8 ms·

> to actively engage in hidden manipulation of public views strikes at the very heart of democracy. Indeed, Fox News, Britebart, and friends are terrifying.

by jlebar 8y ago

wtf_is_up 8y ago
Agreed. For me, it's CNN, MSNBC, and HuffPo.
parthdesai 8y ago
Let's be honest, all media organizations are biased. Be it Fox News, Britebart, or CNN. Heck even r/politics is biased af.
- beepboopbeep 8y ago
  to say that they are equally as bad is, actually, dishonest.
- nraynaud 8y ago
  the difference is the number of deaths they produce.
- komali2 8y ago
  /r/politics is a subforum on a news aggregator. While media organizations definitely buy upvotes, as of yet there's no actual evidence of Reddit itself artificially promoting/demoting content within a subreddit (Tweaking the algorithm to get bot-propogated t_d content off the front page doesn't count, it's a different subforum) Brietbart is an entirely different category than Fox news. It will publish straight up conspiracy theories with no evidence. I'm talking "moon landing didn't happen" level shit. It's an insult to tabloids, to call it a tabloids. Fox News is so comically biased to compare it to CNN is dishonest. CNN has liberal bias, sure, but it doesnt sink to the level of claiming Hillary Clinton had Seth rich assassinated (https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/may/23/newt-gingrich/claim-slain-dnc-staffer-seth-rich-gave-emails-wiki/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/may/23...) or completely makes shit up about supreme court candidates whole-cloth (https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/mar/18/bill-oreilly/bill-oreilly-wrongly-says-merrick-garland-voted-ba/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/mar/18...). Sure, they're gonna spend a lot of airtime on the "kavanaugh allegedly raped a girl in high school" story, or when the president says some messed up ish they're gonna go ahead and play that clip again and again, but that is a far cry from outright lying, which fox news does again and again, and which Breitbart does every breath.
  - parthdesai 8y ago
    >/r/politics is a subforum on a news aggregator. Agreed, i didn't say otherwise and i didn't group it with other three websites. As an outsider, i have seen tons of people who are non-liberal (either centrist or right wing) get dismissed immediately even though there are times when the argument makes sense. Also, it filled with Russian hacking. I never compared the three news sites. Parent point first two, i just said it's not like CNN is completely neutral as well. Also remember this is the same channel that didn't want you to download wikileaks and only listen to what they say. Did CNN's political commentator not actually pass questions to Hillary prior to the debate? How is that not biased? I also completely agree with your points about Fox news and Breitbart and i do agree they are worse than CNN but we aren't on a binary scale. You can't just blame Fox news and Brietbart and completely ignore CNN (which the op did).
    - komali2 8y ago
      I hear you, but I still disagree. I think the depth of the "crime" fox news and Breitbart are engaging in is so great that CNN controversies are meaningless comparatively. To try to "both sides" by lumping CNN in is in my opinion muddying the waters.
  - goblekitepe 8y ago
    CNN is exclusively supportive of the Leftist and Liberal agenda. They are absolutely a fair game comparison to Fox. CNN has spent over a year covering the Russia investigation, breathlessly accepting any shred of hearsay that could possibly maybe implicate Trump in collusion, however it seems now that there has been no collusion whatsoever and the entire issue is fake. CNN has been pushing nonsense this entire time! In fact I've watched both Fox and CNN my entire life and Fox seems to me much less biased than CNN as of late.
    - komali2 8y ago
      Oh absolutely cnn is biased left. But its journalists don't lie at nearly the same frequency as fox's Here's a very simple comparison, persue at your leisure: https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/fox/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/fox/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/cnn/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/cnn/
- mattnewton 8y ago
  Bias is a sliding scale; it’s possible to decide the degree to which a source is biased about a topic, and treat it different from more biased or less biased sources. We definitely don’t want to just throw our hands up and say everything is biased, we can’t trust news, or worse, everything is biased, might as well pick the one that feels comfortable to me.
mc32 8y ago
Keep in mind that of US journalists 50% ID as (lowrcase) independent, but 28% as Dems and only 7% as Repubs. So there is inherent bias on one side, if looking at affiliation.
- tacomonstrous 8y ago
  You're basically implying that only someone who shares your political views can report fairly about you. Pretty toxic view. Also, if journalists are reluctant to be identified as Republican, perhaps the Republican party should do some soul searching about why this is so.
  - mc32 8y ago
    It looks like you're claiming that Silicon Valley is wrong when they talk about implicit bias, or Dems are wrong when they state that judges nominated to the SCOTUS by Republicans can't execute the law faithfully. Or that a call for more women in the boardroom is unnecessary because that implies that people are biased. Note that I'm not taking a position on those implications, but am saying according to your logic the above is sound. Also according to your logic Dems should do soul searching because lumberjacks and truck drivers are mostly Republicans...
  - propman 8y ago
    Not toxic at all, that is absolutely true in this day and age. The most neutral news I watch is pbs which leans left. I’m not going to find illegal immigrant crimes on CNN for the most part, but I’ll find them all over Fox. I won’t find Trump scandals and hate crimes against minorities on Fox much but I’ll find them super highlighted on CNN. Assuming there’s no bias is naive.
- humanrebar 8y ago
  You presume the independents are in the center. There are plenty of libertarians and conservatives disgusted by Trump and staying away from the Republican party until they get their act together again.
  - 8y ago
goblekitepe 8y ago
Try actually watching and reading them, they're not as "terrifying" as you've been trained to think.

> to actively engage in hidden manipulation of public views strikes at the very heart of democracy. Indeed, Fox News, Britebart, and friends are terrifying.

by jlebar 8y ago

> to actively engage in hidden manipulation of public views strikes at the very heart of democracy. Indeed, Fox News, Britebart, and friends are terrifying.

wtf_is_up 8y ago

Agreed. For me, it's CNN, MSNBC, and HuffPo.

parthdesai 8y ago

Let's be honest, all media organizations are biased. Be it Fox News, Britebart, or CNN. Heck even r/politics is biased af.

beepboopbeep 8y ago
to say that they are equally as bad is, actually, dishonest.
nraynaud 8y ago
the difference is the number of deaths they produce.
komali2 8y ago
/r/politics is a subforum on a news aggregator. While media organizations definitely buy upvotes, as of yet there's no actual evidence of Reddit itself artificially promoting/demoting content within a subreddit (Tweaking the algorithm to get bot-propogated t_d content off the front page doesn't count, it's a different subforum) Brietbart is an entirely different category than Fox news. It will publish straight up conspiracy theories with no evidence. I'm talking "moon landing didn't happen" level shit. It's an insult to tabloids, to call it a tabloids. Fox News is so comically biased to compare it to CNN is dishonest. CNN has liberal bias, sure, but it doesnt sink to the level of claiming Hillary Clinton had Seth rich assassinated (https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/may/23/newt-gingrich/claim-slain-dnc-staffer-seth-rich-gave-emails-wiki/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/may/23...) or completely makes shit up about supreme court candidates whole-cloth (https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/mar/18/bill-oreilly/bill-oreilly-wrongly-says-merrick-garland-voted-ba/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/mar/18...). Sure, they're gonna spend a lot of airtime on the "kavanaugh allegedly raped a girl in high school" story, or when the president says some messed up ish they're gonna go ahead and play that clip again and again, but that is a far cry from outright lying, which fox news does again and again, and which Breitbart does every breath.
- parthdesai 8y ago
  >/r/politics is a subforum on a news aggregator. Agreed, i didn't say otherwise and i didn't group it with other three websites. As an outsider, i have seen tons of people who are non-liberal (either centrist or right wing) get dismissed immediately even though there are times when the argument makes sense. Also, it filled with Russian hacking. I never compared the three news sites. Parent point first two, i just said it's not like CNN is completely neutral as well. Also remember this is the same channel that didn't want you to download wikileaks and only listen to what they say. Did CNN's political commentator not actually pass questions to Hillary prior to the debate? How is that not biased? I also completely agree with your points about Fox news and Breitbart and i do agree they are worse than CNN but we aren't on a binary scale. You can't just blame Fox news and Brietbart and completely ignore CNN (which the op did).
  - komali2 8y ago
    I hear you, but I still disagree. I think the depth of the "crime" fox news and Breitbart are engaging in is so great that CNN controversies are meaningless comparatively. To try to "both sides" by lumping CNN in is in my opinion muddying the waters.
- goblekitepe 8y ago
  CNN is exclusively supportive of the Leftist and Liberal agenda. They are absolutely a fair game comparison to Fox. CNN has spent over a year covering the Russia investigation, breathlessly accepting any shred of hearsay that could possibly maybe implicate Trump in collusion, however it seems now that there has been no collusion whatsoever and the entire issue is fake. CNN has been pushing nonsense this entire time! In fact I've watched both Fox and CNN my entire life and Fox seems to me much less biased than CNN as of late.
  - komali2 8y ago
    Oh absolutely cnn is biased left. But its journalists don't lie at nearly the same frequency as fox's Here's a very simple comparison, persue at your leisure: https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/fox/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/fox/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/cnn/ https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/tv/cnn/
mattnewton 8y ago
Bias is a sliding scale; it’s possible to decide the degree to which a source is biased about a topic, and treat it different from more biased or less biased sources. We definitely don’t want to just throw our hands up and say everything is biased, we can’t trust news, or worse, everything is biased, might as well pick the one that feels comfortable to me.

mc32 8y ago

Keep in mind that of US journalists 50% ID as (lowrcase) independent, but 28% as Dems and only 7% as Repubs. So there is inherent bias on one side, if looking at affiliation.

tacomonstrous 8y ago
You're basically implying that only someone who shares your political views can report fairly about you. Pretty toxic view. Also, if journalists are reluctant to be identified as Republican, perhaps the Republican party should do some soul searching about why this is so.
- mc32 8y ago
  It looks like you're claiming that Silicon Valley is wrong when they talk about implicit bias, or Dems are wrong when they state that judges nominated to the SCOTUS by Republicans can't execute the law faithfully. Or that a call for more women in the boardroom is unnecessary because that implies that people are biased. Note that I'm not taking a position on those implications, but am saying according to your logic the above is sound. Also according to your logic Dems should do soul searching because lumberjacks and truck drivers are mostly Republicans...
- propman 8y ago
  Not toxic at all, that is absolutely true in this day and age. The most neutral news I watch is pbs which leans left. I’m not going to find illegal immigrant crimes on CNN for the most part, but I’ll find them all over Fox. I won’t find Trump scandals and hate crimes against minorities on Fox much but I’ll find them super highlighted on CNN. Assuming there’s no bias is naive.
humanrebar 8y ago
You presume the independents are in the center. There are plenty of libertarians and conservatives disgusted by Trump and staying away from the Republican party until they get their act together again.
- 8y ago

goblekitepe 8y ago

Try actually watching and reading them, they're not as "terrifying" as you've been trained to think.