Media Bias and Its Public Influence
Media Bias and Its Public Influence
Do today’s media hold a biased opinion? Political figure heads of modern day America have argued the subject of a biased liberal media for decades. The notion of the media being predominantly liberal is not unheard of because since publicly broadcasted news media first became common, the Republican Party was not yet one to rival the Democrats. The core argument presented is the possibility of a liberal media manipulating the American public and thus influencing them to vote in congruence with the ways of the Democratic political party. Thus far it is simple to see the media clearly holds a bias that is in favor of the liberal viewpoint. I believe the media should not hold an opinion because, it comes through in their coverage and thus influences some of the American public to vote in a way in which they would not have otherwise.
Narratio:
The American public has historically believed anything they have seen in the media. This can be seen easily, not only through political news coverage but as well in other media programming. Further proof of liberal media control comes in the form of faulty broadcasting. Liberal programming, which constitutes most of the media today, deliberately leaves out crucial news that casts a tainted image and tarnishes the reputation of democratic politicians. Furthermore, these same newscasters that fail to report honest news are projected as preachers of political problems and are perceived as public icons in the eyes of the mindless masses of America. In addition to the newscasters being liberally biased, the newspapers and magazines are also in congruence, which clearly reflects a discrete liberal point of view; all the while plastering discriminatory images of republican politicians on the front covers of their magazines. Finally, in recent years, conservatives have been able to obtain a network free of liberal political bloggers.
Probatio:
Although the biased liberal media is force feeding their opinions into the mouths of the unassuming people of America, part of the problem lays in the American public themselves, and their ability to make their own decisions instead of taking everything in the media as fact. Page, Shapiro, and Dempsey found that “in television news commentary, a single story is associated with over 4 percentage points of opinion change” (Page, Shapiro, and Dempsey 1987 – in Jordan 196). Therefore, if a single story is responsible for 4 points of percentage change, than a 95 percent comprised liberal media has the potential to make crucial changes in public opinion in just a short amount of time. A simple 4 percent of change with a single story reflects how easily manipulated the American public is. In correspondence, “Research offers clear evidence that what is presented in the media influences the policy preferences of the American public” (Jordan 191). Therefore, since the American public is influenced by what is presented to them in the media, and the media presents a biased opinion in favor of the liberal point of view, then one can only conclude that the American public is absorbing this obscured perspective and implementing it as if it were their own.
As well as forcing their opinions upon the American public, liberal programming deliberately eradicates the discriminating information from their broadcasts to keep clean the slates of the politicians whom they so strongly support. Such allegations can be proven in the case of “David Chang, [who was] the [money] donor who admitted to five misdemeanor election-law crimes and one felony count of obstruction of justice, and obscure contributor” (Malkin 48). This news was buried deep inside a June 3 edition of New York Times (48), deliberately meant to keep to keep the liberal slate clean around election time. What is also interesting is the lack of attention this scandal received from the campaign-ethics mavens, who are so eager to set off alarms regarding any republican mishap (48). Furthermore, Chris Galloway states that in today’s media “Modern conflicts are increasingly battles over images and ideas, as protagonists [news casters] seek to shape audiences’ views by managing the information available through the media” (Galloway Abstract). So, in attempt to further influence and manipulate the American public in the way which they desire, it is clear that the liberal news broadcasts and newspapers alike will stop at nothing to shape this perfect image of the political candidate of the Democratic Party by managing the information available through the media.
When discussing political news casters of major political networks, Donald L. Jordan came to the conclusion that “actors or news sources do indeed have differential impacts on public opinion and that in both newspaper items and television broadcasts experts