Even though all media is Slanted to some view, I tend to blow it off if said News are proven to be Legit. NPR and Bloomberg is the only news I watch. In terms of the Virus, CDC.gov.
Even though all media is Slanted to some view, I tend to blow it off if said News are proven to be Legit. NPR and Bloomberg is the only news I watch. In terms of the Virus, CDC.gov.
_ said:In reply to mtn :
Yes, and they don't HAVE to report what they don't want to. And if they broadcast something their viewers won't like, they don't have to do a long segment on it. They can reduce it to a few short words and move on. We all know what kind of people listen to NPR. NPR knew it before anyone else did. And thus, they cater to what keeps them relevant.
eidt: I would like to point out I'm not affiliated with EITHER political side. None of it has anything to do with me, which is why I do like I mentioned before. Watch a little of everything and see what's in the middle.
Fair enough. I also do the "find the middle" sometimes, but sometimes that means the least possible truth. Take an AP or Reuters story, give it to five networks who put their own spin on it, then I put my own "spin" on it to guess what's in the middle.
Not sure I trust myself and I sure as heck don't trust the extreme sides of some media outlets. 
Way back when, in the run up to the Iraq war, when the internet was still a recent thing, most every paper started to get online so you could read news from most of the major papers and networks around the world. I got fairly obsessive about researching not just the war stuff, but the differences in coverage between the sources, as well as my own biases driving my source selection. For those of you that remember, pretty much every U.S. news source was behind the war effort. Many of the foreign papers were skeptical and some where downright contrary to what we were reading in the US.
Questioning the war effort was unpatriotic and could have some negative effects, as the Dixie Chicks found out. I lost some friends back then.
To the point of all this: Most news sources tailor their information to their audience. If they make their audience uncomfortable they will lose market share and revenue. People watch, listen, and read things that reinforce what they want to hear and make them feel good. Confirmation bias.
Anyway, relative to the Iraq war, hindsight is 20/20 and I thought that the left leaning UK Guardian overall had the best English language coverage as proven by the history. They are funded by a foundation and contributions which I suspect allows them to be fairly far outside the mainstream. PBS coverage was weak and largely conforming. Somebody in this thread mentioned Christian Science Monitor and they were one of the best US sources of real information.
Long post, I'm bored...
I've been an avid public radio listener for about 10 years now. Until a pledge drive comes.
It'd be different if they could stop once you've donated, like you could give them so much per quarter and then the donation pleas go away. Oh well.
I started listening because I was just sick of everything on the radio. Same 25 songs on rotation. DJs that were syndicated and not local. Didn't matter the genre. All of it was garbage.
At least I can learn something from NPR. They correct mistakes, and always fess up when a donor is involved in a story.
They're not perfect, but they're pretty dang good.
All I read is zero hedge. Its trustworthy and well researched. The journalists hold themselves to the highest ethical standards.
/s
BBC, NPR and Al Jazeera are about the only ones I have any faith in.
I listen to NPR on a regular basis. I love how NPR will introduce someone as "A senior Fellow" or "A fellow with ____".
I will have CBSN on in the background on PlutoTV because it's the only real live news channel that Pluto offers.
Toyman01 said:My default position is all of them are biased. I gather info from most sources and assume the actual truth is somewhere in the middle.
When I was studying for my History degree in college, this is exactly what we were taught. You gather as much primary and secondary source material as possible and deduce with an OBJECTIVE view what has happened. Bias is always there, and it's up to the individual to leave their own bias at the door to find the truth. It's not easy, especially today.
I really wish more people paid attention in History class; the world would be a better place.
DukeOfUndersteer said:I listen to NPR on a regular basis. I love how NPR will introduce someone as "A senior Fellow" or "A fellow with ____".
My favorite game to play these days is to look up the name of the think tank then pull their tax disclosures for their 501(c)(3) to see who provided the bulk funding.
That's usually both horrifying and so amazing that you have to sort of respect the commitment to shaping the narrative.
Some years back I listened to a local NPR station consistently. They played some great music during some of their local shows and I listened to their NPR provided news and shows. Then XM came along and I listened to a couple of their channels consistently. After some months I noticed I was a happier, more optimistic, less depressed person. Then it hit me - no NPR!
Of course YMMV but suggest taking happy pills for an offset if you plan a long exposure to NPR.
Most major news sources straight news is only slight bias. It's when they throw in the Mr X shows, almost full opinion, that the bias meter pegs.
Regarding Al Jazeera: It is a great source of an a bit of an outside view, but they will have some VERY heavy bias for certain topics / groups.
One fun one to look at sometimes is RT (and no, that's not Road and Track). It's almost like reading The Onion, and does give you an idea of what news could be like, and is, for some.
Pretty much all news source are useful in their own way. Even the extreme ones can give you a good perspective on what the angle is for certain groups.... you of course need to be aware of their slant.
The more legitimate news sources tend to express their bias not through the news reporting, but by what they chose to cover. So the "get news from a lot of different sources" approach can be a good way to balance that out.
I found the "watch all of them and try to decode and throw away the bias" tedious and unhelpful. If I see bias I move on. Its sad to see all the big name news agencies shrink to making unhelpful political overtones (in either direction) about the recent outbreak.
While not immune, I have found VOA news to be the best on youtube for non-editorialized content, with reuters a close second.
NPR, while excellent, is burdened by the bias their supporters pay to hear. I know, as I am often one of them.
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