6 ms·

During the election cycle they openly defended their bias, and have continued to produce extremely biased coverage since then. They are just as responsible as a

by rfrank 10y ago

During the election cycle they openly defended their bias, and have continued to produce extremely biased coverage since then. They are just as responsible as anyone else. If their bias is acceptable, why is bias from Fox or Breitbart unacceptable? How is NYT meaningfully better, if they present an equally biased perspective, just from a side you agree with? https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/08/business/balance-fairness-and-a-proudly-provocative-presidential-candidate.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/08/business/balance-fairness...

eeeeeeeeeeeee 10y ago
What made you think I agree with all of their bias? I specifically said they have a bias, just like everyone does. But there is also a huge difference between individual reporter bias, the entire bias of the paper, the bias of the editorial board, etc. Just like WSJ op-ed pages are not the same as the rest of the paper. I am fully aware NYT screwed up stories, they generally back a globalist tilt, they screwed up the Iraq/WMD story, etc. But I also know they are, overall, committed to the truth. And Fox News and Breitbart are committed to propaganda. To compare the two is an absolute joke.
- rfrank 10y ago
  > What made you think I agree with all of their bias? Your defense of it. Their entire organization is biased, just like Fox or Breitbart. Why are they "committed to the truth" when conservative outlets are "propaganda"? Do you think conservatives view NYT/CNN bias as "truth telling" or "propaganda"?
  - x0x0 10y ago
    > Do you think conservatives view NYT/CNN bias as "truth telling" or "propaganda"? What on earth do their views have to do with reality?
    - rfrank 10y ago
      Hey really great comment that's worth taking seriously!
    - rjeli 10y ago
      His point is obvious. Please, please don't comment in bad faith.
  - brazzledazzle 10y ago
    Personally I view Fox and Breitbart as being on a scale of propaganda with Brietbart near the extreme end and Fox somewhere in the middle. But while I don't always agree with The Wall Street Journal or The Economist I don't think they're anything like Fox/Breitbart. There's a difference between bias and propaganda.
    - rfrank 10y ago
      > There's a difference between bias and propaganda. Then actually define it, and provide examples of them being literal propaganda. Otherwise the discussion is just a political version of "beauty is in the eye of the beholder."
      - x0x0 10y ago
        No, facts exist whether you like them or not.
      - brazzledazzle 10y ago
        I think this sort of demand seems reasonable at face value but really has a reductive effect on the conversation. I don't have a catalog of infractions I keep to draw from for Internet debates so I can either compile a list that you might ignore or nitpick apart or just let the conversation die here. I don't need a list or carefully defined criteria to come to the conclusion that a news organization is a propaganda outlet because I'm just some asshole nobody who's just trying to make a point that it's not some party or philosophical allegiance that determines how I view a news or media organization.
        rfrank 10y ago
        Might want to give this one a shot. http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html
        brazzledazzle 10y ago
        Is there a specific section you think I should focus on? I think his point about agreement being sort of brief and shallow while disagreement forces you to explore ideas that haven't is oddly relevant here. Despite the fact that we're disagreeing even a lively debate between us would actually be shallow because "is Fox News/Breitbart propaganda?" is a dead horse beaten until it's dust. You might be a special exception but I assure you that I, like most people, wouldn't be adding additional insight at all. I'm more than happy to let other people do it, I just don't see the point in participating. I just wanted to let you know that thinking it's just some liberal bias against conservatives that makes people think Fox and Brietbart are propaganda is pigeonholing these folks into a very convenient "idiot" bucket. If it was that simple they'd think that about every conservative media/news organization.
  - alphapapa 10y ago
    You're arguing with an example of the blindness that resulted in the public's trust of the media hitting an all-time low and Trump getting elected. One kind of person reasons forward from principles; another kind of person reasons backward from desired results, i.e. that the ends justify the means. It seems that they are simply unable to recognize their own bias, a kind of willful self-deception.
- tracker1 10y ago
  Fox is committed to maximizing advertising profits... as for Breitbart, well, that's a little different.
  - lettergram 10y ago
    Pretty sure the NYT is also committed to maximizing profit. Otherwise, they wouldn't paywall every article.
    - tracker1 10y ago
      My comment is mainly in that "conservative news" makes money... a large portion of the population is conservative, and was under-served by the commentary from other news outlets. Now I think it's too far the other way, but businesses are, and should be allowed to adapt or die. I would presume that a lot of people in the media may or may not believe what they are spewing... as for the management/administration of Fox News, I would say it's likely more about money than political views.
jbooth 10y ago
Look at the numbers: Something like 50% of Fox News viewers believe ridiculous falsehoods, like Obama wasn't born in the country or Saddam really had WMD. There are studies showing that Fox News viewers are less informed than no-news viewers. There are no such studies for the NYT, editorial page bias notwithstanding.
- jrs95 10y ago
  Those demographics aren't necessarily a reflection of the degree of bias in the media coverage. More educated/well-informed people could just have a preference for one form of bias over another.
- goldenkey 10y ago
  Well he wasn't. The birth certificate has been shown to have many signs of forgery [1]. The Hawaiian Health department worker who signed off on the copy of it died mysteriously in a plane crash. [1] https://youtu.be/yuhF-Ok3djI https://youtu.be/yuhF-Ok3djI [2] http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/health-director-who-approved-obama-birth-certificate-dies-plane-crash-f2D11732106 http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/health-director-who-approv...
  - Nimitz14 10y ago
    7/10 troll
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
- ThomPete 10y ago
  How is that different from the liberal left to believe trump is a sexoffender for saying "grab them by the p"? There are just as many angled stories in the mainstream media and they are actually worse because they claim to be objective.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
BigJono 10y ago
> if they present an equally biased perspective Where has it been said that they're both equally biased? I don't know anything about American news, this is all from an Australian perspective, but if a right-wing paper runs fairly standard stories and occasionally has an opinion piece on stricter border controls; and a left-wing paper runs page after page after page of manipulative appeals to emotion full of terrible anecdotal "evidence", nobody would suggest that they were equally biased. The same works in reverse. You don't get to declare a Facist state and openly call for the execution of all Muslims because your rival paper ran an investigative story into refugee camp abuse and then go on to claim an equal bias.
MaysonL 10y ago
How much coverage did they do of Trump's scandals as opposed to Clinton's emails?
- rfrank 10y ago
  Is that supposed to be a point? Look it up.
  - MaysonL 10y ago
    See https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-2016-general-election/ https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-2016-general-ele... Overall the media gave Clinton a bit more (by percentage) positive coverage in the general, while Trump got more if you include the primaries. However, Trump got much more coverage overall. The negative coverage of Clinton spiked during the last two weeks of the campaign.

by rfrank 10y ago

eeeeeeeeeeeee 10y ago

What made you think I agree with all of their bias? I specifically said they have a bias, just like everyone does. But there is also a huge difference between individual reporter bias, the entire bias of the paper, the bias of the editorial board, etc. Just like WSJ op-ed pages are not the same as the rest of the paper. I am fully aware NYT screwed up stories, they generally back a globalist tilt, they screwed up the Iraq/WMD story, etc. But I also know they are, overall, committed to the truth. And Fox News and Breitbart are committed to propaganda. To compare the two is an absolute joke.

rfrank 10y ago
> What made you think I agree with all of their bias? Your defense of it. Their entire organization is biased, just like Fox or Breitbart. Why are they "committed to the truth" when conservative outlets are "propaganda"? Do you think conservatives view NYT/CNN bias as "truth telling" or "propaganda"?
- x0x0 10y ago
  > Do you think conservatives view NYT/CNN bias as "truth telling" or "propaganda"? What on earth do their views have to do with reality?
  - rfrank 10y ago
    Hey really great comment that's worth taking seriously!
  - rjeli 10y ago
    His point is obvious. Please, please don't comment in bad faith.
- brazzledazzle 10y ago
  Personally I view Fox and Breitbart as being on a scale of propaganda with Brietbart near the extreme end and Fox somewhere in the middle. But while I don't always agree with The Wall Street Journal or The Economist I don't think they're anything like Fox/Breitbart. There's a difference between bias and propaganda.
  - rfrank 10y ago
    > There's a difference between bias and propaganda. Then actually define it, and provide examples of them being literal propaganda. Otherwise the discussion is just a political version of "beauty is in the eye of the beholder."
    - x0x0 10y ago
      No, facts exist whether you like them or not.
    - brazzledazzle 10y ago
      I think this sort of demand seems reasonable at face value but really has a reductive effect on the conversation. I don't have a catalog of infractions I keep to draw from for Internet debates so I can either compile a list that you might ignore or nitpick apart or just let the conversation die here. I don't need a list or carefully defined criteria to come to the conclusion that a news organization is a propaganda outlet because I'm just some asshole nobody who's just trying to make a point that it's not some party or philosophical allegiance that determines how I view a news or media organization.
      - rfrank 10y ago
        Might want to give this one a shot. http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html
        brazzledazzle 10y ago
        Is there a specific section you think I should focus on? I think his point about agreement being sort of brief and shallow while disagreement forces you to explore ideas that haven't is oddly relevant here. Despite the fact that we're disagreeing even a lively debate between us would actually be shallow because "is Fox News/Breitbart propaganda?" is a dead horse beaten until it's dust. You might be a special exception but I assure you that I, like most people, wouldn't be adding additional insight at all. I'm more than happy to let other people do it, I just don't see the point in participating. I just wanted to let you know that thinking it's just some liberal bias against conservatives that makes people think Fox and Brietbart are propaganda is pigeonholing these folks into a very convenient "idiot" bucket. If it was that simple they'd think that about every conservative media/news organization.
- alphapapa 10y ago
  You're arguing with an example of the blindness that resulted in the public's trust of the media hitting an all-time low and Trump getting elected. One kind of person reasons forward from principles; another kind of person reasons backward from desired results, i.e. that the ends justify the means. It seems that they are simply unable to recognize their own bias, a kind of willful self-deception.
tracker1 10y ago
Fox is committed to maximizing advertising profits... as for Breitbart, well, that's a little different.
- lettergram 10y ago
  Pretty sure the NYT is also committed to maximizing profit. Otherwise, they wouldn't paywall every article.
  - tracker1 10y ago
    My comment is mainly in that "conservative news" makes money... a large portion of the population is conservative, and was under-served by the commentary from other news outlets. Now I think it's too far the other way, but businesses are, and should be allowed to adapt or die. I would presume that a lot of people in the media may or may not believe what they are spewing... as for the management/administration of Fox News, I would say it's likely more about money than political views.

jbooth 10y ago

Look at the numbers: Something like 50% of Fox News viewers believe ridiculous falsehoods, like Obama wasn't born in the country or Saddam really had WMD. There are studies showing that Fox News viewers are less informed than no-news viewers. There are no such studies for the NYT, editorial page bias notwithstanding.

jrs95 10y ago
Those demographics aren't necessarily a reflection of the degree of bias in the media coverage. More educated/well-informed people could just have a preference for one form of bias over another.
goldenkey 10y ago
Well he wasn't. The birth certificate has been shown to have many signs of forgery [1]. The Hawaiian Health department worker who signed off on the copy of it died mysteriously in a plane crash. [1] https://youtu.be/yuhF-Ok3djI https://youtu.be/yuhF-Ok3djI [2] http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/health-director-who-approved-obama-birth-certificate-dies-plane-crash-f2D11732106 http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/health-director-who-approv...
- Nimitz14 10y ago
  7/10 troll
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
ThomPete 10y ago
How is that different from the liberal left to believe trump is a sexoffender for saying "grab them by the p"? There are just as many angled stories in the mainstream media and they are actually worse because they claim to be objective.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

BigJono 10y ago

> if they present an equally biased perspective Where has it been said that they're both equally biased? I don't know anything about American news, this is all from an Australian perspective, but if a right-wing paper runs fairly standard stories and occasionally has an opinion piece on stricter border controls; and a left-wing paper runs page after page after page of manipulative appeals to emotion full of terrible anecdotal "evidence", nobody would suggest that they were equally biased. The same works in reverse. You don't get to declare a Facist state and openly call for the execution of all Muslims because your rival paper ran an investigative story into refugee camp abuse and then go on to claim an equal bias.

MaysonL 10y ago

How much coverage did they do of Trump's scandals as opposed to Clinton's emails?

rfrank 10y ago
Is that supposed to be a point? Look it up.
- MaysonL 10y ago
  See https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-2016-general-election/ https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-2016-general-ele... Overall the media gave Clinton a bit more (by percentage) positive coverage in the general, while Trump got more if you include the primaries. However, Trump got much more coverage overall. The negative coverage of Clinton spiked during the last two weeks of the campaign.