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In other words: NPR/PBS. Every news organization will have bias because every person has bias, and news organizations are made up of people. So the real choice

In other words: NPR/PBS. Every news organization will have bias because every person has bias, and news organizations are made up of people. So the real choice one has to make is: what sort of bias do I want in my news? The easiest way to identify bias is to look at where the money comes from. In the case of CPB-funded organizations yes, some of their funding is government based, so they're likely to be biased toward reporting that favors government funding for public institutions (or, in the extreme: socialism). However they also receive a significant portion of their funding from volunteer donors, so their reporting is also likely to be biased in favor of people who altruistically give without expectation of any specific ROI. Now, if you favor small government and self-sufficient individuals who look out for #1 above all else, NPR/PBS is probably not your cup of tea.

laingc 9y ago
I’m not American, but I do listen to quite a few NPR podcasts and enjoy them a lot. Your claim that NPR isn’t biased is quite frankly ludicrous. Their programming features a clear and unmistakeable liberal* bias, and the fact that you seem to be unaware of this probably just means that you share this worldview. That’s absolutely fine with me, but you should really re-examine your idea of objectivity. * In the American sense of the word. Edit: I acknowledge that you admit that all news organisations are biased, however I’m responding to your central claim that NPR fills the objective role referred to by GP
- jballanc 9y ago
  > Their programming features a clear and unmistakeable liberal* bias, and the fact that you seem to be unaware of this probably just means that you share this worldview. "Reality has a well-known liberal bias." All joking aside, I definitely acknowledge NPR's liberal bias. My main point was to "follow the money". More traditional liberal (and conservative) media outlets have funding that is much more "active" (for lack of a better term) than NPR.
  - humanrebar 9y ago
    On the other hand, NPR and PBS exist partly because they are effective at lobbying Congress for funding.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      NPR and PBS are extremely ineffective at lobbying Congress for funding; what federal funding NPR gets is indirect through member stations, but federal funding is far behind listener support and corporate sponsorship in the revenue streams reaching the member stations; the CPBs federal funding, adjusted for inflation, is basically flat for 40 years.
      - humanrebar 9y ago
        You're saying that PBS and NPR get nontrivial amounts of money from the federal budget. Their ability to maintain that despite challenges (which have been effectively countered with pleas Mr. Rogers and Big Bird) is notably effective lobbying. Extremely ineffective lobbying would be having elbow-patched public intellectuals testifying about federal funding's benefits on the broader Hegelian dialectic.
        dragonwriter 9y ago
        > You're saying that PBS and NPR get nontrivial amounts of money from the federal budget. No, I'm not.
- travmatt 9y ago
  The best you can get is an organization that has a consistent and clear bias, which NPR has - also why people like BBC and the Economist. Additionally, I’d caution against extrapolating NPR’s journalistic bias by their podcasts - it’s a podcast, whereas radio content was produced expressly in line with their journalistic and reporting standards (I don’t listen to any of their podcasts dealing with politics so I couldn’t judge those).
  - humanrebar 9y ago
    NPR doesn't own its bias, so I'm not sure I'd use the phrase "consistent and clear" to describe the NPR viewpoint. Here's NPR poorly representing the controversy over the Google memo this summer: https://www.npr.org/2017/08/08/542180434/google-fires-engineer-who-criticized-diversity-efforts https://www.npr.org/2017/08/08/542180434/google-fires-engine...
    - SauciestGNU 9y ago
      I just read that transcript, and I think it is the least histrionic and probably most charitable to Damore that has come out of the mainstream media. I read the memo (in full, with annotations), and I think it is being properly represented in this interview. Without relitigating the whole kerfuffle, I believe that whether or not you think the media is fair to Damore depends on whether or not you are in agreement with the presuppositions he held when writing the memo.
      - humanrebar 9y ago
        I don't agree with the presuppositions. I also think his views were not fairly summarized, which is critical to the story since his expression of his thoughts are what got him fired. If you mess up that reporting, the story becomes "Google fired a crypto-sexist guy and sexist people are grumpy about it", which is pretty close to how the NPR story reads to me. Grading on a curve, maybe NPR did fine (I've ready Fox News accounts that read similarly), but on topic, some people (Thiel) think there's some monoculture in the media that needs disrupted.
superquest 9y ago
Government cash is no cure for bias.
- MR4D 9y ago
  I’d take your thought one step further: Government cash is often a SOURCE of bias.

laingc 9y ago

I’m not American, but I do listen to quite a few NPR podcasts and enjoy them a lot. Your claim that NPR isn’t biased is quite frankly ludicrous. Their programming features a clear and unmistakeable liberal* bias, and the fact that you seem to be unaware of this probably just means that you share this worldview. That’s absolutely fine with me, but you should really re-examine your idea of objectivity. * In the American sense of the word. Edit: I acknowledge that you admit that all news organisations are biased, however I’m responding to your central claim that NPR fills the objective role referred to by GP

jballanc 9y ago
> Their programming features a clear and unmistakeable liberal* bias, and the fact that you seem to be unaware of this probably just means that you share this worldview. "Reality has a well-known liberal bias." All joking aside, I definitely acknowledge NPR's liberal bias. My main point was to "follow the money". More traditional liberal (and conservative) media outlets have funding that is much more "active" (for lack of a better term) than NPR.
- humanrebar 9y ago
  On the other hand, NPR and PBS exist partly because they are effective at lobbying Congress for funding.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    NPR and PBS are extremely ineffective at lobbying Congress for funding; what federal funding NPR gets is indirect through member stations, but federal funding is far behind listener support and corporate sponsorship in the revenue streams reaching the member stations; the CPBs federal funding, adjusted for inflation, is basically flat for 40 years.
    - humanrebar 9y ago
      You're saying that PBS and NPR get nontrivial amounts of money from the federal budget. Their ability to maintain that despite challenges (which have been effectively countered with pleas Mr. Rogers and Big Bird) is notably effective lobbying. Extremely ineffective lobbying would be having elbow-patched public intellectuals testifying about federal funding's benefits on the broader Hegelian dialectic.
      - dragonwriter 9y ago
        > You're saying that PBS and NPR get nontrivial amounts of money from the federal budget. No, I'm not.
travmatt 9y ago
The best you can get is an organization that has a consistent and clear bias, which NPR has - also why people like BBC and the Economist. Additionally, I’d caution against extrapolating NPR’s journalistic bias by their podcasts - it’s a podcast, whereas radio content was produced expressly in line with their journalistic and reporting standards (I don’t listen to any of their podcasts dealing with politics so I couldn’t judge those).
- humanrebar 9y ago
  NPR doesn't own its bias, so I'm not sure I'd use the phrase "consistent and clear" to describe the NPR viewpoint. Here's NPR poorly representing the controversy over the Google memo this summer: https://www.npr.org/2017/08/08/542180434/google-fires-engineer-who-criticized-diversity-efforts https://www.npr.org/2017/08/08/542180434/google-fires-engine...
  - SauciestGNU 9y ago
    I just read that transcript, and I think it is the least histrionic and probably most charitable to Damore that has come out of the mainstream media. I read the memo (in full, with annotations), and I think it is being properly represented in this interview. Without relitigating the whole kerfuffle, I believe that whether or not you think the media is fair to Damore depends on whether or not you are in agreement with the presuppositions he held when writing the memo.
    - humanrebar 9y ago
      I don't agree with the presuppositions. I also think his views were not fairly summarized, which is critical to the story since his expression of his thoughts are what got him fired. If you mess up that reporting, the story becomes "Google fired a crypto-sexist guy and sexist people are grumpy about it", which is pretty close to how the NPR story reads to me. Grading on a curve, maybe NPR did fine (I've ready Fox News accounts that read similarly), but on topic, some people (Thiel) think there's some monoculture in the media that needs disrupted.

superquest 9y ago

Government cash is no cure for bias.

MR4D 9y ago
I’d take your thought one step further: Government cash is often a SOURCE of bias.