Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/02/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]The News Media. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see, hear, and know, how biased our news reporting establishment is. Anyone who cannot see that they constantly take one side of issues, refuse to report issues that are clearly news and important, and generally speak in a manner that is ambiguous, is either still in his/her mothers womb, or dead. - ----------- Hate you Jim? Never. Wonder where you get this paranoid view of the world? Sure. While I'm sure you won't believe me - in 10 years at The Washington Post, covering everything from local courts, to schools, to cops, to feature writing, to demonstrations, and a lot of health care and medicine, I can only think of ONE occasion on which there was ANY kind of attempt made to shape, change, alter, edit, suppress, pump up, ANY story I wrote - for other than grammatical and/or perfectly reasonable space constraints. That one story was part of a three-part series I did on abortion. I had watched, from the doc's elbow, a second trimester abortion, and had written a minute-by-minute account of what I saw and heard. It was deemed far to graphic to run, and all the descriptive material was reduced to a single paragraph. I have no doubt that was done, at least subconsciously, because what I wrote challenged the "pro-choice" biases of the people who ran the paper - they also happened to be, and still are, my personal biases. I can also honestly say that in 13 years at Newsday, the Long Island daily of which the infamous Bill Moyers was once editor, I NEVER had ANY kind of attempt made to shape, change, alter, edit, suppress, pump up, ANY story I wrote - for other than grammatical and/or perfectly reasonable space constraints. During that time, all of which I spent covering health, medicine, science, and the human impact of same, and during which, serving for six years as Science Editor, working on numerous special projects, I wrote a weekly nationally syndicated column. That column was horribly politically incorrect, often ticked off readers, said things that are usually not said in "polite society," and NO ONE ever told me to change anything. How is it that those who always see media conspiracies lurking behind every printing press and t.v. broadcast tower conveniently forget that the vast majority of owners of these various media are BUSINESS men and women, and, more often than not, are Republicans, and often conservative Republicans. Yes, most reporters and editors tend to be "liberal," as do most artists of any sort - and reporters and editors are, at heart, writer/artists who have found a way to feed themselves with their artistic skill. But the bosses are conservatives. And if you don't believe that, look at their records on labor issues. You're certainly entitled to your views, and, I must say that I agree with a lot of what you say about the trashiness of most of what passes for "news" on t.v. these days. But that trashiness is there for ONE reason only - it sells advertising. If quality journalism sold advertising, it would be there. If most Americans would rather watch the modern equivalent of Edward R. Murrow doing See It Now, than 20/20, 60 Minutes, or Prime Time, believe me, that's what they'd be seeing on their sets. Your fight isn't with the media, it's with your fellow citizens. I realize that killing the messenger has been in vogue since the Trojan wars, but it has never changed the truth. B. D. P.S. I promise this is my first, last and only contribution to this thread. :-)