4 ms·

A lot of media outfits feign neutrality. Maybe most. The test isnt whether they have a page on their website it's how they report on stories that could damage

by pydry 5y ago

A lot of media outfits feign neutrality. Maybe most. The test isnt whether they have a page on their website it's how they report on stories that could damage their bottom line (or, in Al jazeeras case, tolerate a saudi imposed blockade).

woodruffw 5y ago
This isn't a falsifiable claim: what's the difference between "feigning neutrality" and "operating neutrally" if the output is neutral reporting? Nobody is actually netural. What makes a news outfit "neutral" is their adherence to journalistic standards of neutrality, which include both a firewall against executive interests and an editing process designed to temper the biases of individual journalists.
- pydry 5y ago
  Of course it's falsifiable: pick a bunch of topics that negatively affect them (stories about them, their key advertisers, etc.) and diff it against a source that has no interest. If there is no difference they're neutral. If they downplay or ignore - not so neutral. >What makes a news outfit "neutral" is their adherence to journalistic standards of neutrality, which include both a firewall against executive interests and an editing process designed to temper the biases of individual journalists. Which involves more than just talking about neutrality. It involves executives being willing to pay the price when that neutrality would violate their interests - financial or otherwise.
  - woodruffw 5y ago
    That, or they don't just have a reporter working that beat. Outlets frequently choose to allocate reporters based on the likelihood that another outlet will beat them to the presses. Or more saliently: your supposedly "disinterested" source has an undisclosed positive interest. Reuters has historically typified the kind of reporting that's labeled as "neutral." We have no particular reason to believe that their ex-CEO has had any undue influence on their newsdesk's neutrality.

by pydry 5y ago

woodruffw 5y ago

This isn't a falsifiable claim: what's the difference between "feigning neutrality" and "operating neutrally" if the output is neutral reporting? Nobody is actually netural. What makes a news outfit "neutral" is their adherence to journalistic standards of neutrality, which include both a firewall against executive interests and an editing process designed to temper the biases of individual journalists.

pydry 5y ago
Of course it's falsifiable: pick a bunch of topics that negatively affect them (stories about them, their key advertisers, etc.) and diff it against a source that has no interest. If there is no difference they're neutral. If they downplay or ignore - not so neutral. >What makes a news outfit "neutral" is their adherence to journalistic standards of neutrality, which include both a firewall against executive interests and an editing process designed to temper the biases of individual journalists. Which involves more than just talking about neutrality. It involves executives being willing to pay the price when that neutrality would violate their interests - financial or otherwise.
- woodruffw 5y ago
  That, or they don't just have a reporter working that beat. Outlets frequently choose to allocate reporters based on the likelihood that another outlet will beat them to the presses. Or more saliently: your supposedly "disinterested" source has an undisclosed positive interest. Reuters has historically typified the kind of reporting that's labeled as "neutral." We have no particular reason to believe that their ex-CEO has had any undue influence on their newsdesk's neutrality.