I’m sick and tired (ooh, that reminds me I need to write another entry soon after this) of people talking about how media is grossly biased one way for either liberals or conservatives. Here’s what someone I know recently said about media bias: “Yes the right has it’s [sic] share too, but not NEAR the volume.”¹ Now this is entirely speculation (and oh, how I love to speculate (ideas, not oil), but I’ve come up with a hypothesis I think I’ll call “the horde vs alliance effect” (I hate to use this game to compare to real life, but it’s a super awesome analogy, in my opinion). And I am in no way saying media bias does not exist, because it absolutely does.
Basically, no matter which side you pick, everyone seems to complain that the other side significantly outnumbers or outperforms the side you’re on. If you play horde, you hear (or even make) continuous complaints that the alliance are too good, that they cheat, that horde can never win, and vice versa. While on some servers in the game this could possibly be true, the company that runs the game has confirmed that wins and losses are split extremely evenly between the two sides.
I would be rather surprised if this wasn’t also true in nearly every aspect of real life, including media bias.
1. Bennion, Karl-Erik. Used without permission. 3 September 2008. Accessed 1 October 2008. http://kebstuff.com/?p=128
Keb, if you ever read this, I felt that your quote was small enough that I was within fair use, but I’ll remove it (and the citation) from this post if you want.
Every time I watch Fox News, I find myself disgusted at the amount of “right” propaganda that is spewed forth. Local news here in Utah is even worse (don’t even get me started on the newspapers). On the other hand, CNN is blatantly to the left. Both try to project an image of fairness, but do so very poorly. I posted a “liberal” comment on a Fox News website last week, and they censored it. Flat out, censored it.
Media bias exists, sure, but it does goth ways. Unlike journalists, I as a therapist understand that escaping bias is impossible. What I think media needs is a healthy dose of devil’s advocacy. That would certainly help paint a brighter pictured (…and no, Alan Colmes doesn’t count).
For me, that’s the beauty of the Intarnetweb; I get to find out more detail than I would ever get from the local or national talking heads. I’m glad to have at least that.