Trust is a fickle vote of confidence that can never be casually granted to anyone. Full trust is usually only reserved for the closest of relationships. Organizations and corporations should never be granted our trust. Especially in a capitalist society such as ours, it is a no brainer that business exists to make a profit.
On an individual level, every time we listen to someone speak, or read the words they have written, or see an action carried out, these are all biased communications that reflect the attitude, opinion, prejudices, and world-view of that person. Our willingness to trust that person is largely based on our ideological similarities, or at least what we perceive those similarities to be. This can be a faulty barometer of integrity as we have seen multiple times within the celebrity spotlight (most recently John Edwards), and every now and then within closer community or family circles (Val Southwick).
On a business level, these communications are formulated and carried out for one reason, accumulating profit. This is to be expected and does not need to be a negative aspect in our society. But it is that fact alone that should cause hesitation in our choice of whether or not to accept what we hear or read. The information is tainted with corporate need (yes, need, not greed). A business is extinct without revenue, and just like a living organism, it will do anything to survive. When faced with the choice of death with integrity intact versus survival with no integrity, a corporation will always choose the latter. This is because it is not a personal choice. Personal integrity plays little or no role in business decision making. The actions of the organization are directed by the compass of survival only. The businesses that break this rule, do not stay in business, and therefore, do not exist.
Our news organizations are owned by corporations that control the information that is fed to us. We all are already aware of this. I'm not raining down an earth-shaking discovery here. But sometimes it is good to stop and remind ourselves of this. Becoming complacent with a news source can be dangerous. Becoming loyal to any news organization is downright foolish. Once a target audience is identified, they will more often tell you what you want to hear as opposed to telling you the actual truth. This maintains the cash flow. It's just good business sense. Don't rock the boat, and tell them what they want to hear, whatever makes them feel good inside, and keep the cash flow coming.
I think everyone will freely admit that FOX News has a right-wing slant and other networks such as MSNBC are left-leaning. This rant of mine was triggered by this claim from MSNBC that they had proof of right-wing bias from FOX News directly from the Bush administration. As always, there is more to a story than what they choose to say on the air, and FOX News, more specifically Bill O'Rielly, had its chance to refute the claims. These two videos show how ridiculously slanted all networks are and that no one news organization will ever give full disclosure to any political story. They play to their audience.
Everyone has an agenda. An interesting website, freepress.net, documents the media ownership in America. (Hmmm, I wonder what their agenda is?)
Who Owns the Media?
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Everyone has a biased agenda...everyone.
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1 comments:
Interesting post. Interesting video clips. I actually used to like Keith Olbermann when he was on ESPN. He was a little more objective then. He just tries too hard -- saying Bush is more murderous than Hitler (not in the clip you posted obviously...)
Let's distinguish between a journalist and a commentator. People like Rush, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage etc are commentators, NOT journalists... and they don't pretend to be journalists, who are supposed to be objective. On the other hand, "journalists" like Dan Rather, Katie Couric, Brian Williams, Tom Brokaw, and all the MSNBC and CNN people.... they ARE journalists.... they claim to be such.... but are just as open as Rush and Hannity in their bias.
Once again, we all know that Rush and Hannity are conservative.. they don't try to pass themselves off as objective journalists--- they are not employed as such.
If the aforementioned obviously liberal journalists want to be able to freely speak about this as a job, then they need a new job. THey can start up their own liberal talk radio (already tried -- Air America -- a miserable failure and only still around becasue extrememly wealthy liberals are funneling money into it, KNOWING that they'll never see a return on their investment) The general public doens't like it enough for it to survive. But that's where these liberal "jounalists" belong.
Yes, everyone has an agenda or an opinion and is anyone truly objective? Of course not we all have our own viewpoints and opinions. But if I'm a journalists I should keep my opinon to myself as I report the news objectively and if I can't handle that, then I can become a radio talk show host or something.
Anyway, the thing that I find interesting is that for years and years there was no outlet in the media for conservatives. When talk radio came along the the fairness doctrine was done away with, it flourished. All by itself in a free market. It's a cash cow becasue people want to hear it... they identify with it... there is no one else out there who reflects what they believe in... so it works.
And then Fox news came along and they slant right. So I don't know why the liberals in Congress are so worried. Conservatives have one network and the bulk of talk radio. Liberals have everything else. There's hardly a shortage of ways for liberals to say anything they want about conservatives but for some reason Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and others are bound and determined to bring back the fairness doctrine because they know that that would be the end of talk radio and they would love that.... no one out there to say anything that they don't agree with. I thought the Democrats were all about freedom of speech and freedom of the press. But I guress that's only if it has to do with pushing an agenda of homosexuality, gay marriage, legalizing drug use, taxing the middle class (whom they refer to as rich), taxing corporations (there's no such thing as corporations paying taxes... they just pass it on by raising their prices and we pay the corporate taxes) etc etc etc.
Yes, I know both sides in the media operate with similar questionable tactics. I am not myopic enough to miss that.
However, I do believe that one doesn not have to abandon strong beliefs or opionions in order to be objective about an issue.
Ok my rant is over.
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