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How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

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Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#31

Post by trasz »

kenjackson wrote: post #7

It's disappointing, but just a fact of life now, that people will see the world so differently. People have always had differing politics, but there was a semblance of a baseline. I feel like we need a generation that strikes out against the notion of identity altogether (as I think identity is a core part of the issue), but that already feels like an identity in itself.

The “baseline” was established by ignoring points of view that didn’t align with the ruling class. It’s still largely the case, for example crime stories are popular, except for crimes committed by law enforcement, which - in some cases, like theft - is actually the majority of all cases in US, just not reported that way.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#32

Post by blowski »

Victerius wrote: post #21
MonkeyMalarky wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's to deflect liability? If you are quoting someone, you aren't the one who could be sued.

Politician calls bill "horrible" Vs. Politician calls bill horrible

"Politican" calls bill horrible.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#33

Post by Swizec »

wbsss4412 wrote: post #15
kenjackson wrote: post #7

It's disappointing, but just a fact of life now, that people will see the world so differently. People have always had differing politics, but there was a semblance of a baseline. I feel like we need a generation that strikes out against the notion of identity altogether (as I think identity is a core part of the issue), but that already feels like an identity in itself.

Do you have particular examples of identity being a core part of the issue? I see people complain about identity politics all the time, but when it comes down to it, the individual issues that fall under that umbrella are things that people deeply care about and can’t just be dismissed.

People voting D or R because that’s their tribe rather than because they want those policies is an example.

I know a lot of people who vote without even really reading what’s on the ballot. They just go with whatever option has D next to it. Others do the same but for R.

Personally I can’t vote so it’s mostly an interesting phenomenon to observe

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#34

Post by amscanne »

ajross wrote: post #4
HPsquared wrote: post #2

Not to accuse the author of bias, but surely are there must have been some topics covered by CNN that Fox didn't?

The point is more that Fox will routinely elevate issues that aren't really "news" in a traditional sense to major "stories", either to fill time[1] or to make a partisan argument. The IRS funding is a great example here. The IRA bill indeed increases funding for the Internal Revenue Service by something like 30%. This would be reasonable content to include in a print article, say, of the kind of bureaucratic funding…

Increasing funding for enforcement for the IRS is something that I personally feel is a good thing, but I think it’s fair to cover it in light of the fact that it seems to be colored by politics, like so much else. Why on earth would the Democrats pronounce that it won’t be used to audit anywhere earning less than $400k? As an extension of the anti-rich rhetoric, it’s no longer a simple “bureaucratic funding decision” and should be covered/discussed. (Not that I fully agree with the tone or manner of coverage, but you can’t claim that it’s not news.)

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#35

Post by secondcoming »

Victerius wrote: post #21
MonkeyMalarky wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's to deflect liability? If you are quoting someone, you aren't the one who could be sued.

Politician calls bill "horrible" Vs. Politician calls bill horrible

In the first, the politician actually uses the word ‘horrible’ and so it’s quoted.

In the second, the headline writer is giving their opinion/spin.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#36

Post by mywittyname »

secondcoming wrote: post #25
mywittyname wrote: post #14

I "really hate" how some "news" sites like to, "quote excessively" in headlines. If you want to call some nonsense, or a bold face lie, have the damn courage to just call it that. Don't air-quoting some nebulous entity to make it sound more official.

Oh no. Is that really why you think people use quotes, or are you trolling? I hope you are.

Quoting entire sentences is fine. But anymore, news is quoting literally single words without any citations.

/u/secondcoming asks, "are you trolling? I hope you are."

Vs.

User "trolls" forum. Posters respond to "quotes" with "oh no."

Seriously, about 80% of FN headlines contain one or two word mini-quotes.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#37

Post by BeetleB »

ziddoap wrote: post #8
BeetleB wrote: post #5

I know this will come across as a bit of flame-bait, but: What is the point in comparing two crappy news sources? Neither is worth spending time on. Also, more on-point: Are they looking only at news, or are they including opinion?

> 60% of Republicans turn to Fox News for political news and 53% of Democrats turn to CNN It'd be nice to see comparisons of all the news networks, but if you're going to start somewhere it seems like the two which have the majority of viewers seems appropriate.

It doesn't provide much useful info. That one item is much crappier than another crappy item is not very helpful information.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#38

Post by pclmulqdq »

jollybean wrote: post #18
BeetleB wrote: post #5

I know this will come across as a bit of flame-bait, but: What is the point in comparing two crappy news sources? Neither is worth spending time on. Also, more on-point: Are they looking only at news, or are they including opinion?

CNN is not a crappy news source. It's mostly above board, if biased. The non-opinion parts of Fox are not that bad but it's more rare. My bet is they are looking at headline coverage both news and opinion. I think this is a really worthy excercise so that we can see a bit more methodologically what kind of bias happens with selective coverage. The tone and content of the coverage matters a lot. Almost all of the edit…

In my past experience, CNN has not been very transparent in terms of admitting its bias, which is very much apparent to the average news viewer. I am not sure that anyone in the US other than a few highly sheltered democrats, who get their news only from left-leaning sources, still believes that it is "the most trusted name in news."

Incidentally, I actually think MSNBC, which admits to being a left-leaning news source, produces better (and less biased) news content than CNN. I have actually seen them cover important stories that are unfavorable to their point of view, when CNN has radio silence.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#39

Post by sofixa »

kenjackson wrote: post #11
BeetleB wrote: post #5

I know this will come across as a bit of flame-bait, but: What is the point in comparing two crappy news sources? Neither is worth spending time on. Also, more on-point: Are they looking only at news, or are they including opinion?

What are good news sources? I guarantee you that for any news source you pick, there are people who will argue that it is crappy and/or biased.

Financial Times, The Guardian, Reuters are usually pretty good. There might be some bias somewhere, or a weird opinion piece (clearly labeled as such) but they are honest reporting outlets that don't outright lie, and fix any mistakes that might have slipped in.

Re: How does Fox vs. CNN compare in topic/event coverage over the last week?

#40

Post by NaturalPhallacy »

The scariest thing about biased news sources is not how they cover something but whether they cover something at all.

People who don't tune into multiple will simply have no idea that something even happened. They'll have completely different realities based on their perceptions.

Just looking at the graph you can see four whole stories that CNN completely omitted, yet there was nothing that CNN covered that Fox ignored. I'm sure there are weeks where fox ignored something too, but in this data the omissions are one sided.

This is why one of my daily bookmarks is https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news

If any outlet on either side covers it, I'll see it.

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