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Yes, the prominent center, center-left, and leftish new outlets (NYT, WSJ, Economist, WP, etc.) have some bias in their writing. However, most of the authors a

Yes, the prominent center, center-left, and leftish new outlets (NYT, WSJ, Economist, WP, etc.) have some bias in their writing. However, most of the authors and staff at those organizations are extremely professional and take their mandate to report and analyze very seriously. To me, this is self-evident 95% of the time. To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle. Opinion is labeled as such. Pointing to specific counter-examples is like identifying NASA with the failures of the Challenger -- it completely misses the forest for the trees. What there is not is a serious right-leaning counter-weight to this, and that is the vacuum into which the manifestly untrue and unserious outlets stream. Why this is true is an interesting and controversial discussion in its own right.

bb101 10y ago
Here in the UK, we have the Spectator magazine, whose writers are very professional and generally support a conservative position.
maxerickson 10y ago
WSJ is at least center-right.
- dude01 10y ago
  That's true, but their opinion/editorial pages are extreme right-leaning, they're different teams.
  - tomhoward 10y ago
    “Extreme right”? Some proportionality would be good. “Extreme” when used in the context of political ideology implies some form of totalitarianism; i.e., Nazism, Fascism (extreme right), Stalinism, Maoism (extreme left). The WSJ, from the little of it I read, tends to adopt generally classical liberal or libertarian positions; i.e, moderately right-leaning economically, moderately liberal on social issues, generally in favour of more liberty across the board, and thus opposed to authoritarianism. There's a valid debate to be had about the merits of these positions, but to describe the WSJ as “extreme right” does an injustice to the many who've suffered and died – and who continue to do so to this day – due to genuinely extreme political ideologies.
    - griffinmmahon 10y ago
      I basically do not take issue with your dissection of terms here. However I have seen another bit of your logic elsewhere and strongly disagree with it: the idea that mislabelling (or even correctly labelling) something "does an injustice" or "is a disservice" or "would be offensive to" people who died in the past at the hands of someone/something. We only have an obligation to make the lives of current and future people better: people who have died because of hatred would surely appreciate us doing our best to combat hatred in the modern world.
      - tomhoward 10y ago
        I'm not sure I see where the disagreement is. I agree that making life better for people today and in the future is what matters most. And I think an important step in doing that is to heed the lessons of history, which includes having sympathy for the suffering of those who've gone before.
        griffinmmahon 10y ago
        Sure, we're agreeing. I just take issue with the idea that it is possible to do an injustice against the dead over word choice. I probably jumped too quick, though, and maybe shouldn't have commented. Sorry if any of this came off as combative!
        tomhoward 10y ago
        Fair enough :) I see what you're getting st, thanks for sharing your thoughts.
    - dude01 10y ago
      Sorry for late reply, but I totally did not mean the word "extreme" like you are talking about. I meant extreme as in, my expectations for a newspaper opinion section with the heft of the WSJ should contain wisdom and NOT be mostly a cheer-leader for one side of the political spectrum.
- DashRattlesnake 10y ago
  I've heard its newsroom is even more liberal that the NYT, but it's very professional so it's hard to tell.
  - enraged_camel 10y ago
    Its news coverage is inarguably center-right (since it caters to a primarily business audience), but its opinion pieces are quite liberal.
    - DashRattlesnake 10y ago
      > but its opinion pieces are quite liberal The WSJ? What are you talking about? It's opinion pages are famously conservative.
- JohnTHaller 10y ago
  It's owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp of "fair and balanced" Fox News fame.
Wohlf 10y ago
I wonder if it's just impossible to find serious right-leaning journalists that aren't full right wing, since journalism is already heavily liberal, full of institutional bias, and few people are willing to work for peanuts.
- maxerickson 10y ago
  Does full right wing even have a coherent meaning? edit: Which I realize now is poor phrasing. When I say "coherent", I'm not talking about right wing ideologies being coherent or not, I'm asking if there is actually a bundle of beliefs that have extremes that can meaningfully be taken together. Some ideologies embrace national defense, others are less concerned with it, others consider it at odds with personal rights, and so on.
- NoGravitas 10y ago
  I'd consider the responsible center-right newspaper to be the Wall Street Journal. As for news/opinion magazines, there's Commentary, The American Spectator, National Review, The Weekly Standard. I'd consider U.S. News & World Report to be an establishment conservative outlet, too.
- alphonsegaston 10y ago
  Perhaps the Economist? They seem generally professional and intellectually honest, but posit everything from a right/Capitalist perspective.
  - soundwave106 10y ago
    The Economist is a bit unique in that their "classic liberalism" editorial viewpoint doesn't neatly fit into America's current tribal division; in America I've heard it called both "right-wing" and "left-wing" as a result. Such shows a danger of trying to pigeonhole every editorial stance into "left" and "right" categories. It would be nice if we expanded beyond these somewhat artificial opinion collectives.
- ylem 10y ago
  I lean to the left, but I enjoy the writings of McArdle: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/contributors/megan-mcardle https://www.bloomberg.com/view/contributors/megan-mcardle who is solidly libertarian. She tries to argue her point logically, and in cases where I still disagree with her, I can respect her perspective.
ue_ 10y ago
I think it would be pleasant to some bigger far-left papers rather than liberal or conservative papers. All the ones you named are liberal papers.
- griffinmmahon 10y ago
  Yeah "left" is not the way I would describe papers that dishonestly hyped the invasion of Iraq etc. For readers-by: try Jacobin or Dissent
  - RodericDay 10y ago
    Current Affairs also.
mark_l_watson 10y ago
I have to disagree with you. Before we 'cut the cable' my wife used to watch MSNBC and last year it seemed like their nightly news hours were mostly the opinion of the show's host, couched as news. I do agree with the way papers like the NYT has separate 'opinion' sections or labels articles as being and editor's opinion - way better than how MSNBC put forth opinion as hard news.
- daveguy 10y ago
  OP did not include MSNBC in that list. They are obviously the left equivalent of Fox News. Their opinion shows run in the prime time. I thought that was generally known of both, but maybe it's not known on either side and people tuning in to Fox and MSNBC both think they are getting unbiased news in the evenings.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- maxerickson 10y ago
  The 7-11 block on MSNBC is unabashedly opinionated. They aren't even trying to be subtle about it.
Clanan 10y ago
"To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle. Opinion is labeled as such. Pointing to specific counter-examples is like identifying NASA with the failures of the Challenger -- it completely misses the forest for the trees." Are you serious? You broadly profess the journalistic integrity of multiple institutions that have been embroiled in ethics scandals and then preemptively disallow any responses as missing the point. What a disingenuous and absurd statement. Forgive my nearsightedness, but I would argue that a prominent newspaper has serious problems, far past "slight and subtle" bias, when its own writers are secretly giving drafts and veto power to a political campaign [0]. Keep in mind I'm not defending right-leaning publications, either. They have their own set of problems. But this ironic, constant claim that left-leaning publications are above reproach or criticism is laughable. We, the readers, must always keep them honest through our own honest critiques and feedback. [0] http://nypost.com/2016/10/11/the-new-york-times-abandoned-its-integrity-just-to-bash-donald-trump/ http://nypost.com/2016/10/11/the-new-york-times-abandoned-it... - first that popped up in Google
- wcummings 10y ago
  Are you seriously citing the New York Post to make a point about media bias and integrity? I read the nypost for fun but it's barely a real newspaper, and to the extent that it is it's extremely biased and unprofessional.
- leot 10y ago
  FOX News literally circulates a memo, every day, that guides its treatment of political subjects. That they have a primary goal of pushing an agenda is made manifest by FOX's abrupt termination of coverage of a meeting between President Obama and the GOP when it began to show Obama in a sympathetic light. Name one example of another mainstream media outlet being this institutionally cynical. https://mediamatters.org/research/2010/01/30/fox-cuts-away-from-obama-gop-qampa-but-airs-gop/159818 https://mediamatters.org/research/2010/01/30/fox-cuts-away-f... http://www.cc.com/video-clips/kja25r/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-moment-of-zen---roger-ailes-defends-fox-news http://www.cc.com/video-clips/kja25r/the-daily-show-with-jon...
  - deleted 10y ago
spenuke 10y ago
I think the main problem is that we conflate the political spectrum (what are the responsibilities of the State?) and the epistemological spectrum (how do we determine what is true and not?). The "Western World", for better and worse, is a product of the Enlightenment, and as a result is irreducibly leftist in its epistemology: modern democracy depends on a belief that a citizenry armed with the scientific method and rational discourse can rule themselves without resorting to the authority of a king or a holy book. The Right Wing (in the US, our Republican Party) is less identifiable by its right-wing policies as it is by its right-wing epistemology: they reject all scientific evidence for climate change, biological and geological history, medicine, etc. For the religious, this manifests itself in the old epistemology that says the Bible is the sole source of all Truth. For the non-religious, this tends to manifest itself as total nihilism, which is expressed in the more heartless strains of Libertarian Objectivism; for these people, might equals right and society is a zero-sum game where the only truth is winning and losing. And this epistemological divide is the one that is tearing us apart. When you say there's no serious right-leaning counter-weight to (the NYT et al.), what you mean is that there is no serious news outlet that doesn't hold the Enlightenment values. And when you put it in this light, it's an obvious statement, isn't it? Politically speaking, the WSJ and the Economist can very much be considered right of center (leaving aside that the median center has moved right over the last 40 years), but they are still rooted in Enlightenment science and rationalism. Point is, although the political right wing is currently the main base of the epistemological right wing, it doesn't necessarily have to be that way. And the problem with saying we need more right-wing voices in mainstream media is that there are so few of them who meet the basic epistemological requirements; when they do, they are often rejected by the broader right wing for being too far left!
- golemotron 10y ago
  That's a very convenient and self-congratulatory view of things. Science denialism happens on both the left and the right. The book Galileo's Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and One Scholar's Search for Justice, by Alice Dreger gives a good survey of the terrain.
  - enraged_camel 10y ago
throwaway1920 10y ago
> However, most of the authors and staff at those organizations are extremely professional and take their mandate to report and analyze very seriously. To me, this is self-evident 95% of the time. To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle. You clearly haven't read their pieces on India - though I suppose this is a symptom of something more insidious.
yummyfajitas 10y ago
I'd disagree pretty strongly with this. Here's a couple of NYT examples: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students-us-colleges-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students... After reading this article, do you think colleges overall are seeing a significant drop in international applicants, a significant increase, or it stayed about the same? Or here's another example: https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/30/upshot/free-market-for-education-economists-generally-dont-buy-it.html https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/30/upshot/free-market-for... After reading this article, what do you think about the general views of economists on school vouchers?
- xname2 10y ago
  Here is another example: "A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift" https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/us/for-detroits-children-more-school-choice-but-not-better-schools.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/us/for-detroits-children-... According to NYT: "half the charters perform only as well, or worse than, Detroit’s traditional public schools." According to data from the cited study: Half the charters perform significantly better, around half no significant difference, a small percentage (1% in reading, 7% in math) perform significantly worse. See: https://jaypgreene.com/2016/06/29/nyt-hatchet-job-on-charters/ https://jaypgreene.com/2016/06/29/nyt-hatchet-job-on-charter...
  - Bartweiss 10y ago
    Yet another: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/opinion/sunday/how-the-most-dangerous-place-on-earth-got-a-little-bit-safer.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/opinion/sunday/how-the-mo... Give that a read and try to work out when and why Honduras became the most dangerous place on Earth. The entire piece overlooks the fact that the danger is a recent issue, and the American role in propping up the government that made it happen. It's less clear-cut than bad stats, but it got them called out by a bunch of neutral groups for white-washing a major coup.
- MaxfordAndSons 10y ago
  What about these examples is indicative of damning bias on the NYTs part? And what are the countervailing data sources that you're cross referencing against to know that they're being misleading?
xname2 10y ago
"To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle." This is a delusion. NYT has a bad record in reporting data. One easy example: "Amid ‘Trump Effect’ Fear, 40% of Colleges See Dip in Foreign Applicants". https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students-us-colleges-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students... Quote from the original report: "39% of responding institutions reported a decline in international applications, 35% reported an increase, and 26% reported no change in applicant numbers. " http://www.aacrao.org/docs/default-source/TrendTopic/Immigration/intl-survey-results-released.pdf http://www.aacrao.org/docs/default-source/TrendTopic/Immigra...
cat199 10y ago
>> Yes, the prominent center, center-left, and leftish new outlets (NYT, WSJ, Economist, WP, etc.) have some bias in their writing. However, most of the authors and staff at those organizations are extremely professional and take their mandate to report and analyze very seriously. To me, this is self-evident 95% of the time. Lets investigate this claim - news article from today's NYT interspersed with some critique... https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/world/europe/serbia-prepares-to-elect-a-president-amid-a-murky-media-landscape.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/world/europe/serbia-prepa... > BELGRADE, Serbia ? When he was Serbia?s information minister in the late 1990s, Aleksandar Vucic censored journalists, forced media critics out of business and served as chief propagandist for the regime of Slobodan Milosevic, the Serbian strongman reviled for the atrocities that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia. Apparently these are established facts. I have not done sufficient research to critique either way. The overall picture is fairly negative, I'm sure you will concur. > Today Mr. Vucic is the prime minister of Serbia, having been elected in 2014 as a reformer on promises to lead Serbia into a democratic future and membership in the European Union. He has renounced the extreme nationalist views of his past. Apparently also established facts. The juxtaposition is somewhat cynical, indicating a hypocrisy. How does this juxtaposition narrative match similar stories of currently elected politicians who were once part of regiemes deemed 'bad', and what criteria are used to label them as such? > Western leaders rely on him as a partner to maintain calm within the Serbian min orities in Kosovo and Bosnia, to support their migration policies and to keep su fficient distance from Russia ? even though Russia?s president, Vladimir V. Puti n, has professed his support for Mr. Vucic. More summary facts, also implying that the Serbian minorities are instigators in ethnic troubles in various areas, and the other groups are victims of same. Sets up a false dichotomy between distance from Putin and Putins endorsement. Is that same dichotomy applied to WSJ treatment of Russia-China relations? If not, what geopolitical bias might relate to such a inconsistency in reportage? > However, Serbian journalists who have reported critically on Mr. Vucic say that little has really changed. They say that tactics of harassment and intimidation have made it almost impossible to do fair-minded journalism. "Some Say"... (I will give them that this is a transition paragraph) > Stevan Dojcinovic is the editor of the Crime and Corruption Reporting Network, a nonprofit organization that does online investigative journalism. He is 31, wit h a steely personality, a short scruffy beard and metal piercings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organized_Crime_and_Corruption_Reporting_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organized_Crime_and_Corruption... " Radu and Sullivan realized more cross-border investigative reporting was needed and started OCCRP with a grant from the United Nations Democracy Fund. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Democracy_Fund https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Democracy_Fund " UNDEF supports projects that strengthen the voice of civil society, promote human rights, and encourage the participation of all groups in democratic processes. The large majority of UNDEF funds go to local civil society organizations -- both in the transition and consolidation phases of democratization " No direct insight on the OCCRP organization, however it appears to be externally funded through an organization with a distinct philosophical and socioeconomic perspective, which, is not to disagree that there is likely much corruption here which should be studied. Relatedly, I wonder how much the UNDF funds research into US lobbying and campaign finance corruption, or have we already 'consolidated as a democracy'? > He was investigating the undeclared assets of Mr. Vucic?s family last year when his picture appeared on the front page of The Informer, a popular pro-Vucic tabl oid in Serbia, five times in one month. Some of the photographs and personal inf ormation could only have been obtained from government surveillance, Mr. Dojcino vic says. Definately cause for concern I'd say, were it me. Though I nearly digested the summary dismissal of this outlet as 'pro regime' without even questioning it. Where does the WSJ editorial staff post it's guidelines for evaluating news sources as such, and what is it basing this critique on? > Other articles accused Mr. Dojcinovic of working alternately for organized crime , the businessman and philanthropist George Soros and Western intelligence agenc ies, without explaining how he managed to juggle working for all three at the sa me time. This presumes this is not possible? Here's a scenario: oligarchs funding preferred organized crime groups and social organizations on behalf of state security apparatuses in order to create political networks with which to exert local political influence, the same as it has been since the dawn of time? You know, the same thing the NYT is accusing Putin of using Russian oligarchs to do with the FSB, the Russian mob and 'pro russia' groups? Stopping here, but I think I've made my point: Sorry man, if you read between the lines, the emperor has no clothes. And yes, this goes for all news sources - Xinhua, RT, Al Jazeera, BBC, etc. And for the record I have no distinct conclusion about this topic, not being informed enough to make a call. I do agree with you that more 'reputable' reporters do their best - however that 'best' is more often than not couched in the socio-political and philosphical biases which they, their editorial staff, owners, and dominant national culture share.
randiantech 10y ago
Its is not just "some bias". Its every single day accessing to WaPo or NYT and have two dozens articles and news about Trump with negative connotation. As a non American, I just got tired of this. I dont feel the need to access to the mainstream portals anymore. It just began to be boring. There is an ongoing coup in Venezuela, with illegal arrests but somehow the very same Russian - Trump news remains more important.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > Its is not just "some bias". Its every single day accessing to WaPo or NYT and have two dozens articles and news about Trump with negative connotation. The existence of news articles that convey a negative impression of a person or organization, regardless of quantity, does not, in and of itself, indicate any bias, either in selection or presentation. > There is an ongoing coup in Venezuela, with illegal arrests but somehow the very same Russian - Trump news remains more important. The Washington Post and New York Times are US newspapers. The President of the US, and his close associates, involvement with Russian government is more important news for them than the auto-coup in Venezuela for the same reason that that auto-coup is more important in Venezuela than the Russia-Trump issue.
  - frankc 10y ago
    You're right that the existence and quantity of news does not necessarily indicate bias, however, bias is found not just in news that is reported but also in what news is reported versus what news is not reported. I personally find this to be where most of the egregious media bias is. For instance, if the media chooses to not cover left-wing initiated violence at a protest, but heavily cover right-wing initiated violence at a protest, that is still bias, even if the reporting about the right-wing violence is accurate. It's a much more insidious bias too because its harder to point out. You will have to use non-mainstream sources as they are the only ones doing the covering, and the fact that they are not mainstream will be used to hand waive away the complaints.
braveo 10y ago
Where were these news outlets professionalism in the pewdiepie fiasco? They were manufacturing it, that's where. I think you're romanticizing these outlets, they're no different than any other private organization whose purpose is to make money and power.
millermp12 10y ago
"What there is not is a serious right-leaning counter-weight to this" What the right lacks in quantity it matches in quality. Claremont Books/Quarterly is as good or better in terms of long form journalism as anything on the left. Do you think NYTimes is trending toward Breitbart or the other way around (in terms of objectivity, quality of journalism, business model)?

bb101 10y ago

Here in the UK, we have the Spectator magazine, whose writers are very professional and generally support a conservative position.

maxerickson 10y ago

WSJ is at least center-right.

dude01 10y ago
That's true, but their opinion/editorial pages are extreme right-leaning, they're different teams.
- tomhoward 10y ago
  “Extreme right”? Some proportionality would be good. “Extreme” when used in the context of political ideology implies some form of totalitarianism; i.e., Nazism, Fascism (extreme right), Stalinism, Maoism (extreme left). The WSJ, from the little of it I read, tends to adopt generally classical liberal or libertarian positions; i.e, moderately right-leaning economically, moderately liberal on social issues, generally in favour of more liberty across the board, and thus opposed to authoritarianism. There's a valid debate to be had about the merits of these positions, but to describe the WSJ as “extreme right” does an injustice to the many who've suffered and died – and who continue to do so to this day – due to genuinely extreme political ideologies.
  - griffinmmahon 10y ago
    I basically do not take issue with your dissection of terms here. However I have seen another bit of your logic elsewhere and strongly disagree with it: the idea that mislabelling (or even correctly labelling) something "does an injustice" or "is a disservice" or "would be offensive to" people who died in the past at the hands of someone/something. We only have an obligation to make the lives of current and future people better: people who have died because of hatred would surely appreciate us doing our best to combat hatred in the modern world.
    - tomhoward 10y ago
      I'm not sure I see where the disagreement is. I agree that making life better for people today and in the future is what matters most. And I think an important step in doing that is to heed the lessons of history, which includes having sympathy for the suffering of those who've gone before.
      - griffinmmahon 10y ago
        Sure, we're agreeing. I just take issue with the idea that it is possible to do an injustice against the dead over word choice. I probably jumped too quick, though, and maybe shouldn't have commented. Sorry if any of this came off as combative!
        tomhoward 10y ago
        Fair enough :) I see what you're getting st, thanks for sharing your thoughts.
  - dude01 10y ago
    Sorry for late reply, but I totally did not mean the word "extreme" like you are talking about. I meant extreme as in, my expectations for a newspaper opinion section with the heft of the WSJ should contain wisdom and NOT be mostly a cheer-leader for one side of the political spectrum.
DashRattlesnake 10y ago
I've heard its newsroom is even more liberal that the NYT, but it's very professional so it's hard to tell.
- enraged_camel 10y ago
  Its news coverage is inarguably center-right (since it caters to a primarily business audience), but its opinion pieces are quite liberal.
  - DashRattlesnake 10y ago
    > but its opinion pieces are quite liberal The WSJ? What are you talking about? It's opinion pages are famously conservative.
JohnTHaller 10y ago
It's owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp of "fair and balanced" Fox News fame.

Wohlf 10y ago

I wonder if it's just impossible to find serious right-leaning journalists that aren't full right wing, since journalism is already heavily liberal, full of institutional bias, and few people are willing to work for peanuts.

maxerickson 10y ago
Does full right wing even have a coherent meaning? edit: Which I realize now is poor phrasing. When I say "coherent", I'm not talking about right wing ideologies being coherent or not, I'm asking if there is actually a bundle of beliefs that have extremes that can meaningfully be taken together. Some ideologies embrace national defense, others are less concerned with it, others consider it at odds with personal rights, and so on.
NoGravitas 10y ago
I'd consider the responsible center-right newspaper to be the Wall Street Journal. As for news/opinion magazines, there's Commentary, The American Spectator, National Review, The Weekly Standard. I'd consider U.S. News & World Report to be an establishment conservative outlet, too.
alphonsegaston 10y ago
Perhaps the Economist? They seem generally professional and intellectually honest, but posit everything from a right/Capitalist perspective.
- soundwave106 10y ago
  The Economist is a bit unique in that their "classic liberalism" editorial viewpoint doesn't neatly fit into America's current tribal division; in America I've heard it called both "right-wing" and "left-wing" as a result. Such shows a danger of trying to pigeonhole every editorial stance into "left" and "right" categories. It would be nice if we expanded beyond these somewhat artificial opinion collectives.
ylem 10y ago
I lean to the left, but I enjoy the writings of McArdle: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/contributors/megan-mcardle https://www.bloomberg.com/view/contributors/megan-mcardle who is solidly libertarian. She tries to argue her point logically, and in cases where I still disagree with her, I can respect her perspective.

ue_ 10y ago

I think it would be pleasant to some bigger far-left papers rather than liberal or conservative papers. All the ones you named are liberal papers.

griffinmmahon 10y ago
Yeah "left" is not the way I would describe papers that dishonestly hyped the invasion of Iraq etc. For readers-by: try Jacobin or Dissent
- RodericDay 10y ago
  Current Affairs also.

mark_l_watson 10y ago

I have to disagree with you. Before we 'cut the cable' my wife used to watch MSNBC and last year it seemed like their nightly news hours were mostly the opinion of the show's host, couched as news. I do agree with the way papers like the NYT has separate 'opinion' sections or labels articles as being and editor's opinion - way better than how MSNBC put forth opinion as hard news.

daveguy 10y ago
OP did not include MSNBC in that list. They are obviously the left equivalent of Fox News. Their opinion shows run in the prime time. I thought that was generally known of both, but maybe it's not known on either side and people tuning in to Fox and MSNBC both think they are getting unbiased news in the evenings.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
maxerickson 10y ago
The 7-11 block on MSNBC is unabashedly opinionated. They aren't even trying to be subtle about it.

Clanan 10y ago

"To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle. Opinion is labeled as such. Pointing to specific counter-examples is like identifying NASA with the failures of the Challenger -- it completely misses the forest for the trees." Are you serious? You broadly profess the journalistic integrity of multiple institutions that have been embroiled in ethics scandals and then preemptively disallow any responses as missing the point. What a disingenuous and absurd statement. Forgive my nearsightedness, but I would argue that a prominent newspaper has serious problems, far past "slight and subtle" bias, when its own writers are secretly giving drafts and veto power to a political campaign [0]. Keep in mind I'm not defending right-leaning publications, either. They have their own set of problems. But this ironic, constant claim that left-leaning publications are above reproach or criticism is laughable. We, the readers, must always keep them honest through our own honest critiques and feedback. [0] http://nypost.com/2016/10/11/the-new-york-times-abandoned-its-integrity-just-to-bash-donald-trump/ http://nypost.com/2016/10/11/the-new-york-times-abandoned-it... - first that popped up in Google

wcummings 10y ago
Are you seriously citing the New York Post to make a point about media bias and integrity? I read the nypost for fun but it's barely a real newspaper, and to the extent that it is it's extremely biased and unprofessional.
leot 10y ago
FOX News literally circulates a memo, every day, that guides its treatment of political subjects. That they have a primary goal of pushing an agenda is made manifest by FOX's abrupt termination of coverage of a meeting between President Obama and the GOP when it began to show Obama in a sympathetic light. Name one example of another mainstream media outlet being this institutionally cynical. https://mediamatters.org/research/2010/01/30/fox-cuts-away-from-obama-gop-qampa-but-airs-gop/159818 https://mediamatters.org/research/2010/01/30/fox-cuts-away-f... http://www.cc.com/video-clips/kja25r/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-moment-of-zen---roger-ailes-defends-fox-news http://www.cc.com/video-clips/kja25r/the-daily-show-with-jon...
- deleted 10y ago

spenuke 10y ago

I think the main problem is that we conflate the political spectrum (what are the responsibilities of the State?) and the epistemological spectrum (how do we determine what is true and not?). The "Western World", for better and worse, is a product of the Enlightenment, and as a result is irreducibly leftist in its epistemology: modern democracy depends on a belief that a citizenry armed with the scientific method and rational discourse can rule themselves without resorting to the authority of a king or a holy book. The Right Wing (in the US, our Republican Party) is less identifiable by its right-wing policies as it is by its right-wing epistemology: they reject all scientific evidence for climate change, biological and geological history, medicine, etc. For the religious, this manifests itself in the old epistemology that says the Bible is the sole source of all Truth. For the non-religious, this tends to manifest itself as total nihilism, which is expressed in the more heartless strains of Libertarian Objectivism; for these people, might equals right and society is a zero-sum game where the only truth is winning and losing. And this epistemological divide is the one that is tearing us apart. When you say there's no serious right-leaning counter-weight to (the NYT et al.), what you mean is that there is no serious news outlet that doesn't hold the Enlightenment values. And when you put it in this light, it's an obvious statement, isn't it? Politically speaking, the WSJ and the Economist can very much be considered right of center (leaving aside that the median center has moved right over the last 40 years), but they are still rooted in Enlightenment science and rationalism. Point is, although the political right wing is currently the main base of the epistemological right wing, it doesn't necessarily have to be that way. And the problem with saying we need more right-wing voices in mainstream media is that there are so few of them who meet the basic epistemological requirements; when they do, they are often rejected by the broader right wing for being too far left!

golemotron 10y ago
That's a very convenient and self-congratulatory view of things. Science denialism happens on both the left and the right. The book Galileo's Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and One Scholar's Search for Justice, by Alice Dreger gives a good survey of the terrain.
- enraged_camel 10y ago

throwaway1920 10y ago

> However, most of the authors and staff at those organizations are extremely professional and take their mandate to report and analyze very seriously. To me, this is self-evident 95% of the time. To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle. You clearly haven't read their pieces on India - though I suppose this is a symptom of something more insidious.

yummyfajitas 10y ago

I'd disagree pretty strongly with this. Here's a couple of NYT examples: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students-us-colleges-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students... After reading this article, do you think colleges overall are seeing a significant drop in international applicants, a significant increase, or it stayed about the same? Or here's another example: https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/30/upshot/free-market-for-education-economists-generally-dont-buy-it.html https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/30/upshot/free-market-for... After reading this article, what do you think about the general views of economists on school vouchers?

xname2 10y ago
Here is another example: "A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift" https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/us/for-detroits-children-more-school-choice-but-not-better-schools.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/29/us/for-detroits-children-... According to NYT: "half the charters perform only as well, or worse than, Detroit’s traditional public schools." According to data from the cited study: Half the charters perform significantly better, around half no significant difference, a small percentage (1% in reading, 7% in math) perform significantly worse. See: https://jaypgreene.com/2016/06/29/nyt-hatchet-job-on-charters/ https://jaypgreene.com/2016/06/29/nyt-hatchet-job-on-charter...
- Bartweiss 10y ago
  Yet another: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/opinion/sunday/how-the-most-dangerous-place-on-earth-got-a-little-bit-safer.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/opinion/sunday/how-the-mo... Give that a read and try to work out when and why Honduras became the most dangerous place on Earth. The entire piece overlooks the fact that the danger is a recent issue, and the American role in propping up the government that made it happen. It's less clear-cut than bad stats, but it got them called out by a bunch of neutral groups for white-washing a major coup.
MaxfordAndSons 10y ago
What about these examples is indicative of damning bias on the NYTs part? And what are the countervailing data sources that you're cross referencing against to know that they're being misleading?

xname2 10y ago

"To the extent that there is bias, it is slight and subtle." This is a delusion. NYT has a bad record in reporting data. One easy example: "Amid ‘Trump Effect’ Fear, 40% of Colleges See Dip in Foreign Applicants". https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students-us-colleges-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/us/international-students... Quote from the original report: "39% of responding institutions reported a decline in international applications, 35% reported an increase, and 26% reported no change in applicant numbers. " http://www.aacrao.org/docs/default-source/TrendTopic/Immigration/intl-survey-results-released.pdf http://www.aacrao.org/docs/default-source/TrendTopic/Immigra...

cat199 10y ago

>> Yes, the prominent center, center-left, and leftish new outlets (NYT, WSJ, Economist, WP, etc.) have some bias in their writing. However, most of the authors and staff at those organizations are extremely professional and take their mandate to report and analyze very seriously. To me, this is self-evident 95% of the time. Lets investigate this claim - news article from today's NYT interspersed with some critique... https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/world/europe/serbia-prepares-to-elect-a-president-amid-a-murky-media-landscape.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/world/europe/serbia-prepa... > BELGRADE, Serbia ? When he was Serbia?s information minister in the late 1990s, Aleksandar Vucic censored journalists, forced media critics out of business and served as chief propagandist for the regime of Slobodan Milosevic, the Serbian strongman reviled for the atrocities that followed the breakup of Yugoslavia. Apparently these are established facts. I have not done sufficient research to critique either way. The overall picture is fairly negative, I'm sure you will concur. > Today Mr. Vucic is the prime minister of Serbia, having been elected in 2014 as a reformer on promises to lead Serbia into a democratic future and membership in the European Union. He has renounced the extreme nationalist views of his past. Apparently also established facts. The juxtaposition is somewhat cynical, indicating a hypocrisy. How does this juxtaposition narrative match similar stories of currently elected politicians who were once part of regiemes deemed 'bad', and what criteria are used to label them as such? > Western leaders rely on him as a partner to maintain calm within the Serbian min orities in Kosovo and Bosnia, to support their migration policies and to keep su fficient distance from Russia ? even though Russia?s president, Vladimir V. Puti n, has professed his support for Mr. Vucic. More summary facts, also implying that the Serbian minorities are instigators in ethnic troubles in various areas, and the other groups are victims of same. Sets up a false dichotomy between distance from Putin and Putins endorsement. Is that same dichotomy applied to WSJ treatment of Russia-China relations? If not, what geopolitical bias might relate to such a inconsistency in reportage? > However, Serbian journalists who have reported critically on Mr. Vucic say that little has really changed. They say that tactics of harassment and intimidation have made it almost impossible to do fair-minded journalism. "Some Say"... (I will give them that this is a transition paragraph) > Stevan Dojcinovic is the editor of the Crime and Corruption Reporting Network, a nonprofit organization that does online investigative journalism. He is 31, wit h a steely personality, a short scruffy beard and metal piercings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organized_Crime_and_Corruption_Reporting_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organized_Crime_and_Corruption... " Radu and Sullivan realized more cross-border investigative reporting was needed and started OCCRP with a grant from the United Nations Democracy Fund. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Democracy_Fund https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Democracy_Fund " UNDEF supports projects that strengthen the voice of civil society, promote human rights, and encourage the participation of all groups in democratic processes. The large majority of UNDEF funds go to local civil society organizations -- both in the transition and consolidation phases of democratization " No direct insight on the OCCRP organization, however it appears to be externally funded through an organization with a distinct philosophical and socioeconomic perspective, which, is not to disagree that there is likely much corruption here which should be studied. Relatedly, I wonder how much the UNDF funds research into US lobbying and campaign finance corruption, or have we already 'consolidated as a democracy'? > He was investigating the undeclared assets of Mr. Vucic?s family last year when his picture appeared on the front page of The Informer, a popular pro-Vucic tabl oid in Serbia, five times in one month. Some of the photographs and personal inf ormation could only have been obtained from government surveillance, Mr. Dojcino vic says. Definately cause for concern I'd say, were it me. Though I nearly digested the summary dismissal of this outlet as 'pro regime' without even questioning it. Where does the WSJ editorial staff post it's guidelines for evaluating news sources as such, and what is it basing this critique on? > Other articles accused Mr. Dojcinovic of working alternately for organized crime , the businessman and philanthropist George Soros and Western intelligence agenc ies, without explaining how he managed to juggle working for all three at the sa me time. This presumes this is not possible? Here's a scenario: oligarchs funding preferred organized crime groups and social organizations on behalf of state security apparatuses in order to create political networks with which to exert local political influence, the same as it has been since the dawn of time? You know, the same thing the NYT is accusing Putin of using Russian oligarchs to do with the FSB, the Russian mob and 'pro russia' groups? Stopping here, but I think I've made my point: Sorry man, if you read between the lines, the emperor has no clothes. And yes, this goes for all news sources - Xinhua, RT, Al Jazeera, BBC, etc. And for the record I have no distinct conclusion about this topic, not being informed enough to make a call. I do agree with you that more 'reputable' reporters do their best - however that 'best' is more often than not couched in the socio-political and philosphical biases which they, their editorial staff, owners, and dominant national culture share.

randiantech 10y ago

Its is not just "some bias". Its every single day accessing to WaPo or NYT and have two dozens articles and news about Trump with negative connotation. As a non American, I just got tired of this. I dont feel the need to access to the mainstream portals anymore. It just began to be boring. There is an ongoing coup in Venezuela, with illegal arrests but somehow the very same Russian - Trump news remains more important.

dragonwriter 10y ago
> Its is not just "some bias". Its every single day accessing to WaPo or NYT and have two dozens articles and news about Trump with negative connotation. The existence of news articles that convey a negative impression of a person or organization, regardless of quantity, does not, in and of itself, indicate any bias, either in selection or presentation. > There is an ongoing coup in Venezuela, with illegal arrests but somehow the very same Russian - Trump news remains more important. The Washington Post and New York Times are US newspapers. The President of the US, and his close associates, involvement with Russian government is more important news for them than the auto-coup in Venezuela for the same reason that that auto-coup is more important in Venezuela than the Russia-Trump issue.
- frankc 10y ago
  You're right that the existence and quantity of news does not necessarily indicate bias, however, bias is found not just in news that is reported but also in what news is reported versus what news is not reported. I personally find this to be where most of the egregious media bias is. For instance, if the media chooses to not cover left-wing initiated violence at a protest, but heavily cover right-wing initiated violence at a protest, that is still bias, even if the reporting about the right-wing violence is accurate. It's a much more insidious bias too because its harder to point out. You will have to use non-mainstream sources as they are the only ones doing the covering, and the fact that they are not mainstream will be used to hand waive away the complaints.

braveo 10y ago

Where were these news outlets professionalism in the pewdiepie fiasco? They were manufacturing it, that's where. I think you're romanticizing these outlets, they're no different than any other private organization whose purpose is to make money and power.

millermp12 10y ago

"What there is not is a serious right-leaning counter-weight to this" What the right lacks in quantity it matches in quality. Claremont Books/Quarterly is as good or better in terms of long form journalism as anything on the left. Do you think NYTimes is trending toward Breitbart or the other way around (in terms of objectivity, quality of journalism, business model)?