicative of the near total void in your posts of any true critical thought. Your answers to my queries are further evidence (*long, low whistle*), but in order to avoid the tit for tat I will focus on what to you was the most egregious of my offenses:

Here's my least favorite part:

*Although you have asserted that your youth gives you a special vantage point, you have entirely ignored the rebuttals of those your age and younger who disagree with you.
I wish there were I nicer way to say this, but... you're wrong. You could try to show me one or two instances where I've ignored someone my age. I don't think you can, but even if you do, you've only gone a fraction of the way to being right since your statement is so sweeping.

Read what I said, Jess. I NEVER said you ignored someone your age. I said “you have entirely ignored the rebuttals of those your age and younger who disagree with you.”

Now, it is a tricky thing indeed to do what you have asked, i.e., demonstrate a void—show where you didn’t write something. But I can show where they wrote things, and I rather challenge you to show me at which point you responded to them and admitted that being young means a whole lot of nothing in this debate:

If ya go back to the first page, Jess, you'll see that my opions match those of the 'old oak trees'... not being an old oak tree myself, mind you.

Actually as I stated before there are a few of us here that agree with the "Oaks" that are actually young sprouts ourselves.

Your posts following these assertions (esp. post 49, the first post of yours following these statements) never refer to them in the least.

Now, since you said this bothered you the most, I’ll use it as a test case to point out why discussing matters critically with you is approaching the farcical. Your analysis of my statement does two things:

First, it accuses me of accusing you of being rude—of simply ignoring your peers outright. Basically you are accusing me of slandering your manners, of being obnoxious. I never said this.

Second, in so doing you duck the real issue, which is indeed found in my words. I said you ignored their rebuttal of your point about your youth somehow qualifying you for clear thought beyond the thinking of people older than you. In fact, to this point all you have said is, “I never meant for such a big deal to be made of that statement”—yet you still hold to it, in contradiction to what they are saying. Their very presence and stance here makes that assertion of yours deeply problematic.

Given this humble example of what you do with words, I think it futile to discuss the matter with you any further.

jesslaugh

05-21-2007, 12:01 PM

Oh, David... I see how this works. Several of you take very critical stances against my position on this issue, and critique/question me up and down. But as soon as I stop being defensive and start asking you to defend your positon, you take a step back and suddenly decide that this discussion is becoming "futile". I get it.

Since the only thing you really said in your last post is that I have ignored the rebuttals of people my own age, it's really the only thing I can respond to. I have not only acknowledged that people my age disagree with me, but I have explicitly stated that the age issue is not important... at all. It was merely me defending myself when I was criticized for being young.

See:
Post 52, "Yes (the youth issue is of little value), and I've said that it was simply a defense of my youth. It was never meant to be something discussed so much. If felt criticized for my youth, so I wanted to show that youth can be beneficial."
Post 49, "I never said that only oak trees have those opinions. I didn't even say that all oak trees have those opinions. The oak tree vs seedling stuff was just illustrating the lack of mobility some people have due to their roots." (which was directly responding to both the posts [46 & 47] that you quoted as examples of how I ignore the rebuttals of people my age)

I acknowledged that people my age can disagree with me. That is the response. And, to be clear, posts 46 and 47 (at least the quoted portions) are not rebuttals. They're not saying anything other than "I'm young, like you, and I disagree with you". But I never said that young people will all agree with me. If anyone even hinted at that idea, it was you folks with all the "young people are all spoon-fed propaganda by the leftist media" talk. But, even so, I still addressed their concern; and I have now just shown you to be wrong in your continued assertion that I have ignored people my age.

And, may I say, this also demonstrates my point that the focus seems to always be the insignificant things. POTW said that it is not valuable, and I agreed. But, magically, some of you like to keep bringing it up. Feels like you're dodging the important stuff. In case I'm wrong about that, I've given you a list of things I would like to have addressed/answered, and I'll give it again:

How do you reconcile your explanation with the two remaining faults I listed?
If I have been spoon-fed ideological propaganda my whole life (as you claim), what should my life look like right now?
How is saying "Norman Lear is the media" different from saying "President Bush is America"?
Do you recognize the obvious logical flaw by even saying that "Norman Lear is the media", and how do you explain that?
Do you agree that the statement "Teachers are against conservatives", is flawed because it over-generalizes?
Where have I made a logical flaw in supporting my explanation that a socio-political agenda can't be attributed to "The Media"?
What evidence do you have that I am "liberal" (since one of you has more-or-less stated that I'm liberal)?
Do you think the media deliberately hides the truth from us?

EveningStar

05-21-2007, 12:30 PM

Gang,

This thread is growing increasingly personal. The main thrust no longer appears to be the media but debating tactics.

There is a fine line between debating and argueing, and that line is crossed when "I must differ with my distinguished opponent" turns into "so that's your little game."

Please consider refocusing on the task at hand, or respectfully agreeing to disagree before lasting harm is done.

John

jesslaugh

05-21-2007, 01:33 PM

Thx John. The refs always catch the reaction. lol :p

I, also, would like to see us get back to some substance.

In regards to the link by POTW... is that the right story? Your link takes me to a story about the 2nd recent Republican debate. Nothing from 2004, that I can see. And even if you really have a story from ABC that admits some level of ideological agenda, I doubt the author speaks for more than himself and *maybe* his editor. But even if I accept that all of ABC signed off on a story that admitted some ideological agenda to push our society "left", I wouldn't call that justification for claiming that there is one huge media agenda. If anything, it is a counter-balance to Fox News. But this all depends on the missing story.

Anyway, I was asking if there is proof of a singular media intention to push a leftist agenda on our society. It's pretty hard to show proof of intention, which makes this a challenge for those of you in the "leftist media agenda" camp. Which is why I think it best to settle this with a simple understanding that the media feeds us what we want, and our society wants liberal ideas and entertaining garbage. I've agreed with that since the get-go.

PrinceOfTheWest

05-21-2007, 02:23 PM

Oh, the link's correct. It's a dynamic site anyway, so you'll see what's at the end of the link changing several times a day. The article was on there for most of the day on the date specified - though as word got out of its presence, it was yanked before 24 hours were up.

With respect to the question of whether there is deliberate intent behind media coverage, or whether it just reflects the tastes of the audience (i.e. it gives them what they want): we have the word of a major media insider named Bernard Goldberg on the matter. He worked for much of his career within CBS News and published a book in 2002 called Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News (http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9780060520847&itm=2). It's a big, thick book detailing just how those who run the media intentionally, deliberately distort what is presented by the media in order to form public opinion. That's someone who's worked for that same media for decades, so if it comes down to taking his word on what actually goes on against yours against what you think goes on, I'm afraid I'm picking his.

Crisis magazine ran an interesting article called Media Bias: The State of the Problem (http://www.crisismagazine.com/april2007/liaugminas.htm) in their April 2007 article. The whole thing is worth reading, but here's a telling excerpt:“Too many news people, especially the ones at worldwide headquarters in New York, where all the big decisions are made, basically talk to other people just like themselves,” says Goldberg. “That’s one of the biggest problems in big-time journalism: its elites are hopelessly out of touch with everyday Americans. . . . Almost all of them think the same way on the big social issues of our time: abortion, gun control, feminism, gay rights, the environment, school prayer. After a while they start to believe that all civilized people think the same way they and their friends do. That’s why they don’t simply disagree with conservatives. They see them as morally deficient.”

inkspot

05-21-2007, 03:04 PM

Jess, I am truly sorry about the whole old oak vs. young sapling thing. I think I started it, and I think I tried to stop it by going back and editing the posts, but it went all crazy! I agree with you that it was a rabbit trail, but we were all so delighted with analogy we kept it up.
Which is why I think it best to settle this with a simple understanding that the media feeds us what we want, and our society wants liberal ideas and entertaining garbage. I've agreed with that since the get-go.
LOL! :) And I think it's best to settle it with an agreement that, as demonstrated by PoTW's references and the article PK linked to, most of the folks in the mainstream media are liberal-leaning and work to mold society that way. Clearly it has worked when a well-educated and erudite young lady like Jess cannot even see that it is happening because she is so used to a liberal-leaning media.

She allows there may be one single news source which has an agenda, Fox News -- and that's a conservative agenda. What she can't see is that Fox stands out because it is the only one without as much of a liberal-leaning agenda. When a tree stand straight in a gale that has all the others bent double to the east, from the bent trees perspective, that straight one looks as if he is leaning west.

If PoTW is lying about what was posted on the website, or if that was only the opinion of one person which they posted on their ABC site, and if the fellow from CBS who wrote the book is also lying, and if the polls PK sited are also lies, then the conservatives not only have a chip on their shoulder, but they are willing to do a lot of lying and deception to prove their false claim.

Assuming it is not only conservatives who are malcontents, but that there are, somewhere in the world a few liberals who are also malcontents and willing to lie to make people believe there is a media bias in the opposite direction ... I wonder why they aren't trying to call attention to it? Where are their specious polls and pitiful cries for attention? Why is it only conservatives are convinced of a liberal media bias? If it was just PoTW saying it, or only the one poll fabricated, then I could see maybe it was just a deranged person with an axe to grind (no offense PoTW) but it seems to be a theme repeated again and again, even by media insiders (witness the book PoTW sites) ... and to some extent, where there's smoke, there's fire.

I completely agree with the idea that rubbish news about Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole is driven by idiots who cannot understand news and so demand entertainment. But usually the news networks can distinguish themselves from E-Entertainment, and when they choke out all news which might cast a good light on the Christian faith and open the flood-gates to all news which casts a good light on immorality, homosexuality, abortion and in general what we call the "liberal" viewpoint, it becomes quite clear that there's more to this bias than supply and demand.

~Grateful * Surrender~

05-21-2007, 03:21 PM

Here's the problem, David, you like to ignore the force of what I say and focus on some insignificant part. And it's not just you, it's just about everyone that I've noticed.

Have you concidered that "everyone else" are not the ones in the wrong here? Perhaps because most of us are on those so called insignificant parts if you took a deeper look you might see that they are greater than youy think. Just a thought.

Hi, Doffen! First, I'm pretty sure we've been talking about the current American media. Anyway, you said yourself that Hitler was using the media as a tool. If that's true, is it the media's fault, or Hitler's fault? Do you blame the tool or the user?

Both. the Midia is a tool yes but to even hold a promanent position to make your opinions known with this tool anymore one has to bend so far that those who would have the whole truth be known are smuthered. "truth Tellers" are shot down and burried before they can even take a breath because the "midia" has a focouse and if that focouse is threatened they view wich does that is crushed. On a small scale I have tried this to oppose the general understating of fact with the truth on the situation and in an instant I was out. It's the same thing. What I am getting it is this, if the tool is simpy a tool and can be used by anyone to voice any opinion good or bad, right or left, liberal or conservative, why then (it seems) are only certain views ever allowed to trully serfice?

jesslaugh

05-21-2007, 04:50 PM

Grateful Surrender, you would blame the tool for what the user makes it do? Are you sure? Would you yell at a gun for having fired a fatal bullet? Or the hammer for having missed the nail? Really?

Inkspot, the central issue here (for me) is that you can't give me proof that the media deliberately works to mold our society making it leftist. You can show me that this one guy is liberal and wants to use the media to shape society. And you can show me that one guy thinks his former network is out to liberally shape society. And one guy has... and another guy has..., but I don't think you have enough "one guy"s to justify a vast liberal media agenda. So, we disagree. I'm ok with that. You see something that I don't see proof of, and maybe it's a perspective thing, maybe not. I think you folks have bought into modern McCarthyism, and you think I'm blinded by propaganda. Either way, we agree that we are under-informed about critical issues, and over-informed about nonsense. And if that's all we can agree about with this issue, ok.

POTW, if the liberal media leaders think that the rest of society agrees with their liberal beliefs, is it still an agenda to intentionally change society, or is it the media mistakenly trying to reflect the beliefs of society?

Doffen

05-21-2007, 05:10 PM

inkspot

05-21-2007, 05:58 PM

I think you folks have bought into modern McCarthyism, and you think I'm blinded by propaganda. Either way, we agree that we are under-informed about critical issues, and over-informed about nonsense. And if that's all we can agree about with this issue, ok.
So it seems. :)

I will say ... we have shown you evidence that the average maintstream media person has a far more liberal bent than the average American, and we have shown you evidence that some folks in the media freely admit that media people have an agenda and follow it. It seems unless we can find some kind of signed liberal manifesto, you will not believe there is a threat, and to me this is closing your eyes to facts which could have far-reaching consequences. Rather a Neville Chamberlain approach to things.

If you think the media screens what they tell us based on their own money-grubbing tendencies, it is at least as dangerous as their screening what to tell us based on their notions of what's "best" for us, I suppose.

PrinceOfTheWest

05-21-2007, 05:59 PM

POTW, if the liberal media leaders think that the rest of society agrees with their liberal beliefs, is it still an agenda to intentionally change society, or is it the media mistakenly trying to reflect the beliefs of society?

Well, according to one guy who's been there, it's a conscious, deliberate effort to constantly reshape and reform society. You can dismiss him as "just one guy", except that there are others, as well as many who can observe things that are happening all around.

Learning from those who've been there is called "taking things on authority". Most of our knowledge is acquired this way. It's good to be judicious about which authorities one accepts, but rejecting a legitimate one simply because it conflicts with what one prefers to believe is not sound scholarship.

Copperfox

05-21-2007, 06:06 PM

inkspot

05-21-2007, 06:17 PM

Money definitely is not the only motivation for the hard-leftwing media. Some people in the industry actually have a warped sense of "mission," like a "sacred duty" to promote socialism, adultery, abortion, etc. That's one reason why some film directors will make sordid, immoral movies THAT LOSE MONEY, when they could be filming family-friendly movies that would MAKE LARGE PROFITS.
I totally agree with you, CF. And I think we can believe the evidence of our eyes in that regard, too. But Jess wants these media people to come out and document their mission. She doesn't believe it just because we say it ... which is in itself a good thing, but PoTW had a point about believing things on authority.

jesslaugh

05-21-2007, 06:49 PM

I believe authority adds credibility to statements. And I believe numbers also add credibility to statements. When I see a few people talking about how there's a media agenda, but a vast majority who disagree, I would tend to side with the more credible group. They all have authority and dissenting people don't mysteriously get more authority points. But one group far out-numbers the other.

Before you accuse me of a logical error, I'm not saying that they're right because there are more of them. I'm only saying that they tend to have more credibility.

And the quote by Goldberg makes it sound like the media is trying to reflect the beliefs of society, not change them.

There's still a handful of my questions that haven't been answered, but I won't repeat them. If any of you have time, it would be nice.:D

Copperfox

05-21-2007, 10:11 PM

Jess, without taking any position on whether you committed any logical error or not, let me share with you one of the reasons why I know there is such a leftwing bias in the media infraculture.

Almost forty years ago, something happened involving then-Vice-President Spiro Agnew. Agnew later was driven from office because of unethical actions he had taken; but his unethical actions were not yet known at the time of the incident I'm going to tell about, so they were not the cause of the way Agnew was treated. What was done to Agnew was done because he was perceived to be a conservative.

Even back then there was a leftwing bias in the media; and Spiro Agnew undertook to denounce it. He gave a speech, which I listened to live. In it, he spoke of how journalists played favorites, trying to make liberals look good and conservatives look bad. Then came the crucial part. Agnew asked American citizens to raise a protest against the bias. He made it as clear as clear can be that he was NOT calling for government censorship of the media; what he was asking for was that private persons should independently complain to media corporations about the slanting of news reporting.

Scarcely twenty-four hours had passed before I heard an anchorman on one of the Big Three TV networks (all we had then, besides fledgling public television), claiming with a straight face THAT AGNEW HAD CALLED FOR GOVERNMENT CENSORSHIP. There was no way this man could NOT have known what Agnew really said; his own network had carried it! But, counting on the stupid masses not to have been paying attention, the anchorman INTENTIONALLY LIED to his audience, to make the Republican administration look like tyrants who wanted to destroy freedom of the press. A supposedly impartial journalist represented as fact a statement which HE KNEW to be false, in order to make the party he didn't like look bad.

This has been going on almost all my life. Millions of Americans--either innocently or lazily--trust the establishment media to tell them the truth; and, being continuously fed fabricated lies, the people have their opinions shaped for them without even suspecting that they are subjected to blatantly partisan indoctrination.

EveningStar

05-21-2007, 10:38 PM

Here is a prime example to add to Copperfox's statement....

While there was a dispute about Bush vs. Gore in terms of who won the first matchup in 2000, the stock market was going crazy over the uncertainty.

The never ending debate on news channels was the possibility that our economy would be ruined for the long term if SOMEONE wasn't appointed the clear winner and SOON.

Gore refused to let go. He kept on about recounting. The Democratic party kept on about recounting.

The stock market kept sinking. Everyone from the tall to the small said if the uncertainty wasn't over soon the market would tank.

Funny thing is the moment Bush was declared the winner, FROM THAT MOMENT ON people in the media refused to publically acknowledge that the uncertainty factor had ANYTHING to do with the state of the economy during the toss-up. They treated the whole thing as if Bush caused it when mere weeks before they were wondering if Al's refusal to concede would destroy America and, by extension, the world economy.

Amazing how the top news story for MONTHS suddenly disappeared without a trace!

That is liberal bias. The deliberate and concerted effort to absolve Al's refusal to give up of any possible blame for the drastic fall in stock prices.

The United States, unlike Ancient Rome or even some modern European Countries, has a passage of power from the old to the new that is graceful, civil and historic. The tenor of our civilization and culture depends on the fact that the sun comes up tomorrow no matter who wins. There was a three month long solar eclipse. It was a MAJOR precident, a MAJOR disruption.

Why is it we never hear about it anymore? And don't tell me it wasn't there...I sat through months of listening to it on TV, RADIO and seeing it in the paper!

John

Darth Sparhawk

05-22-2007, 03:18 AM

Well, I can't speak for the USA, but in my country, Bulgaria, media serves politic parties and are also mostly left-biased. The trouble is that in the USa there are two huge parties. In Bulgaria there are many small parties, the biggest of which, arguably is the Socialist part (the commies, right).
This party has major influence in the media, because most of the journalists were also commies 20 years ago. It is tough to leave old habits, so the media subtly - or not sos ubtly serves the currently ruling left party. For example, if there is a scandal with the ruling party, our newpapers remind people that several years ago the right party had similar problems, so they should not protest now.
BTW, the right parties had such trouble before, true, but not in such extent, and they saved our country from total disastes, caused by the Socialists.
As a result, now there is a new right party, which won a recent elections and the old ones were destroyed. For some reasons, which are not exactly clear, the new right party is NOT attacked in the media.
I say this to portray a clear way in which media can influence politics and life and it is clearly doing with with an agenda.

inkspot

05-22-2007, 08:57 AM

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch ordered his U.S. editors to kill any negative stories about President Clinton and his wife Hillary, according to claims in a lawsuit.
Thought this was timely -- and this from the man who owns FOX news in addition to others ...
I believe authority adds credibility to statements. And I believe numbers also add credibility to statements. When I see a few people talking about how there's a media agenda, but a vast majority who disagree, I would tend to side with the more credible group. They all have authority and dissenting people don't mysteriously get more authority points. But one group far out-numbers the other.
I was not aware of a huge number of people denying the media bias? If I have heard anyone talking about it at all, I have heard them lamenting it. The fellows here have presented polls which show the majority of mainstream media people admit to holding views far left of the rest of the country; PoTW has presented an entire book which details this from the perspective of one of those people; CF, ES and myself have presented clear and compelling "anecdotal" evidence of clear, sheer media bias ... where is this majority voice which you hear, denying any such bias? Good heavens, Dan Rather spoke at a Democratic fund-raiser while he was still an anchorman, and he ruined his career in a mad dash to sully President Bush's name and impact the national elections, using some forged documents which non-professionals on the web were able to debunk in about 5 minutes. Then he was excused by the industry as if it were an honest mistake -- from a news man with his years of experience, not even to try and authenticate obvious forgeries? If he had acted so in order to bring down a Democratic candidate, the response would have been far different, surely you see that? Look how the media rallied around Clinton, trying to outdo each other in convincing us a man's character had nothing to do with his leadership abilities ... How can you ... oh ... well ... you get the idea ...

There's still a handful of my questions that haven't been answered, but I won't repeat them. If any of you have time, it would be nice.:D
You can repeat them. The only one I remember that didn't make sense to me was you asked how we knew you were a liberal yourself. But I had gotten the impression that you aren't particularly liberal by your own lights, so I cannot answer that. I don't know who you were thinking of who called you a liberal.

I do remember, though, that you accused us of McCarthyism, with its overtones of gullibility and a witch hunt. I would submit the witch hunt takes place in the mainstream media, as PoTW related, when Christians are forced to go underground about their faith or else risk being fired and or passed over because it's understood that a Christian's work can't fit in with the unspoken agenda. The other thing is: McCarthyism required a McCarthy, if I understand how you are comparing our views to it: one person riling up the populace with fear and the power to terrorize those in his way. There is no such person on the right, as the reports of media bias come from every sector and many different people (in from those on the left, as PoTW detailed with his report on the book). You say you will trust the majority on this, but it seems to me the only people who talk about it at all are saying a media bias surely exists; if you want to trust a "silent" majority who are unaware of it or lack the skills to analyze it (present company excluded) it seems to me you have chosen more than anything just to close your eyes to it.

Parthian King

05-25-2007, 01:02 AM

Sorry, folks, for several things. (For being away for so long, for one.) Thanks, John, for the corrective. My intention was not to get personal, but rather to deal with nuts and bols issues. One never knows here whether something casual will get serious (as with this discussion), and then you find that all sorts of ground rules for philosophical discussion are not in place and you are paying a price for it in lack of clarity, rising temperatures, etc.

The one that hits me the most is the "definition of terms" issue. Jess has, for the most part (though not absolutely), defined the media as an impersonal, inhuman system that can be illustrated by the "tool" metaphor. Most everyone else tacitly or openly rejects this definition, defining the media as people. Although I generally consider referring to Nazis to be out of bounds (everything goes nuclear when we do), in this case I think it fairly safe, especially since it has been used wihout ill effect so far. For Jess, the Nazi media is an impersonal network that collectively was a tool in Hitler's hand. Hence, Hitler is to blame, not the media which was an inanimate tool. For me, the Nazi media was Goebbels, Hitler's Minister of Propaganda, and his cronies.

Now, I'm sure Jess would agree Goebbels and his thugs were bad guys. So, whatever she would call them, it is that element (though certainly operating in a different mode, context, and degree) that we all have a problem with and say has an agenda in the Modern and Postmodern West. You say potayto, I say potahto. I call it media, you say it is the one who controls the media. Whatever.

Perhaps if this definition of terms were laid down early, at least sme of this may have been avoided. Some of it anyway.

Charn_Tim

05-25-2007, 01:39 AM

PK, I think that's a perfect analysis of the situation. I tried a bit ago to argue that there was more agreement than it first appeared because of the way we were defining the word "media" (point#2 in this post (http://narniafans.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1099028&postcount=60)). I do believe this is the bulk of the reason for the disagreement, although there are some other points to consider still.

Olórin the Wise

05-25-2007, 11:56 PM

The thing about the 'tool' analogy is that the media has to consent to be used in such fasion, while a true 'tool' does not. Obviously the user can attempt to convince the media to allow themselves to be used, but they still have to consent. Do you generally ask your hammer's permission before banging away with it? I doubt it...

jesslaugh

05-29-2007, 01:45 PM

Parthian King

05-29-2007, 03:23 PM

The issue, from the beginning (for me), is that there is too much generalizing when you say something like "the media has a liberal agenda to change society and hide the truth from us". If you want to, instead, say that there are many powerful people in the media who want to do that stuff, ok.

Well, this final statement isn't too far off from what we have been asserting. Woven throughout the discussion has been the recognition that we are not literally speaking of every single person involved in media. POTW even noted that some social conservatives in media have an ad hoc, underground fraternity going; if that doesn't betray an understanding that we aren't speaking of every last person, I can't imagine what would.

No, we are speaking of a large majority and a resulting culture and atmosphere of consensus that not only desires certain things, but executes them. And by the way, I would not contend there is a smoke filled room somewhere (as POTW noted) wherein people plot to "hide the truth" from the public. Collectively, they have a worldview, an understanding of a "big picture 'truth'" that they want to get across. I think they think their task noble, and if they cut corners, well, the end justifies the means. No one, Jess, buys the caricature of "bad guy media types" (a la a nefarious James Bond villain) who wants to "hide the truth." No, we think they just think they know better, and are helping the public out.

Inkspot, regarding authority, people who work in the media have authority to speak about bias and agendas. A couple people from the media claim there to be this liberal bias/agenda. Most of the media, however, rejects this idea. More numbers means more credibility.

So much for whistleblowers, by definition! This is a logical fallacy and a dangerous one. Have you noticed what just happened in Venezuela, Jess? Chavez just removed the last opposition media outlet--Venezuela's oldest TV/radio station--from the air for "subversive, coup-inciting" material. The media in Venezuela is now 100% pro-Chavez. I guess that means Chavez was right in doing this--since more numbers means more credibility. This is chillingly similar to the media in erstwhile Germany, Soviet Russia, and any number of other regimes that litter the timeline of the 20th and now 21st century.

More numbers do not mean, in themselves, more credibility. If they did, by definition this discussion would be over before it started, along with discussions about slavery, abortion, child labor, widow burning in India, and any number of other social issues.

And the idea of the media being a tool is relevant in that we can't blame the troops for what the President tells them to do. That's how people can say "I support the troops, but not the war".

The difference is that the troops, once enlisted, cannot walk away from a lawful order without being prosecuted for desertion. Even so, they would chafe at being compared to a mindless tool like a hammer. Media people--small and great--are not bound by the oaths a soldier or sailor of the U.S. military is. They do what they do by choice.

jesslaugh

05-29-2007, 05:52 PM

So much for whistleblowers, by definition! This is a logical fallacy and a dangerous one. Have you noticed what just happened in Venezuela, Jess? Chavez just removed the last opposition media outlet--Venezuela's oldest TV/radio station--from the air for "subversive, coup-inciting" material. The media in Venezuela is now 100% pro-Chavez. I guess that means Chavez was right in doing this--since more numbers means more credibility. This is chillingly similar to the media in erstwhile Germany, Soviet Russia, and any number of other regimes that litter the timeline of the 20th and now 21st century.

More numbers do not mean, in themselves, more credibility. If they did, by definition this discussion would be over before it started, along with discussions about slavery, abortion, child labor, widow burning in India, and any number of other social issues.
David, thank you, once again, for giving me a perfect example of why it's really fruitless to be in this discussion. Please read the post where I said "Before you accuse me of a logical error, I'm not saying that they're right because there are more of them. I'm only saying that they tend to have more credibility".

The difference is that the troops, once enlisted, cannot walk away from a lawful order without being prosecuted for desertion. Even so, they would chafe at being compared to a mindless tool like a hammer. Media people--small and great--are not bound by the oaths a soldier or sailor of the U.S. military is. They do what they do by choice.
When the choice is: Working vs Unemployment... where's the choice? If all the conservatives quit their media jobs, there would be other people to fill their spots. The "choice", therefore, doesn't solve anything.

Economically, the idea that the media pushes unwanted products into the market and stays prosperous is nonsensical. Supply and demand says that successful businesses must produce a supply to meet the public's demand... not the other way around. In the case of the media, that means the media gives us what we (collectively) want. It also means that the media does not force stuff upon us that we don't want.

Parthian King

05-29-2007, 06:32 PM

Well, Jess, I appreciate the gratitude. :) And thank you for doing what many do in such discussions, i.e., saying their not saying something, then saying it after all. It's kind of like a friend of mine from Alabama says--just so long you say "bless their heart" at the end of a sentence you can preface it with even the most blistering of criticism. Likewise, saying, "Now, I'm not saying..." before you saying something is a common rhetorical device to disclaim something that is obviously absurd, but then appeal to it anyway--bless your heart.

I repeat: More numbers don't mean more credibility, or even a tendency towards it. So if you grant that... what was the point again?

As for the other, are you really suggesting that it is worse to be an honest and honorable unemployed person than it is to be a lying, unprincipled employed person? Aside from the other logical fallacy (i.e., that media positions are the only ones to be had, and the hypothetical person will starve if they don't get and keep that job), to answer your question, the choice lies in honor and truthfulness, and following principle. The funny thing is, the day was when men did indeed starve rather than break their word, twist the truth, or violate their principles. Guess those days are gone, huh?

Wow, we are dealing with a clash of worldviews...

Sometimes the media pushes products. But (for instance) constantly harping on dollars and cents costs of this war, and giving a continual crawl on casualties while obscuring two facts (this is one of the cheapest wars in relation tot he GDP and in U.S. casualties we have ever fought) is not a product. It is a perspective. The idea that people sit down for the nightly news thinking, "OK, another trip to the news market--let's see what there is to buy" is terriby inaccurate. That they sit down, trusting that the voice speaking to them is a professional, objective, and trustworthy information authority is closer to the mark--or has been. In anycase, it is certainly what they spin themselves to be. They don't promote themselves as merchants, they promote themselves as teachers, or counselors, or interpreters.

Nevertheless, what you say is certainly part of the picture. Whether selling a product or spinning a perspective (or both), the thesis stands that the people in the media (either Fox News or ABC News) are interested individuals that ultimately play a role in distorting the vision we have in the world--under-informing us on some things we should know, and over-informing us on drivel that we could certainly live without.

(We do agree on the fruitlessness issue, but others are reading, and keeping things clean and clear is good for them, anyway.)

jesslaugh

05-30-2007, 12:02 PM

Credibility is one of those things that doesn't necessarily mean someone is correct. Let's do a thought experiment. If the entire community of politicians were to be asked a question, and 98% of them said X while the other 2% said Y, wouldn't you give more credibility to the 98% of politicians? That doesn't mean they are correct, but their answer certainly has more credibility.

The logical error you are thinking about would be to say that they are correct because there are more of them. But, please notice, I have not done that. I've only said that numbers add credibility, just like expertise adds credibility, and just like experience adds credibility. While, on the other hand, you would have us believe that 98% of all politicians who are in agreement about an issue have no more credibility about this issue than the 2% who think differently. David, there's always going to be 2% who think something crazy.

The hypothetical journalist I was thinking of spent four years in college to get a degree in journalism and spent a year interning at a local paper before getting the chance to write something productive, and has spent years building an impressive portfolio of work and gaining credibility. Not qualified to do much else. Over-qualified to do most things. Even if this person found another job, it would be at tremendous expense. I don't see the honor or responsibility is doing that to your family on principle.

And everything the media produces is product. All of it. You can't simply arbitrarily say that numbers aren't a product. And just because they don't call themselves salespersons, doesn't mean they aren't. But, the fact remains, that the market would not allow the media to flourish while pushing unwanted products. Supply and demand governs business, and media is a business.

Shadow Hawk

05-30-2007, 06:09 PM

I repeat: More numbers don't mean more credibility, or even a tendency towards it.

I agree with that because of the plight with Galileo.

Parthian King

05-30-2007, 08:58 PM

OK, Jess, I follow your line of thinking. It works as a general rule of thumb--to a point. Basically, it means that at first blush, it is likely that the majority have something correct, while the minority are operating according to some unknown variable or are outright wrong. This works when it comes to pie shops, current fashion, and immigration protocol in foreign airports.

Where is doesn't work is the nitty gritty of a philosophical argument. In such a case, everything must be judged entirely upon the merit. Discussions such as these are meant to be levelers--wherein presuppositions are examined and the reasons behind the crowds at the pie shop, the sales of that kind of scarf, and why you have to have your passport checked thrice in Havana is discussed.

So, though the idea that "the majority doesn't think there's a liberal bias" may well be taken into account at the beginning of the discussion, as things progress it hardly becomes worth mentioning. The primary reason, of course, is that the warp and the woof of the opposing argument is that by definition the media is dominated by a liberal majority. It is pointless to reply to this with, "Hey! That argument lacks credibility because it is a minority position!" Well, yeah...

So it has been in the rise and fall of the great totalitarian regimes of the 20th century. Hitler, Goebbels, Himmler, Goering, Eichmann--these guys were riding high with what was beyond a majority. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was in the minority. But today, only nuts (or academes, who are pretty close :)) read Mein Kampf, while millions read The Cost of Discipleship. Perhaps what the true "majority" is must be determined by the test of time--and on the matter we are discussing we are still in history's crucible.

In any case, the point is to determine a matter on the merits, and not mere majorities. I think a fair amount of proof has been offered on this point, though you (for whatever reason) don't want to accept it (though you will accept, as Ink has noted, that some outlets are guilty of conservative bias).

What strikes me in all this, as I noted before, is that you reduce media distortion to good old fashioned marketing: People swallow what they swallow because they consciously or unconsciously like it, the media pitches what it pitches because people buy it, and media employees prefer unprincipled employment rather than principled unemployment. In other words, for you, it's all about money. Now, if that doesn't lead to distortion, I don't know what would. You therefore actually agree with the thread's thesis, and this discussion is really tangential.

I, and it seems several others, are arguing that the media types on the left are pitching what they are pitching not only for money's sake (though I would certainly include that), but because they are ideologues convinced of the rightness (or correctness--sorry) of their worldview.

For you, they are guided primarily by cash. For me, they are guided primarily by ideology. I wonder which position they would prefer to have thought of them, even in animosity?

Shadow Hawk

05-31-2007, 08:48 AM

that we can't blame the troops for what the President tells them to do. That's how people can say "I support the troops, but not the war".

First, lets get this straight....... I have two cousins....well three if you count the one in ROTC. the two in the Army Reserve have another job because they are on stand down. the third is in college. Now, I'm 17 in just under five years I will have finished ROTC. However IF you gave me enough money I'd grab a rifle and head over there now. However IF you gave me the president's power this war would be over in a few months:D

Now the slogan "I support the troops, But not the war" was more or less put out by the media. Also the media is using the same tacitics they used during the Vietnam and Korean War. Now Politically we lost the wars.........But, by numbers and military startdards we won.

Now my opinion on the war is steadfast. However Heres the actual question.......... "Has the nations opinion changed? Or have we lost sense of our morals?

Copperfox

05-31-2007, 09:58 AM

In many cases, "I support the troops but not the war" is really a thinly-disguised way of saying, "Military people are gullible idiots who don't have the brains to see that they're being used as suckers." But as a twenty-year Navy veteran, I can tell you that we have a lot of smart, alert, well-educated people in the Armed Forces, in fact _better_ educated than the national average.

And an important Vietnamese Communist general has admitted in print that it was ONLY through manipulating American politics and journalism that Hanoi was able to win; America WAS beating the pants off North Vietnam in combat.

Parthian King

05-31-2007, 10:29 AM

Just to keep this on track, let's focus on the contention that the media is the source behind the "I support the troops and not the war"--else this thread will become something else entirely (i.e., something that should be locked).

For my part, I would also contend that it is a distortion, since any military person I have ever talked to sneers at that slogan as patronizing and glib. How does one support the troops if one refuses to support the cause for which they are spilling their life blood? If the media is behind that, it is certainly a gross distortion of how the military on whole feels, or at least prefers to have the politcal debate phrased. Anyway, that's what they have said to me.

And btw, my elder son just finished a tour of duty on the Eisenhower in the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea. He noted to me that when CNN covered their activities off the coast of Africa, the guys all had a good laugh. Not only was the film footage from 1993 (with no note of any kind saying "file footage/images"), but what the reporters said was almost entirely wrong about the Navy's actions. Either A) They are inept and got it wrong because they don't know up from down, or B) They made it up because they wanted Co appear knowledgable and say something anyway for "credibility's" sake, or C) (variation of B) they have an agenda in their reporting and made news to fit that agenda.

In any case, my son consistently let me know what was really happening (as much as allowable), and the little he gave me was far, far different than what we heard on the news.

The First Joke

05-31-2007, 10:47 AM

Shadow Hawk

05-31-2007, 11:25 AM

In the last few years of conflict between Israel and the nations surounding it. Some of the footage used in the reports were from the 1970's during the war between Israel Egypt and Syria.

Parthian King

05-31-2007, 01:21 PM

I was referring to jets taking off from the deck of the U.S. Eisenhower--and yes, according to my son, it was over a dozen years old. This is fine if a crawl or note on the screen says "file footage" (i.e., "we are showing you what these operations are like, but not the actual operations because we either don't have someone there or security prevents us"). In this and many cases, they simply show pics and the gullible public goes, "Wow..."

Meanwhile, we see clips of Lindsay Lohan fleeing the scene of her fender bender over, and over, and over again...

inkspot

06-18-2007, 11:50 AM

I wish Jess had not gone away! We finally have the proof she was looking for, at least from the brave BBC which actually undertook to determine if their presentations were in fact biased. And they found the were! The full story is here:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=56228

Interesting stuff:

The BBC, the British Broadcasting Corporation, has acknowledged the network is biased toward the left, following a report commissioned by the company.

A yearlong probe revealed the corporation especially partial in its treatment of single-issue politics such as climate change, poverty, race and religion, according to the London Times.

"It concludes that the bias has extended across drama, comedy and entertainment, with the corporation pandering to politically motivated celebrities and trendy causes," the paper said.

The report cites the danger of BBC programs being undermined by the liberal culture of its staff, who need to challenge their own assumptions more.

Parthian King

06-18-2007, 03:29 PM

Oh, I think there was plenty of proof offered along the way, Ink. But sometimes "challenging one's own assumptions" (to quote from the end of your post) is brother to having them challenged for you in that neither process is very comfortable.

I'd simply like to throw in the observation that all "reporting" (of human origin, but of course that's a truism) is by its very nature biased, tilted, slanted, spun, or subjective to some degree because of its genesis. In other words, there is no such thing as objectivity in the pure sense. The real question has to do with truth. As a political conservative, I have no problem if the New York Times prints an outraged editorial about the suffering of impoverished homeless people in the shadow of corrupt and greedy Wall Street. It may be left-leaning, but I think we all know that unless they really twist things (entirely possible with that rag), there is a great deal of truth to the observation--even if proposals for solutions will vary greatly. Likewise, I have a great distaste for Fox News' "conservatism" in the face of the sludge they constantly sell in their other venues (Fox is arguably the least family friendly when it comes to matters important to social conservatives).

It's a matter of accountability, of checks and balances, and of the sincere attempt to inform and scren out as much personal perspective as possible, even if the reporter or editorial board knows that this task is constant and can only ever be partially successful at best. From my view, very little of that is really going on.

inkspot

06-18-2007, 03:51 PM

Oh, you know, I agree we had given a lot of proof/evidence of the problem which Jess didn't allow because we were the ones giving the evidence, but here at least, the BBC itself commissioned the study which found them to be blatantly biased. And if you read the entire article, the study recommends not that they stop running the features they're running, but that they balance it by covering the other viewpoint. This works for me in light of the very thing you mention: that all news is going to have one slant or another. That being the case, it would be well to allow both sides to tell their story. The main problem the study seemed to find with the BBC was not their slanted news, but it slanted all in one direction.

Parthian King

06-20-2007, 01:54 AM

Here's another one: The guy who runs CNN polling is a flaming Clinton fan:

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2007/6/19/215339.shtml?s=ic

inkspot

06-20-2007, 09:41 AM

Not even just a fan -- a million-dollar activist. But then ... that's just one person, not an entire media. Tee-hee.
:)

Parthian King

06-21-2007, 03:34 PM

And then there's this one...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19113485

...which is most enlightening!

Oh, where is Jess when you want her!:p

Olórin the Wise

06-21-2007, 11:02 PM

She never seems to be around when we're presenting the most telling evidence...

:D (just joking)

inkspot

06-22-2007, 10:05 AM

My favorite part of that report...
Most of the newsroom checkbooks leaned to the left: 125 journalists gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Only 17 gave to Republicans. Two gave to both parties ... Conservative-leaning journalists tended to greater generosity. Ann Stewart Banker, a producer for Bill O'Reilly at Fox News Channel, gave $5,000 to Republicans. Financial columnist Liz Peek at The New York Sun gave $90,000 to the Grand Old Party.
Isn't that just the way? The conservatives are more liberal in their giving -- just few of them in the field to give.

Olórin the Wise

06-23-2007, 09:51 PM

:D I like that description. :D

inkspot

07-20-2007, 12:18 PM

A bit more evidence if Jess drops by ...
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=56742

It seems the media's beloved statistic of 47 million uninsured Americans is quite faulty. Realistic sources put it clloser to 10 million. This fact has not reached -- or is being ignored by -- ABC news of, of course, Michael Moore.

~Lava~

07-20-2007, 01:04 PM

I can say that the Media Bias is true, but I think the people above me are doing a great job of proving it.

jesslaugh

07-25-2007, 03:20 PM

You all are too funny! I left to do various things more important than spending hours on narniafans, and I was talking to my parents about something when the issue of blind obedience came up... one thing led to another and I was pulling up this thread on the family computer.

They had a good laugh. So did I. There's a reason this kind of argument doesn't last long in places where 95% of the people aren't brash conservative idealogues. You can stay here and make each other feel special for being so "right" and "smart", but please be careful in the "real world".

Your "proof" that one media outlet (from another nation) found that they present news with a bias shows a couple things. First, that they are willing to critically look at themselves and will not hide from the results. Second, that they are more transparent (in a good way) than... say... Fox News. The last thing you can take away from this "proof" is that they are presenting to an audience that is BUYING their product (their left-leaning news).

It goes back to supply and demand. Why am I repeating myself? Take this opportunity to sit down, relax, and think about it. Businesses don't push products into the market when there is no demand for them. The media is a business. The newspapers, magazine, shows, programs, etc. are all products. Therefore, if the media has a leftist bias, it's because there is a demand for it from the consumers (the American public).

And the proof about the uninsured is just silly. They say there are 47 million uninsured and they count illegal immigrants and all people who are uninsured. So? Sure, they could JUST count the people who are too poor to pay for insurance... but the statistic doesn't say "People who are uninsured because they don't have enough money to pay for it"... it just says "Uninsured".

PrinceOfTheWest

07-25-2007, 05:26 PM

Well, if that couldn't have been expected: the ad hominem attack. "I can't answer your arguments, so I'll call you names and scorn you so I can continue to feel superior". Sorry, Jess, trotting out the same stuff that's been answered several times over isn't argument of any sort; it's ranting.

Since this thread seems to have degenerated to this level, I'm going to exercise the prerogative of locking it. If anyone has a good argument for unlocking (such as something constructive to add), PM me, but otherwise we'll just leave it here.

Parthian King

07-29-2007, 11:04 PM

Ditto, POTW. I am retired, but popped in for a brief look around. I have rarely seen such a rude and uncouth display--all in the name of "argument"--on this forum. This display of just plain bad manners does more to damage the poster's position than all the non-sequiturs and circular reasonings put forth to date.

This behavior cannot tolerated on this site, which is meant to be a family friendly and cordial place to chat about Lewis and Lewis-related themes (media being an item about which he had very strong opinions).

EveningStar

07-29-2007, 11:08 PM

Amen! (9.735 Thingy)

PrinceOfTheWest

07-30-2007, 10:13 AM

Okay, I've now unlocked the thread, in case anyone wants to jump back in.

Copperfox

07-30-2007, 10:50 AM

Well, if this counts:

The propaganda comic strip "Doonesbury" recently did the same thing that so-called serious journalists do all the time: focus on some institution that the so-called journalist doesn't like, and pretend that some problem with that institution was completely covered up and unknown until the ultra-liberal media heroically exposed it. In this case, "Doonesbury" dramatized sexual harassment in the armed forces, trying to make us believe that no one had been dealing with it adequately up to now. In the REAL world, all through my twenty-year career in the Navy, we were getting lectures against sexual harassment and racism on an average of once every four minutes.

inkspot

07-30-2007, 11:07 AM

I think it was Doonesbury not long ago who also did some obfuscation of the stem cell research issue. They showed a puzzled girl saying, "Tell me again how finding a cure for Parkinson's Disease (or some such) is immoral?!" without ever showing how useless embryonic stem cell research has proven as a means to cure anything, and how perfect moral everyone thinks it is to use adult stem cells, which can be harvested without killing anyone. It seems so important for the media to blur the lines ...

Parthian King

07-30-2007, 11:28 AM

The propaganda comic strip "Doonesbury" recently did the same thing that so-called serious journalists do all the time: focus on some institution that the so-called journalist doesn't like, and pretend that some problem with that institution was completely covered up and unknown until the ultra-liberal media heroically exposed it. In this case, "Doonesbury" dramatized sexual harassment in the armed forces, trying to make us believe that no one had been dealing with it adequately up to now. In the REAL world, all through my twenty-year career in the Navy, we were getting lectures against sexual harassment and racism on an average of once every four minutes.

Joseph, are you suggesting that 20 years in the military gives you an angle on the reality of a matter like this? Whatever are you doing here, then? ;)

I would just say that people are people, are people. Objectivity is a chimera, and everyone has an agenda of some kind or another. Everyone. From what I understand from the so-called "Purple America" post-election maps, the USA is split about 50/50 on these things (remember, a presidential candidate winning with 52% is considered decisive, and 55% is a landslide victory). This means in the US, about half the folks are basically liberal, and about half basically conservative (though more consider themselves conservative, they don't live or vote that way). Each of these schools of thought will move, speak, and argue from their point of view, because they think it is best for the country. That's politics.

Now, when statistic after statistic overwhelmingly reveals that the folks running the media are largely (though not exhaustively) liberal, what is the tough thing about saying these folks are going to use their position and influence to push what they think is best? As I've said before, I respect a liberal (even like the creator of Doonesbury) who writes what he writes because he feels its best for America more than if I thought he was doing it only for money. That is what strikes me so strange about this discussion. I am branded a conservative ideologue (though my position on some things would get me clobbered on Rush Limbaugh), yet I am more theoretically open to the idea that liberals in the media do what they do because they believe it (in other words, I ascribe some virtue to them) than the one who until recently has seemed to defend them. Incredibly, I have not heard, "Hey, liberals in the media are simply right, while the handful of conservatives are simply wrong." That's an argument. To say liberals in the media are so simply because they can be bought is an extraordinarily cynical view--far more cynical than my own. To put it another way, I have viewed social liberals as worthy but deeply misguided opponents; their (until recently) champion has viewed them as nothing but harlot wordsmiths.

inkspot

07-30-2007, 05:04 PM

OK, what Jess denied was that the media people are overwhelmingly liberal in their point of view. She did not trust the polls and research that said so. Further, I think, she said that the media do not present a liberally-biased point of view; that we see it that way because we are so over the top conservative, but in fact, they present a quite balanced view. She said the BBC study did not apply to the USA's media, and of course it doesn't apply down to the minute details, but BBC is a respected news provider along with CNN, the NY Times and other sources which people consult here in the USA; it is similar to our news providers, can we say that? So I think the study showing their overwhelming liberal bias could, of course, apply in some ways to the media of the USA.

Now, where Jess did see a bias in the media was that if there is some kind of bias, it is there because people pay to have their news biased, and the news is a business, and people get what they pay for. This is a very jaundiced view of the thing, and it also argues against her previous point that there is no bias ...

And I think PK is a huge idealogue. Probably the biggest ever. :)

Parthian King

07-30-2007, 05:37 PM

Mods! Mods! This is a personal attack! I've been brashly branded, and branding is reserved for horses, cattle, and...Basenjis! Besides, if there's ever been a time someone has criticized the speck in her brother's eye while ignoring the (ideo)log in their own, this would certainly qualify!

My point, Ink, was that regardless of what someone might say about media bias (for whatever reason), it will be there. Why? People are biased because they are people--not because they are liberal or conservative. How (in what way) they are biased depends on their ideology. Hence, if conservatives dominate the airwaves (as they do in talk radio), that will be biased in a conservative direction. If libs dominate cable news channels, that will be biased accordingly. What's the point in trying to deny this unless there is something else in play?

inkspot

07-31-2007, 07:57 AM

Mods! Mods! This is a personal attack! I've been brashly branded, and branding is reserved for horses, cattle, and...Basenjis! Besides, if there's ever been a time someone has criticized the speck in her brother's eye while ignoring the (ideo)log in their own, this would certainly qualify!
LOL! I knew you were the one who was mean to puppies!!!
(Not to mention torturing innocent puns.)

I don't know what the point of trying to deny media bias is, and I don't think there is a viable way to do so (at least from what I understood of Jess' posts). But she did deny that there was such a thing. The only bias she saw was that Fox News has a conservative bias. Since she cannot try, again, to explain her views here, I will not do further damage to them by trying to explain them with limited understanding.

If the answer was to get a broader range of ideology in the media, that option is closed because the media, now controlled by liberals, polices itself so that conservatives, if they make their views known, have a hard time getting into positions of influence.

Copperfox

07-31-2007, 10:06 AM

Yes, everyone has some agenda; but not everyone strives ruthlessly to gag and silence everyone _else's_ agenda. It is the hard left that is the force for censorship in our time.

inkspot

07-31-2007, 10:43 AM

Yes, everyone has some agenda; but not everyone strives ruthlessly to gag and silence everyone _else's_ agenda. It is the hard left that is the force for censorship in our time.
That's a very good point, you know? Lately it has been reported that some D senators (Democrat, you scoundrels!) have said something has to be done about conservative talk radio -- to force the airing of liberal talk radio to balance it out. This is downright laughable. If anyone who listens to talk radio had wanted to hear the other viewpoint, then the asinine Air America would have remained on the air, instead of going out of business and failing to pay its creditors ... I wish I had thought to ask Jess about that if $ is the only reason the media is so biased in the USA: why wasn't the liberal viewpoint a huge seller on talk radio?

But back to CF's point: I do not see conservative media trying to squash all other viewpoints out of existence, the way liberal media does. Maybe we should try harder ... :)

Parthian King

07-31-2007, 11:13 AM

Yes, everyone has some agenda; but not everyone strives ruthlessly to gag and silence everyone _else's_ agenda. It is the hard left that is the force for censorship in our time.

I truly agree. And that is really the larger issue in the thread, which was started not to discuss whether there was liberal (or any) bias in the media, but whether the bias there causes us to be over-informed about nonsense and under-informed about what is necessary.

I also agree that it is a shame Jess cannot clarify her views for us. That is the loss of inappropriate behavior on the forum: It cuts off a stream of thought that might have been fruitful had it been more fully developed. Unfortunately, unvarnished, malicious rudeness cannot be allowed, even if it is mixed into an interesting discussion.

inkspot

08-03-2007, 11:48 AM

OK, I know I said the BBC is comparable to American news providers. Sadly, it took the UK Times online to share this bit of inspirational news with the world.
July 23, 2007
Al-Qaeda faces rebellion from the ranks
Sickened by the group’s barbarity, Iraqi insurgents are giving information to coalition forces

Fed up with being part of a group that cuts off a person’s face with piano wire to teach others a lesson, dozens of low-level members of al-Qaeda in Iraq are daring to become informants for the US military in a hostile Baghdad neighbourhood.
What we have been desirous to see in Iraq, the Iraqis standing up for themselves against the terrorists, is beginning to happen, and the news media in the US cannot be bothered to tell us about this great victory. Why? Because the media is made up mostly of people who are liberal-leaning, and the liberals are not excited about victory in Iraq. This is not just my opinion. They have stated it themselves. Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC), the third-highest-ranking House Democrat says, "A good report from General David Petraeus would be “a real big problem for us.”" When Army General Jack Keane told Congress in Iraq "the trends are up and progress is being made. We are on the
offensive and we have the momentum," some Democrats simply walked out on his testimony, and the Speaker said congressional Democrats are unwilling to concede there has been any progress.

It is clear that the liberals want out of Iraq now, which translates into failure for the USA in Iraq, and so the liberal media in the USA is unwilling to cover any progress being made there.

Another story largely ignored by the US media: two South Korean missionaries have been killed by Taliban in Afghanistan. (I think about 20 were kidnapped, and the terrorists said they would begin killing them if some terrorists were not released from prison). These South Koreans were in Afghanistan to help people. The two who have been killed were true martyrs ...

Yet the US media feels their story is not worth telling. Let Israel defend itself from Palestinian terrorists and accidentally kill two innocent bystanders, and our press will show dramatic footage of the wailing mourners -- bad, bad Israel! ... let two Christians be slain by Islamic terrorists in their efforts to extend the hands of Christ, and our media completely ignores it. :( What could the difference be if not ideology?

PrinceOfTheWest

08-27-2007, 06:43 PM

An interesting call by a major member of the American media, specifically the Washington Post:

The "irreverent" comic strip Opus, drawn by Berkeley Breathed, has had its August 26th cartoon pulled by the Washington Post and several other newspapers. The rationale for this decision was that the content might be offensive to Muslims (see the comic here (http://www.comics.com/wash/opus/archive/opus-20070826.html)).

Ironically, the strip just the week before (here (http://www.comics.com/wash/opus/archive/opus-20070819.html)) had poked fun at one of Breathed's favorite targets, the late Rev. Jerry Falwell. All the papers ran that without comment or, seemingly, consideration of whether the strip would be offensive to Christians.

Comics editor Amy Logo gave this explanation for the double standard:Lago said she didn't flag newspapers about that strip because she didn't think readers would misunderstand the humor.

"They're not going to take it seriously," she said.

But she did alert newspapers about the Muslim-themed cartoon because there was a question about whether Muslim readers would be offended.

"I don't necessarily think it's poking fun [at Islam]," Lago said. "But the question with Muslims is, are they taking it seriously?"

The "Opus" strip in question takes swipes at Islamists — a term used for radical Muslims — as opposed to moderate Muslims, she pointed out, but there was concern that the distinction wouldn't be clear.
So we see that this paper - one of the most prominent of the Western papers - and those that followed suit do care about what Muslims may think when their faith is but slightly mocked, but do not care about what Christians may think when the principles of their faith are used as the butt of jokes. This issue is not so much what Breathed penned (anyone who knows his works understands that he cannot be held to a high standard), but how the Post responded - and what that says about their attitude toward Christians in particular.

Olórin the Wise

08-27-2007, 07:02 PM

Ironically, the strip just the week before (here (http://www.comics.com/wash/opus/archive/opus-20070819.html)) had poked fun at one of Breathed's favorite targets, the late Rev. Jerry Falwell. All the papers ran that without comment or, seemingly, consideration of whether the strip would be offensive to Christians.

Maybe that's because Christians don't blow up cities or kidnap prominent figures when they get offended. :D

Sir Benjamin the Lion

08-27-2007, 07:04 PM

Rightly said Prince of the West. :p That said comic strip, Opus, even mocked Jerry Falwell, but instead of being insulted, I took it as a compliment because it meant he got under their skin good! Go Jerry!!!!:p

inkspot

08-29-2007, 12:20 PM

And a little more proof that the media chooses to over-inform us regarding viewpoints widely held by media personnel and under-inform us regarding any conflicting POV: CNN's Christiane Amanpour and her recent "Warriors of God" series, which over-informed us about "Jewish terrorism" which is so rare as to be nearly non-existent, and under-informed us about any right Israel may have to exist as a nation.

Amanpour's "God's Warriors" describes itself as focusing on religious fundamentalism among Christians, Muslims and Jews.

The Jewish segment started off comparing "Jewish terrorists" to that of Muslims, specifically focusing on the few instances of violence or attempted violence by religiously motivated Jews against Muslims. It told the story of Baruch Goldstein, an American-born Israeli physician who killed 29 Arabs in the West Bank city of Hebron in 1994. Goldstein's actions were widely condemned by Israelis and worldwide Jewry. The organization he was a part of was outlawed in Israel.

States the CAMERA report: "While in reality Jewish 'terrorism' is virtually non-existent, the program magnifies at length the few instances of (Jewish) violence" comparing it to "violent jihadist Muslim campaigns" when indeed there is no such comparison "either in numbers of perpetrators engaged or in the magnitude of death and destruction wrought."
The entire article is worth a look -- CNN passed the three-part series off as journalism, and the gullible among us will either say they did so because the public is simply clamoring for more anti-semitic and anti-Christian propaganda, or that the series wasn't weighted at all in any particular direction, which is poppycock!