I've been hearing forever about "damn liberal media" and been annoyed by the idea for nearly as long. I've gotten slapped around by friends for reading the Village Voice (okay, granted) and the New York Times (maybe, but can I simply say "Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper"?).
And I've found it incredibly annoying in lieu of the overwhelming preponderance of conservative noise in the talk radio/TV world (one friend I know refers to it as Hate Radio—even as she listens to it regularly). Frankly, as with most of our currently polarized society, I think you hear what you want to hear and get worked up by what you choose to get worked up over. Complaints about liberal media come from people that feel their narrow worldview isn't represented by the press. Complaints about hate radio come from people like me that find all the noise coming from these clowns detrimental to our worldview of a place where people should be rational and tolerant… yeah, I'm in a world of ideological hurt these days.
Having said all that, what I really wonder about is this latest trend in reporting fringe opinions as if they've got some kind of credibility behind them.
Back when Star Wars opened, this idiot got national press with his call to boycott Star Wars because of its "liberal Bush bashing agenda" and generally "treasonous" tone. I'm talking USA Today and that "liberal bastion", the New York Times quoting him. My favorite part of the Times article is when they observe that Pabah.com is "A little-trafficked conservative Web site about film". (Hell, MY blog is a "little-trafficked" site… I can't wait till I get quoted in the Times.) My real question here is, if it IS a little trafficked site… why the hell are we paying attention to his noise? And why is he getting treated like he's a source for anything other than one man's rants?
Then last week, I see this headline in my email:
For movies, G is for gold
It goes on to report statistics on how much more profitable G-Rated films are over R-Rated films, and that this proves that "edgy, adult-themed entertainment… constitutes a bad investment." But it's not until you've gotten into the second paragraph in the article that you find that this study is from The Dove Foundation, "a media advocacy group… which says it pushes for films with a Judeo-Christian ethic." And all I've got to ask is what the hell did you expect them to say? This is like Big Tobacco revealing a survey that shows that smokers enjoy their cigarettes much more than non-smokers, or some such BS like that. OF COURSE these people are arguing that there's more profit in G-Rated films! That's their whole reason for existence! But the headline doesn't give you any indication that this is anything but solid data.
What the survey neglects to point out is that most of that profit can surely be traced to the 2 or 3 big budget digital animated films that come out each year and which account for upwards of $200 to $300 million in box office each (even the mediocre ones), skewing the tallies upward. SURE, if every studio could release a Shrek 2 or The Incredibles every time they release a G-Rated film, then you could make the argument that G is the way to go. But that's not the reality. And treating this report as if it's an unbiased take on the current state of box office performance is misleading, at best.
The only bright spot in all this chatter from the Right is that it calls into questions reports like this one, AP Poll: Religion Key in American Lives, which shows that an overwhelming majority of people in this country are quite comfortable with rejecting that whole notion of "Separation of Church & State". Maybe this poll's as skewed as these other reports and we aren't on the fast track to the United Theocratic States of America.
One can only hope.
And I've found it incredibly annoying in lieu of the overwhelming preponderance of conservative noise in the talk radio/TV world (one friend I know refers to it as Hate Radio—even as she listens to it regularly). Frankly, as with most of our currently polarized society, I think you hear what you want to hear and get worked up by what you choose to get worked up over. Complaints about liberal media come from people that feel their narrow worldview isn't represented by the press. Complaints about hate radio come from people like me that find all the noise coming from these clowns detrimental to our worldview of a place where people should be rational and tolerant… yeah, I'm in a world of ideological hurt these days.
Having said all that, what I really wonder about is this latest trend in reporting fringe opinions as if they've got some kind of credibility behind them.
Back when Star Wars opened, this idiot got national press with his call to boycott Star Wars because of its "liberal Bush bashing agenda" and generally "treasonous" tone. I'm talking USA Today and that "liberal bastion", the New York Times quoting him. My favorite part of the Times article is when they observe that Pabah.com is "A little-trafficked conservative Web site about film". (Hell, MY blog is a "little-trafficked" site… I can't wait till I get quoted in the Times.) My real question here is, if it IS a little trafficked site… why the hell are we paying attention to his noise? And why is he getting treated like he's a source for anything other than one man's rants?
Then last week, I see this headline in my email:
For movies, G is for gold
It goes on to report statistics on how much more profitable G-Rated films are over R-Rated films, and that this proves that "edgy, adult-themed entertainment… constitutes a bad investment." But it's not until you've gotten into the second paragraph in the article that you find that this study is from The Dove Foundation, "a media advocacy group… which says it pushes for films with a Judeo-Christian ethic." And all I've got to ask is what the hell did you expect them to say? This is like Big Tobacco revealing a survey that shows that smokers enjoy their cigarettes much more than non-smokers, or some such BS like that. OF COURSE these people are arguing that there's more profit in G-Rated films! That's their whole reason for existence! But the headline doesn't give you any indication that this is anything but solid data.
What the survey neglects to point out is that most of that profit can surely be traced to the 2 or 3 big budget digital animated films that come out each year and which account for upwards of $200 to $300 million in box office each (even the mediocre ones), skewing the tallies upward. SURE, if every studio could release a Shrek 2 or The Incredibles every time they release a G-Rated film, then you could make the argument that G is the way to go. But that's not the reality. And treating this report as if it's an unbiased take on the current state of box office performance is misleading, at best.
The only bright spot in all this chatter from the Right is that it calls into questions reports like this one, AP Poll: Religion Key in American Lives, which shows that an overwhelming majority of people in this country are quite comfortable with rejecting that whole notion of "Separation of Church & State". Maybe this poll's as skewed as these other reports and we aren't on the fast track to the United Theocratic States of America.
One can only hope.
Comments
Talk radio, gossip rags, daytime talk shows...I don't know who/what came first, but a valuable lesson was learned some time ago - appeal to an extreme, make a BIG headline (with little to back it up), and you get big ratings/sales/whatever. Call it what you want ("reporting fringe opinions" is too kind) - I call it sensationalism. Appealing to the lowest common denominator for the biggest monetary return.
And, now, even old, established bastions of journalism such as the Pulitzer prize winning NY Times, and our disgusting LA Times all do it. They push agendas, they publish half-stories, opinions, and gossip; and, they don't keep it to the editorial pages anymore - they do it on the front page. Why? Money. The NY Times saw readers jumping to the Post. LA Times sees their subscribers dwindling. And, there isn't an editor-in-chief in the country with half the balls that Bill Bradley had back in the day (for the uninformed - he was EiC of the Washington Post during the Watergate era).
Just watch the movie "All the President's Men" again. Watch how TOUGH Bill Bradley is on Woodward and Bernstein. He wants sources and sources on sources and he wants double confirmation on the record. They were JOURNALISTS!
That no longer exists today. And, if you really want the NEWS you have to search for it. You have to read a paper, and a couple blogs, and watch cable news, and do research. And, then, you MIGHT have an inkling of the truth.
All I've got to say is William Randolph Hearst.
Sensationalism in the press is nothing new, it's just gotten to the point where no one's immune to it any longer. The worst thing that ever happened to TV news was the decision to include them in the annual ratings wars. Once they had to compete on ratings, you ended up with the pablum that is local news and the bs that passes for national news.
Newspapers, as they struggle to complete in today's market, are just as guilty these days, and with the ever increasing consolidation of these news sources under fewer and larger corporations, it's only going to get worse.
The problem, of course, is few are going to do the research to find the real story, convinced that they've got it already because they've found the source they trust (the one that helps affirms their world view, of course).
I'm honored (though I think I was slammed as well)!
You know I agree with Quentin---whatever it takes to sell the "news" or just to sell the person/station/show selling the news. It's pretty amazing that people will actually believe some of the stuff that is "reported". I am the opposite, I no longer believe anything I hear or read. And don't ever ask for a follow-up story unless it involves more sensationalism.
Cnn.com has an article about how the paparrazi is growing as the demand for pictures of celebrities is growing (an article I apparently believe). I guess people have already forgotten the circumstances surrounding Princess Diana's death.
I think the problem isn't that journalists aren't going to do the research because they have found sources which have worked for them in the past. I don't think they have the time or need to worry about accuracy. It's all sales driven--and the readers aren't looking for accuracy, they are looking for sensationalism too.
Which brings us back to the age-old question--Chicken or egg?
Chris
I wasn't talking about journalists doing their research. One would hope they'd be doing their research. (One would, of course, probably be wrong in most cases, but we can hope, right?)
Anyway, I was referring to the average schmuck thumbing through today's headlines who's got his sites bookmarked and that's as far as he needs to go for the latest news. But if it's on the Internet, it's gotta be true, right?