Do you believe "the media"?

[Danner]

Most of us know media is being controlled by biljonairs, governments, etc, all with their own agenda.

What does this say about the credibility of the news we consume? If history is written by the victors, who is to tell the losers weren't the righteous ones?

So is an "IS soldier' a terrorist? Or someone who makes desperate attempts to defend his country from foreign invading forces who seek oil? We all know writing angry letters wont do them any good. Arent the taliban just freedom fighters? What did Kim Jung Il ever do to anyone that we (the west) never did?

Theres a huge grey area our news chooses to ignore. Why is that?

Do you believe "the media"?

All media are biased on some subject or other. And bias is not inherently bad, as long as they wear their colors openly. You just have to be aware of those colors, and let that tint your perception of what is being reported. Instead of taking one news agency's outputs as gospel, read a bunch of them and compare what they say.

I would love to see more of the ideal of journalism where journalists are exclusively reporting on the facts, and any kind of opinions or analysis is left as attributed quotes. It may still be biased by who you attribute and who you don't, but it's so much purer than what we see in today's media. That kind of journalism is almost non-existent. Sadly.

There is a saying - never attribute to malice what can easily be attributed to incompetence. I find this to be pretty accurate when it comes to journalism. It's not that most journalists are evil truth-twisting sleazebags hellbent on ruining the lives of those of a different political alignment than themselves. It happens, but it's in my experience a very rare specimen. Most journalists are idealists, for better or worse. They want to make the world better, and they want to expose the corruption of society. Most journalists literally live for the once-in-a-career moment where they bring catch a person of power doing something they really really shouldn't be doing.

But journalists also have a day job that require them to fill a quota of news, and that quota keeps on increasing year-by-year in the name of profit. Quality is the first sacrifice in that ordeal. Getting a second confirmation of a source - not happening - you have 3 more news stories to write before you can call it a day. This makes it really really easy for propaganda to seep in. Some government agency sending out a press release saying X, you're gonna print it without fact checking - you can't afford the time to fact-check the government. And even if you did some fact checking, some other news agency is going to print it, and everyone else is going to pile on "X happened! (according to other news site Y)" and you'll be super late with the news. It literally only takes one bad apple to then ruin the entire industry in the quota-driven environment.

There certainly is propaganda going on, but I do not think it is that deliberate from the media's side (most of the time). Ask yourself who is feeding the media propaganda stories about IS or north korea. Because it sure as hell ain't the journalist with a quota.

[Radeghost]

I don't. They're great at manipulating though - they manipulated millions of Americans making them think that an orange, blonde foul-mouthed old man is worse than a corrupted warmonger who's mother of ISIS.
That's actually fascinating. Are people that dumb or the media that great?

[Radeghost]

Yes, but in the recent weeks I've heard more about Trump grabbing someone's pussy X years ago (really who cares) than about leaked e-mails, after what one of presidential candidates should be put in prison.

[Draco-Onis]

Trumpy aint bad.. the left wing media want political correctness to roll on.

You consider Fox news liberal media?

[unbound]

Do I believe "the media"? Do you believe "the whites"? Do you believe "the man"? Do you believe "the corporations"?

Those are such vague statements that they are meaningless. Do I believe all members of "the media"? lol...no. No more than I believe all of "the white", "the man", or "the corporations". Just because I don't believe all members of any of those groups doesn't mean that I believe all members of those groups do nothing but lie.

If you want to understand reality (or at least understand more about reality), you need to give up your notions of groups as being monolithic beings. There are certainly groups that behave so consistently that you can generalize with pretty good accuracy high level concepts and be reasonably accurate, but none of the groups mentioned behave that way at a large scale. There are certain sub-groups that you might have a good argument towards (e.g. extreme partisan media groups like Breitbart or Mother Jones of "the media", the KKK of "the whites"), but that is about as far as you can realistically go.

In regards to "the media", you need to find quality sources. Look at the history of the organization and individuals to determine if they are trustworthy. Fox News gets panned because it was created specifically to be right-leaning (Roger Ailes, creator of Fox news, actually said he wanted to change news to support right wing ideology), and its behavior remains consistent with the origin of the news organization. Similarly, Huffington Post was created by distinctly left-leaning people and is accurately described as a liberal news site.

Despite claims of extreme bias, the reality is that NY Times and Washington Post are actually mildly right leaning publications, and much of their reports are of good quality. That said, a Russian proverb is always relevant for making sure it is good information...Doveryai, no proveryai (Trust, but verify). Side note: fascinating that this Reagan signature phrases was Russian in origin.

Basically, at the end of the day, you will not find any simple solutions that sync up with reality. You will always have to use critical thought. Sources that were trustworthy years ago may not be so today...sources that are trustworthy today may not be so tomorrow. As Captain Disillusion says, "Love with your heart; use your head for everything else".

[Deleted]

Believing the (((media)))? Is this a serious topic?

[anyaka21]

All media are biased on some subject or other. And bias is not inherently bad, as long as they wear their colors openly. You just have to be aware of those colors, and let that tint your perception of what is being reported. Instead of taking one news agency's outputs as gospel, read a bunch of them and compare what they say.

I would love to see more of the ideal of journalism where journalists are exclusively reporting on the facts, and any kind of opinions or analysis is left as attributed quotes. It may still be biased by who you attribute and who you don't, but it's so much purer than what we see in today's media. That kind of journalism is almost non-existent. Sadly.

There is a saying - never attribute to malice what can easily be attributed to incompetence. I find this to be pretty accurate when it comes to journalism. It's not that most journalists are evil truth-twisting sleazebags hellbent on ruining the lives of those of a different political alignment than themselves. It happens, but it's in my experience a very rare specimen. Most journalists are idealists, for better or worse. They want to make the world better, and they want to expose the corruption of society. Most journalists literally live for the once-in-a-career moment where they bring catch a person of power doing something they really really shouldn't be doing.

But journalists also have a day job that require them to fill a quota of news, and that quota keeps on increasing year-by-year in the name of profit. Quality is the first sacrifice in that ordeal. Getting a second confirmation of a source - not happening - you have 3 more news stories to write before you can call it a day. This makes it really really easy for propaganda to seep in. Some government agency sending out a press release saying X, you're gonna print it without fact checking - you can't afford the time to fact-check the government. And even if you did some fact checking, some other news agency is going to print it, and everyone else is going to pile on "X happened! (according to other news site Y)" and you'll be super late with the news. It literally only takes one bad apple to then ruin the entire industry in the quota-driven environment.

There certainly is propaganda going on, but I do not think it is that deliberate from the media's side (most of the time). Ask yourself who is feeding the media propaganda stories about IS or north korea. Because it sure as hell ain't the journalist with a quota.

I would say it even goes further than that. Especially on TV because they are basically paid, in a ton of cases, to say whats on the teleprompter. Thus they are at the whims of the producers and writers, and in many cases management would want people to watch. Hell, a lot of tv news channels aren't really news, just programs where certain people give their opinions on things, thus not really a news channel, but a 24hr op-ed channel. Further, to get hired, you have to adhere to their companies specific mindset and leanings or you won't have a show very long because it's not about journalism, it's about ratings.

Another example, remember the rise of Jim Rome - he basically became famous because he bashed NFL LA Rams quarterback Jim Everett by calling him Chris Everett (a womans tennis player, for those that don't know their history), basically shock jock mentality. He made his name bashing people, after which, he toned it down to become a more respected interviewer. But he basically sold his soul for name recognition.

I think that example is fairly akin to todays journalists. They write a ton of blog type stories hoping for that one piece that gets their name recognized, after which they can then pursue more honest endeavors. But the problem is, that day is pretty much gone. In the time of nobody really cares who writes what. When was the last time you really paid attention to who wrote what on the internet? Or that you read an article specifically because of said journalist? Or do you know just go to yahoo and click on a headline or go to Huffpo and do the same?

The only real way to get recognized is to essentially be one of those shock jocks, for whichever side you are one.

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There is lots of evidence of Trumps vocab level equal to a 10 year olds so I dont know how much deep insightful bullshit you can portray from the man who very clearly is telling us who he is. You are retarded for considering that there is context to his insults.

Then you basically discredit yourself by not doing the research yourself. And consistently calling people retarded just shows your mentality, and in that sense, you mention the vocab of a 10yr old about Trump, but you seem to have cornered the market on 10yr old vocab and mentality.

[Sylreick]

I take the news/media with a grain of salt, as always. But I believe them more than I believe conspiracy theorists.

[Naxere]

Generally, no. Everyone has an agenda. I look at multiple sources of information before forming an opinion.

[Donald Hellscream]

as long as it isn't retarded sensationalist bullshit.

I haven't ingested enough drugs or tinfoil to see conspiracies in everything the media says.

[Deleted]

il never listen to mainstream media look what it did to the brexit campaign just trying to make leave voters out to be racists and shit, i voted leave and guess what i dnt care if your asian or even fucking martian i have no issues with anyones race skin colour etc. but the media can suck my balls its all funded by goverments and rich people who print headlines so the mindless sheeple wil leat it up thinking omg i cant believe this well il tell you i DNT believe it cos all mainstream media is horseshit

[Coffeexbean]

I would say it even goes further than that. Especially on TV because they are basically paid, in a ton of cases, to say whats on the teleprompter. Thus they are at the whims of the producers and writers, and in many cases management would want people to watch. Hell, a lot of tv news channels aren't really news, just programs where certain people give their opinions on things, thus not really a news channel, but a 24hr op-ed channel. Further, to get hired, you have to adhere to their companies specific mindset and leanings or you won't have a show very long because it's not about journalism, it's about ratings.

Another example, remember the rise of Jim Rome - he basically became famous because he bashed NFL LA Rams quarterback Jim Everett by calling him Chris Everett (a womans tennis player, for those that don't know their history), basically shock jock mentality. He made his name bashing people, after which, he toned it down to become a more respected interviewer. But he basically sold his soul for name recognition.

I think that example is fairly akin to todays journalists. They write a ton of blog type stories hoping for that one piece that gets their name recognized, after which they can then pursue more honest endeavors. But the problem is, that day is pretty much gone. In the time of nobody really cares who writes what. When was the last time you really paid attention to who wrote what on the internet? Or that you read an article specifically because of said journalist? Or do you know just go to yahoo and click on a headline or go to Huffpo and do the same?

The only real way to get recognized is to essentially be one of those shock jocks, for whichever side you are one.

- - - Updated - - -



Then you basically discredit yourself by not doing the research yourself. And consistently calling people retarded just shows your mentality, and in that sense, you mention the vocab of a 10yr old about Trump, but you seem to have cornered the market on 10yr old vocab and mentality.

if someone says " woman who have abortions should be punished" what else do I have to research? LOL is there some underlying deep message to that? give me a fucking break republitard

[Theodarzna]

Most of us know media is being controlled by biljonairs, governments, etc, all with their own agenda.

What does this say about the credibility of the news we consume? If history is written by the victors, who is to tell the losers weren't the righteous ones?

So is an "IS soldier' a terrorist? Or someone who makes desperate attempts to defend his country from foreign invading forces who seek oil? We all know writing angry letters wont do them any good. Arent the taliban just freedom fighters? What did Kim Jung Il ever do to anyone that we (the west) never did?

Theres a huge grey area our news chooses to ignore. Why is that?

Do you believe "the media"?

I do not really watch any televised sources since I don't own a TV. By default I do not trust them.

[Venant]

This immediately came to mind when reading the title of this thread

[Selastan]

[anyaka21]

if someone says " woman who have abortions should be punished" what else do I have to research? LOL is there some underlying deep message to that? give me a fucking break republitard

Really, republitard.... wow that's very mature, sounds like Trumpspeak.

Anyways...when have I ever supported Trump? Look at my history, never have never will. But just because I don't like or will vote for the guy, doesn't mean I don't need to be honest and genuine about it.

Hell, if I had to define myself, I'd probably call myself a semi-conservative socialist. Thus not really falling into any catagory.

The only person I deem worthy of a vote atm is Bernie. He's the only one that earned my respect.

But let's be honest, this is about media bias. HRC has been their go to candidate from the beginning. From the private press parties she's thrown, to the journalists leaking stories to her ahead of time, etc...

This is not the real journalism of the 70's that broke watergate, but corporate media trying to control information and how people perceive said information.

[Easo]

Sorry, OP, I am not into the media hate and conspiracy theories.
I do use sanity and logic check when reading articles, I do read multiple sources and I do simply try to check if they are not just sprouting BS. And no, random blogs (with exceptions) or Infowars is not media.
World has literally millions of people in the "Media". Think again...

[May90]

Sorry, OP, I am not into the media hate and conspiracy theories.
I do use sanity and logic check when reading articles, I do read multiple sources and I do simply try to check if they are not just sprouting BS. And no, random blogs (with exceptions) or Infowars is not media.
World has literally millions of people in the "Media". Think again...

Yeah, I think people who take everything media say as ultimate truth aren't any worse than people who believe that all media are liars with reptilians on the backyard plotting brainwashing strategies.

[Easo]

Yeah, I think people who take everything media say as ultimate truth aren't any worse than people who believe that all media are liars with reptilians on the backyard plotting brainwashing strategies.

Exactly, this is what I mean't.

[Felicia]

I swear I answered this same question on this exact forum a few days ago... unless I decided against it... anyway...

When I do read an article... I go straight to google, and look up the same thing... then read other articles on the same topic. It helps me get the bigger perspective. Sometimes I'll even check the cited sources... if there are any. So if I read one thing on CNN, I'll read it elsewhere... probably drudge, newsmax, bbc, and lots of other places.