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Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

fortune.com

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Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#681

Post by autoexec »

latchkey wrote: post #486
jahsome wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Former journalist. I have ranted to friends and family for decades about the lack of media literacy and the lack of understanding for the newsgathering and reporting processes. I'm glad to see others continuing those rants because I gave up shortly after j school and transitioning careers. Media literacy should be mandated in school.

> Media literacy should be mandated in school. Just try for basic literacy first. A Gallup analysis published in March 2020 looked at data collected by the U.S. Department of Education in 2012, 2014, and 2017. It found that 130 million adults in the country have low literacy skills, meaning that more than half (54%) of Americans between the ages of 16 and 74 read below the equivalent of a sixth-grade level, according…

It's the same for math and science. Most Americans aren't capable of anything beyond a 6th grade level. The lack of literacy and numeracy in this country explains a lot about where we are today.

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#682

Post by ChickenNugger »

keyanp wrote: post #197

Yes I know that traditionally media has been used for propaganda, but I'm surprised by the reactions in this thread and those who find what seems like fairly objective reporting as biased. Can someone show me a story from the NYT world or US news sites that are deliberately misleading? If this propaganda is so rampant then where is it? (Note: I'm opinion articles excluded because they are uh opinions). https://www.ny…

The whole entire Russiagate thing was a complete fabrication and tons of articles were based on it: https://www.cjr.org/special_report/trumped-up-press-versus-p...

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#683

Post by wrycoder »

sophacles wrote: post #651
wrycoder wrote: post #636

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s spin, not lie. Your source is spinning the definition of lie, for some reason.

It turns out this is a very old discussion. There is a concept called a "lie of omission". Here's a wikipedia page about the entire concept of lies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lie A question for you: if you make a mistake or misunderstand something then share it, are you a liar? I don't mean like your current actions - the part where you are pretending that you have never encountered the notion of lying like this…

To lie is to tell a deliberate falsehood - to say something you know to be untrue. Sometimes this is taken to be acceptable - to tell a "white lie", e.g. in response to, "Does this dress make me look fat?"

Saying something incorrect, but which you believe to be true, is no lie.

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#684

Post by joe_the_user »

bigger_inside wrote: post #47

There are literal mountains of sociological studies on how (state and corporate) media have been in service of the powers that be, for decades, and how exactly this works. With a mountain of examples. So, for sociologists, this feels like "wow, it only took half a century to trickle through." Though of course this is the wrong reaction; it has always trickled through. Only that, in the past, it took a few years or de…

The problem is that the popular, "scandalized" understanding of "the media lie!!" doesn't have the nuance of sociological and political theories.

The sociologist notes will note that the media serves the interests of the powerful while still reporting some number of facts. The most extreme of the scandalized public will say "the media lies - they say X so Y must be true and X must be a plot". This produces a whole of truly bizarre thinking (often on the right but no doubt on the left as well).

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#685

Post by fidgewidge »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #271
AlbertoGP wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Why do you have vaccines in scare quotes? If a vaccine makes it less likely that you catch a disease, wouldn't that make it less like that you spread the disease? Am I missing something here?

[flagged]

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#686

Post by amoruso »

Early in life I have noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as heroes of imaginary victories; and I saw newspapers in London retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various “party lines.”

― George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia, 1938

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#687

Post by jahsome »

DLTADragonHawk wrote: post #273
jahsome wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Former journalist. I have ranted to friends and family for decades about the lack of media literacy and the lack of understanding for the newsgathering and reporting processes. I'm glad to see others continuing those rants because I gave up shortly after j school and transitioning careers. Media literacy should be mandated in school.

Is there a good list of resources for media literacy you could recommend? I had been thinking of tackling this problem and am curious on journalist's take.

I'd recommend familiarizing yourself with non profit trade groups, as they're generally full of people with very tight butts about journalistic integrity and fewer advertisers/grant committees to please.

Honestly though the goal is to get a good lay of the land for both how a story goes from whiteboard/notebook brainstorm to print, and the general shape of the industry.

Small but impactful example: headlines are often written by a different person than the article. This leads to a lot of conflict, which is healthy in terms of producing quality journalism, but potentially confusing for the consumer who may not understand why.

The main goals would be

- Understand the roles of reporters (gathering), editors (verification), managing editors (suits), publishers (sugar daddies) and their roles for a single given piece, and within the org at large

- Media conglomerates disproportionately dominate local news. It's not just Fox and CNN or the NYT/WaPo, and the impact is far more damaging than the more obvious corporate influence).

These days I tend to stay away from the news for the most part, in an attempt to retain sanity. You don't need 24 hours of news. I read up for about 2-3 hours a week and feel more informed than ever.

Here are a few resources who probably can get you set in a better direction than I would:

Columbia journalism review Nieman lab Poytner institute

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#688

Post by fwungy »

ss108 wrote: post #349
barbariangrunge wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Seeing footage of Trump supporters and speaking with them is sufficient to expose them as bad people You just classified 46% of voting Americans as bad people, as if they have no other motive than to do evil. I didn’t like him either, but give me a break and try to let go of that media narrative. His supporters were just people. Both sides have outspoken nut jobs stealing the spotlight

> You just classified 46% of voting Americans as bad people So? You judge the moral and intellectual merits of things by how popular they are? That's your call. I don't. > Both sides have outspoken nut jobs stealing the spotlight Not really. Only one set of nutjobs actually stormed Congress in an attempt to overturn the results of an election. You've bought into a narrative that minimizes what is an insane fact.

Washington D.C. is a high crime city, but you can safely walk in the National Mall at any hour of the day or night alone, and people do. If it were anywhere else it would be a place be a place most people wouldn't feel safe at when alone late at night in a city like DC.

Know why?

Because Capitol Hill and the Mall are secured six ways to Sunday. It is the seat of the US global empire. Congressmembers and high officials are common sights all around DC and they move around pretty freely. It is common to see them around town. It would seemingly be easy for extremists to find these people and intimidate of harm them, and yet this almost never happens.

That's because DC itself is highly secured, at least where the government people live and work. Congress and the Mall are a secure fortress within a secure city. There are soldiers, air defenses, snipers, and heavy surveillance everywhere.

The J6 protesters had no guns, no supplies, no secure communications, no central command. They were no match for capitol security. The police officers who allegedly died that day are not listed at "line of duty" deaths, i.e. no one says they were killed by J6 protester violence. Capitol security shot and killed an unarmed woman protester, the only death attributable to direct violence. This was also not the first time protesters had occupied the building.

I don't claim to know what actually happened on J6, but it is quite obvious that many of the media narratives about it are highly incompetent at best.

You can only lie to my face so many times before I start to question your credibility.

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#689

Post by cteiosanu »

slg wrote: post #675
xupybd wrote: post #661

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One form of obvious lying is the modern headline. Now that clicks drive revenue many story's don't even come close to what the headline suggests. I do think this is maliciousness, they're telling a lie to draw you in to make money off of you.

This is an example of what I'm talking about. Journalist by and large are not in favor of editors slapping misleading headlines on their work. You are ascribing this practice to maliciousness when it is actually a reluctant response to incentives.

Yeah, it does baffle me when audiences that are supposed to tackle complex topics everyday (and complexity in general) have to fallback to black and white explanations in social aspects.

Re: Half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them

#690

Post by twoodfin »

randcraw wrote: post #184
twoodfin wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edward Snowden has not been exiled in any non-misleading use of the term. He had many opportunities to return to the United States, and could do so today if his current hosts allowed it.

Yes, assuming he was willing to spend the rest of his life in a US prison, if not Khashoggied en-route.

Right, but that’s not definitionally distinct from an accused murderer who skips the country. No one would use the term “exiled” in that case, even if they believe the accusation unjust.

The only reason to use “exiled” is to imply that Snowden is in Russia (or at least outside of the US) by someone’s choice other than his own. That’s what’s misleading about it.

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