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Simply put, editorial and opinion sections are supposed to be like that. It's not an error; it's by design, and it's a design that has existed for as long as ed
by da_chicken 8y ago
Simply put, editorial and opinion sections are supposed to be like that. It's not an error; it's by design, and it's a design that has existed for as long as editorial and opinion sections have existed.
You, as the reader, are expected to be know enough about how newspapers are organized to tell that you're reading part of the opinion or editorial sections and what that means. In an ideal newspaper practicing journalistic integrity, letters to the editor like the one presented here would be published in future editions of the paper, or, failing that, published in competing newspapers.
Yes, everything is subject to bias. Everything is subject to bias. You cannot eliminate it. The point is to be aware of it's existence, and newspapers help do that by placing these types of pieces in their opinion and editorial sections.
- taude 8y agoOne problem I have with it, though, is that often all the most popular articles in their site, are the opinion pieces. I'm still a subscriber, but there's a strongly "promoted" bias, IMHO, and it requires reading news from several sources with an open mind to get the complete story. Also, NYT isn't immune to click-baity titles, where the meat of the story isn't necessary correlate with the title.
- dylan604 8y ago>and it requires reading news from several sources with an open mind to get the complete story. I don’t consider this a negative. I have always had a bit of that “rebellious” streak in me, so I’ve been told. I have always questioned everything. I would ask “Why?” like 2 year old. I wasn’t asking to second guess coworkers, but because I wanted to learn to fish rather than being handed a fish. The question everything mentality stuck, so I’m constantly reading multiple sources to confirm or contradict any one single source.
- barbecue_sauce 8y agoMost people do not have time to do this.
- ant_li0n 8y agoThis is true, but unfortunately the new reality. Imagine when "deep fakes" etc become much more mainstream. You can't rely on one single source of information. You're going to have to get used to checking the sources, and cross-checking with other reputable sources.
- smacktoward 8y ago> often all the most popular articles in their site, are the opinion pieces It turns out people like to read other people's opinions. Who'da thunk? > I'm still a subscriber, but there's a strongly "promoted" bias, IMHO If you want a balanced overall view of the day's news, the place to start is the front/home page, not the "Most Popular" list. Newspaper editors spend extraordinary amounts of time agonizing over exactly what stories should go there and how much prominence to give to each. "Most Popular" skips all that in favor of the "wisdom of the crowd," which it turns out is not all that wise. (If the nytimes.com home page still contains too much opinion for you, you can get a digital edition of each day's print paper's front page at this stable URL: https://www.nytimes.com/section/todayspaper https://www.nytimes.com/section/todayspaper)
- taude 8y agoI typically just read the article notifications when they come in, so I think I get a pretty big mix? And I like their evening in review, or morning review sections when I have time.
- cperciva 8y agoIt turns out people like to read other people's opinions. Who'da thunk? Except that they don't like to read other people's opinions. They like to read their own opinions. The most popular opinion pieces are overwhelmingly those which play to the prejudices of the majority of readers, not those which challenge people by presenting unpopular opinions.
- laretluval 8y agoEvery individual article will have some bias. But GP is complaining that the entire editorial staff seems to share a bias, indeed a single agenda, meaning that there is a lack of rigorous discussion.
- rhizome 8y agoThere's a long-existing term for this: "editorial policy," which is a fundamental feature of all publications. All. In programming, this would be like complaining about the existence of indenting.
- laretluval 8y agoIf I thought indenting was lowering the quality of programming I would comment about it too. If the last decade or so has shown anything it is that people are tired of the standard operating procedures of legacy media. Maybe the idea that the editorials all present a unified narrative is part of that.
- rhizome 8y ago"Legacy media" is itself a misnomer, unless you're suggesting that something replace "editorial policy?" What could that something be? On reread, is it actually about "editorials?" Because that's not what editorial policy is entirely about. Partially, yes, but not completely.
- pcstl 8y agoWhich would be perfectly fine, except that digital newspapers have a pesky habit of putting "Opinion" or "Editorial" in very tiny font on the piece's header, with no other indication that the piece being read is, in fact, an opinion/editorial piece.
- ForHackernews 8y agoI would hope most literate readers could tell the difference. There's an obvious distinction between a pundit advancing a point of view and factual accounting of some event. That's not the say that the news section never betrays bias with the facts a reporter chooses to include, or by omitting contrary perspectives. But really, I hope readers do not need a giant header banner "THIS IS AN OP-ED" to recognize one.
- barbecue_sauce 8y agoThat's assuming the op-ed is not intentionally taking a journalistic style to mislead readers.
- 13415 8y agoYou can increase the font size in your browser if you're unable to read the indications for editorials and opinions. But it's also kind of odd that you consider there to be a problem in the first place, because it's also trivial to distinguish news articles from opinions and editorials just from their writing stile.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- faster 8y agoit's also trivial to distinguish news articles from opinions and editorials It turns out that's not true for most people any more. https://www.bu.edu/research/articles/native-advertising-in-fake-news-era/ https://www.bu.edu/research/articles/native-advertising-in-f...
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- khq 8y ago>You, as the reader, are expected to be know enough about how newspapers are organized to tell that you're reading part of the opinion or editorial sections and what that means. No. They know most people take news articles, editorials and opinion articles as the same thing and exploit it.
- darawk 8y ago> Simply put, editorial and opinion sections are supposed to be like that. It's not an error; it's by design, and it's a design that has existed for as long as editorial and opinion sections have existed. There's a difference between cherry picking stories to support a narrative, and bending the truth. The NYT is engaging in the latter.