News Liberal Media Attempting to Understand Conservatives

[russ_watters]

This is an interesting/entertaining op-ed about how the media attempts to deal with its bias. The tone of the writing of this op-ed is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but what is interesting is how frankly the bias is acknowledged by the NYT in their comment on their attempts to deal with it:

In 2004, the Times assigned a reporter to cover conservatives full-time in order to better inform their readers and staff how the conservative movement works.

"We wanted to understand them," explained editor Bill Keller. The Times' ombudsman later observed that the "decision not to create a liberal beat, it seems to me, reflected the reality that the Times' coverage of liberals had no gaps similar to those in its reporting on the conservative movement." Translation: The Times is staffed almost entirely by liberals and their news judgment flows directly from that fact.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2010-07-06-column06_ST_N.htm

They treated it as trivially self-evident: they don't need someone to cover a 'liberal beat' because they are already covering it as their primary focus.

Apparently, having someone assigned to cover the "conservative beat" is not unusual, as the main subject of the article is a "conservative beat" reporter for another paper who was relieved of his post due to inflammatory anti-conservative comments. Sounds like the "conservative beat" isn't a post reporters take to with much enthusiasm.

And the discrepancy sometimes comes through in the reporting:

Many mainstream news outlets have been caught flat-footed on some major stories in recent years precisely because of this attitude.

For instance, Van Jones, the White House "green jobs czar," was brought down by controversies that went ignored by most leading news outlets but were widely covered by (the hugely successful) Fox News and the thriving conservative press. It seems at times that if conservatives consider something big news, the editors at such places as the Times and the Post must first conduct an anthropological analysis: Why are these right-wing natives so upset?

A responsible reporter must also examine the corollary of such an issue: why aren't 'left-wing natives upset'? That's key to understanding why they missed the story in the first place and for trying to prevent it from happening in the future. The answer is obvious, but probably not comfortable for a liberal press outlet to think about: they missed the story because they are so biased that left-wing crackpottery by a democratic politician didn't raise a red flag for them. Uncomfortable or not, it is something they must think about if they are sincere in their effort to provide balanced coverage. Having someone on the "conservative beat" only gets them halfway.

 

[Cyrus]

Liberal Bias: Olberman and Matthews.

I rest my case.

 

[DavidSnider]

Most 'conservative beat' stories are crackpot non-sense: FEMA Camps, The 'War on Christmas', government taking your guns, affirmative action taking your job, welfare queens wasting your taxes, gays making the military ineffective, religious apologetics.

There is soooo much right wing crack pottery that the few liberal examples they find get lost in the mix.

 

[Gokul43201]

Liberal Bias: Olberman and Matthews.

I rest my case.

What case is that? It's not very obvious what your point is or how it relates to the OP.

 

[Cyrus]

What case is that? It's not very obvious what your point is or how it relates to the OP.

Re-2IB6llYw[/youtube] :biggrin: Listen to Matthews argument.

 

[Gokul43201]

I listened to it. And it's rubbish (IMO). But I still fail to see the exact point you are making. However, in the interest of not deviating any further from the case made in the OP, I'd rather leave things as they stand than probe any further.

 

[Cyrus]

See Russ' citation:

It seems at times that if conservatives consider something big news, the editors at such places as the Times and the Post must first conduct an anthropological analysis: Why are these right-wing natives so upset?

and then watch Matthews argument. Does he do that? No. He starts talking about the costs of war with Iraq. His bias is to the point of obnoxious!

Scarborough is 'that guy' in the article.

 

[russ_watters]

Most 'conservative beat' stories are crackpot non-sense: FEMA Camps, The 'War on Christmas', government taking your guns, affirmative action taking your job, welfare queens wasting your taxes, gays making the military ineffective, religious apologetics.

There is soooo much right wing crack pottery that the few liberal examples they find get lost in the mix.

Perhaps you have that backwards: if the conservative beat reporters see their job as being to look for conservative crackpottery and highlight it (rather than to even-handedly report and analyze conservative positions), while the rest of the reporters ignore liberal crackpottery (example given above), it makes it look like there is a lot more conservative than liberal crackpottery.

The media is so liberal it treats crackpot liberal positions/stories as if they are mainstream.

 

[Jack21222]

The media is so liberal it treats crackpot liberal positions/stories as if they are mainstream.

Can you give an example of a "crackpot liberal position" that's taken as mainstream? Examples have already been provided of crackpot conservative positions being taken as mainstream by Fox.

 

[arildno]

Can you give an example of a "crackpot liberal position" that's taken as mainstream? Examples have already been provided of crackpot conservative positions being taken as mainstream by Fox.

Well, what about speculations that a certain Times Square would-be-bomber became so out of desperation that he couldn't pay his mortgage?

What sort of media outlets emitted this type of story?

Hm?
A few tips:
Cnn:
Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/04/faisal-shahzad-house-in-f_n_562562.html
Ezra Klein, Washington Post:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/05/the_economic_crisis_meets_terr.html
New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/06/nyregion/06profile.html?_r=1
The Economist:
http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/05/times_square_bomber

 

[Gokul43201]

Well, what about speculations that a certain Times Square would-be-bomber became so out of desperation that he couldn't pay his mortgage?

What sort of media outlets emitted this type of story?

So even if there was a huge financial upheaval in someone's life around the same time period as a radicalization you would prefer that news media outlets pay no attention to any possible connections? And "couldn't pay his mortgage" is a bit of an understatement of a situation where someone (with a new wife and a new baby) lost their home to a foreclosure.

In any case, is the foreclosure induced desperation theory the only one proposed by this liberal media, or one of many that they explored? This is not rhetorical - I really have not followed this closely enough to know the details. Also, are you saying that any suggestion of a possible causal relationship between huge financial troubles and a co-incident radicalization is crackpottery?

 

[arildno]

Also, are you saying that any suggestion of a possible causal relationship between huge financial troubles and a co-incident radicalization is crackpottery?

Depends on the direction of the causation arrow.
That radicalization, and the willingness not to care about the lives of others might well de-motivate a person from acting in such a manner that he will gain money in a lawful manner, is of course, not crackpottery at all.
Why should he any longer care about how other people gain comfort in their lives when he is enthused about the thought of..killing them?

Since it has clerly been shown that his radicalization started a lot earlier than his getting a foreclosure, this is the probable connection, if any, between his finances and his mental outlook.

 

[Gokul43201]

Since it has clerly been shown that his radicalization started a lot earlier than his getting a foreclosure, this is the probable connection, if any, between his finances and his mental outlook.

I am not aware of the details, but I was under the impression that the radicalization happened over the last year or two - which would be after the beginning of the collapse of the housing bubble (as well as the start of the recession back in 2008) in the US.

 

[arildno]

I am not aware of the details, but I was under the impression that the radicalization happened over the last year or two - which would be after the beginning of the collapse of the housing bubble (as well as the start of the recession back in 2008) in the US.

Give a credible psychological mechanism for why foreclosure of your house would spiral you into planning methodically the murder of hundreds of innocents at Times Square.

If you can't point to such a mechanism, you may as well dismiss this cherished brainchild of the libleft as what it is: A fantasy.

 

[russ_watters]

Can you give an example of a "crackpot liberal position" that's taken as mainstream? Examples have already been provided of crackpot cOnservative positions being taken as mainstream by Fox.

As i said: the Van Jones story cited above and doscussed in the article.

 

[Evo]

Give a credible psychological mechanism for why foreclosure of your house would spiral you into planning methodically the murder of hundreds of innocents at Times Square.

I've got to agree with you here, a person running into ongoing problems with mortgage payments due to any reason should start preparing to move into a cheaper rental property if it doesn't look like they can sell. Anyone being foreclosed on has had plenty of advanced notice. (unless you're that women that came home from work to find that the bank accidently gave her address to the foreclosure company they hired and they had trashed her house, taken her pet, and put a lock box on the doors).

But this is dragging the thread off topic.

 

[russ_watters]

Note that in the fort Hood case, the media also looked for and generated stories on similar non-Islamic extremist motivation. Also, that's different from reporting on (or not) someone else's crackpottery, but rather is a case of the media generating it themselves and reporting it as if it is a real story. Even if in this case "crackpottery" is too strong of a word, it is still wrong to do it.

 

[arildno]

Note that in the fort Hood case, the media also looked for and generated stories on similar non-Islamic extremist motivation. Also, that's different from reporting on (or not) someone else's crackpottery, but rather is a case of the media generating it themselves and reporting it as if it is a real story. Even if in this case "crackpottery" is too strong of a word, it is still wrong to do it.

It is called violation of the principle of Occam's Razor.
We already have an motival explanation that works fine for BOTH occasions, therefore, that explanation should be favoured rather than inventing disparate "explanations" for both of them.

 

[Jack21222]

As i said: the Van Jones story cited above and doscussed in the article.

You've given one example, and in my opinion, it's a fairly shaky example. Compare this to "climategate," the children singing an Obama song, and the "War on Christmas" and you'll see it isn't even close.

Fox is a nonstop parade of conservative crackpottery, while the "mainstream media" might occasionally miss an opportunity to be critical of the left. Like I said, it isn't even close.

 

[russ_watters]

You've given one example, and in my opinion, it's a fairly shaky example.

You're saying you don't think Van Jones is a crackpot? Do you not consider the 9/11 conspiracy theory movement to be crackpottery? The Free Mumia movement? STORM?

Compare this to "climategate," the children singing an Obama song, and the "War on Christmas" and you'll see it isn't even close.

Odd choices. You're claiming climategate is a conservative media generated conspiracy theory? And I'm not seeing any connection between the "war on christmas" and conservative media. And the chrismas song? Are you talking about the GOP official who distributed a "Barack the Magic Negro" song? Are you claiming that was a conservative media generated piece of crackpottery? Or a story that was missed or misreported by conservative media? Very odd choices indeed that seemingly reflect the type of bias I'm talking about.

Fox is a nonstop parade of conservative crackpottery, while the "mainstream media" might occasionally miss an opportunity to be critical of the left. Like I said, it isn't even close.

Based on your odd choices above, it doesn't surprise me that you feel that way.

In any case, I'm not arguing that Fox isn't conservatively biased, so it isn't all that useful to make that argument. I agree that they are! But even if the liberal bias by the rest of the media isn't as strong (and on average, it isn't), the fact that it is so widespread makes it just as big if not a bigger problem.

 

[CAC1001]

You've given one example, and in my opinion, it's a fairly shaky example. Compare this to "climategate," the children singing an Obama song,

I think the children with the Obama song was just to point out that something like that probably never would have happened with George W. Bush; also I would imagine the Left going wild if there were any videos that surfaced during the Bush administration of children singing songs dedicated to him.

[strike]Fox[/strike] Glenn Beck is a nonstop parade of conservative crackpottery, while the "mainstream media" might occasionally miss an opportunity to be critical of the left. Like I said, it isn't even close.

Fixed.

 

[Vanadium 50]

So even if there was a huge financial upheaval in someone's life around the same time period as a radicalization you would prefer that news media outlets pay no attention to any possible connections?

I would have preferred that the media got the story right, particularly with respect to cause and effect. The reason Shahzad was being foreclosed was because he stopped paying his mortgage when he was in Pakistan studying bomb-making.

 

[madness]

What evidence do you have that the media has a liberal bias? According to this video (I know some of you don't view Noam Chomsky as an acceptable source) the studies show the media has a right-wing bias.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYlyb1Bx9Ic

 

[arildno]

And the only actual FACTS presented was that above 80% of the journalists vote Democrats.

A lot of other brouha-ha, for example Noam Chomsky's fantasy that journalists are so terrified of hunger that they write down, in minutest detail, the decretals their owners give them, and present it as..news.

If any of them were right, it wouldn't have been difficult to give a single, specific case of this.

 

[mheslep]

I would have preferred that the media got the story right, particularly with respect to cause and effect. The reason Shahzad was being foreclosed was because he stopped paying his mortgage when he was in Pakistan studying bomb-making.

That's exactly http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2010/05/faisal_shahzad_violent_fanatic.html":

As recently as Feb. 2009, [Shahzad] was not “underwater” -- as can be deduced from the fact that in this month Wachovia extended Shahzad a $65,000 line of credit secured by the equity in his home.[...]

Two months later, on April 17, 2009, Shahzad became a U.S. citizen -- and within a matter of days he had left his job and stopped paying his mortgage. Note that, unlike so many others in the U.S., he was not fired or downsized in the recession, but voluntarily quit his job and, on June 2, 2009, moved back to Pakistan, where would later begin explosives training.

It was not until three months later, in Sept. 2009, that Chase Home Finance filed for foreclosure in state court.

In addition it is known that Shahzad comes from a wealthy family (as did many of the 911 pilot-hijackers), and bought a $205K car in 2004.

So even if there was a huge financial upheaval in someone's life around the same time period as a radicalization you would prefer that news media outlets pay no attention to any possible connections? And "couldn't pay his mortgage" is a bit of an understatement of a situation where someone (with a new wife and a new baby) lost their home to a foreclosure.

In any case, is the foreclosure induced desperation theory the only one proposed by this liberal media, or one of many that they explored? ...

In some of the links that Adrino provided above (not all IMO) the theme is that financial difficulties are the leading go-to, often with radical Islam completely ignored (Ezra Klein's piece in particular). Those stories do not read as if financial difficulties are one of the "possible connections" under consideration that the news organization hasn't bothered to run down yet. In those cases I'd say that yes the author is guilty of either crack-pottery (they know about radicalism but reject it without examination), or b) severe epistemological closure (they're blinded to radicalism via obsession with some other world view).

 

[madness]

And the only actual FACTS presented was that above 80% of the journalists vote Democrats.

A lot of other brouha-ha, for example Noam Chomsky's fantasy that journalists are so terrified of hunger that they write down, in minutest detail, the decretals their owners give them, and present it as..news.

If any of them were right, it wouldn't have been difficult to give a single, specific case of this.

They didn't give evidence in that video, but entire books have been written on the Propaganda Model. The main assertion in the video was that the idea of a liberal bias is unfounded and without factual evidence. My question is whether you can provide sources which show that such a bias exists.

 

[arildno]

Russ have given one case, I've given another.

 

[madness]

Russ have given one case, I've given another.

I mean studies which show a general and overall leaning towards liberal viewpoints in the media.

 

[mheslep]

What evidence do you have that the media has a liberal bias? According to this video (I know some of you don't view Noam Chomsky as an acceptable source) the studies show the media has a right-wing bias.

I'm fine with someone throwing a Chomsky clip up, we can all take or leave his views as we like (I leave them these days); however, I object to following it with 'studies show' without bothering to identify said studies, much less referencing them. In addition, Chomsky does not say in the clip that the media has 'right wing' bias; instead he said it is controlled by the owners.

 

[arildno]

I mean studies which show a general and overall leaning towards liberal viewpoints in the media.

Listen:

For any bigoted extremist, even a moderate belongs to the other wing.

That is what sort of man Chomsky is, still whining about why most Americans regard him as a nutjob, not the least for his systematic romances with monsters like Pol Pot.

 

[madness]

I'm fine with someone throwing a Chomsky clip up, we can all take or leave his views as we like (I leave them these days); I strongly object to you following it with 'studies show' without bothering to even identify said studies, much less reference them.

You're mis(leadingly)quoting me here - I said "according to this video the studies show". I don't know which studies they refer to, but then no one here has provided any studies to back up the idea of a liberal bias which seems to underly this thread.

 

[madness]

Listen:

For any bigoted extremist, even a moderate belongs to the other wing.

That is what sort of man Chomsky is, still whining about why most Americans regard him as a nutjob, not the least for his systematic romances with monsters like Pol Pot.

So you get angry when I ask you to provide evidence for the assertions made in this thread and resort to personal attacks on Noam Chomsky? Whether Noam Chomsky is an evil nutjob dictator loving communist has no relevance here.

 

[arildno]

So you get angry when I ask you to provide evidence for the assertions made in this thread

Of course.
Because we have already provided you with evidence of a BETTER quality than the mumbo-jumbo of Chomskyites.

That is why your request is inapposite, and why it is perfectly rational to get a teensy bit angry.

At the moment, you are the one who is morally obliged to say you are sorry for having presented nonsensical material here (that video), demanding that we somehow should defeat it.

We already have, by that evidence we have provided.

 

[mheslep]

I mean studies which show a general and overall leaning towards liberal viewpoints in the media.

Not a study, but plenty of evidence:
https://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=2365453&postcount=11"

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/rich-noyes/2008/11/02/democrats-most-reliable-constituents-press"

In their 1986 book, The Media Elite, political scientists S. Robert Lichter, Stanley Rothman and Linda S. Lichter reported the results of their survey of 240 journalists at the nation’s top media outlets: ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report. When asked about their voting patterns, journalists admitted their preference for Democrats:

Of those who say they voted for major party candidates, the proportion of leading journalists who supported the Democratic candidate never drops below 80 percent.

(http://books.google.com/books?id=aU...ower Brokers&pg=PA28#v=onepage&q=80%&f=false")
Chomsky's assertion that this means nothing is ridiculous.

 

[Jack21222]

You're claiming climategate is a conservative media generated conspiracy theory?

I'm saying it's a non-story, but conservative media us pumping it up as a real issue.

And I'm not seeing any connection between the "war on christmas" and conservative media.

Turn on Fox in late November through December.

And the chrismas song? Are you talking about the GOP official who distributed a "Barack the Magic Negro" song?

I didn't say Christmas song, I said "Obama song." There was a story trumpeted by Fox about a school chorus singing a song about Barack Obama, where Fox was attempting to manufacture outrage. This example was used by The Daily Show to show the connection between Fox's editorial division and its news division. It gets pumped by the opinion people, then it is reported by their news division saying that "some people" are outraged. Yeah, it was the people in the next room. Then, the rest of the opinion brigade jumps on the Fox news story.

In any case, I'm not arguing that Fox isn't conservatively biased, so it isn't all that useful to make that argument. I agree that they are!

This was all in response to DavidSnider's comment "There is soooo much right wing crack pottery that the few liberal examples they find get lost in the mix. " To which you responded "...it makes it look like there is a lot more conservative than liberal crackpottery...
The media is so liberal it treats crackpot liberal positions/stories as if they are mainstream. "

My argument is that there IS a lot more conservative crackpottery on Fox news than in all of the "liberal" mainstream media combined.

Maybe my liberal bias is showing, but a lot of what conservative crackpots might consider liberal crackpottery IS mainstream. It's not just a matter of the media treating it as if it is mainstream. It actually is mainstream. I

'll give you an example. In what I consider mainstream society, acceptance of gay people is mainstream. To some people, acceptance of gay people is liberal crackpottery. When a newspaper shows a picture of two members of the same sex in a loving embrace, mainstream society goes "aw, isn't that cute," while conservative crackpots go "wharrgarble!"

But even if the liberal bias by the rest of the media isn't as strong (and on average, it isn't), the fact that it is so widespread makes it just as big if not a bigger problem.

This is where we disagree.

 

[madness]

Of course.
Because we have already provided you with evidence of a BETTER quality than the mumbo-jumbo of Chomskyites.

That is why your request is inapposite, and why it is perfectly rational to get a teensy bit angry.

At the moment, you are the one who is morally obliged to say you are sorry for having presented nonsensical material here (that video), demanding that we somehow should defeat it.

We already have, by that evidence we have provided.

I didn't demand that you defeat anything. I simply asked you to back up the assertions that are being made in this thread. The burden of proof is on you for stating that the media has a liberal bias. I haven't made any assertions - I simply found a source that disagrees and asked you to provide evidence.

 

[arildno]

I didn't demand that you defeat anything. I simply asked you to back up the assertions that are being made in this thread. The burden of proof is on you for stating that the media has a liberal bias. I haven't made any assertions - I simply found a source that disagrees and asked you to provide evidence.

WE have provided evidence to the contrary.
That some irrelevant crackpot says something else is not of importance.

 

[arildno]

To take another case:
There was an embarassed silence from the MSM when Anita Dunn hailed chairman Mao as one of her heroes.

The "crackpot" right wing media had termed her a maoist long before she blooped herself, but before that, she was a heroine in the new Obama administration.

Furthermore:
It was only by being dragged screaming out of their silence that the MSM chose to comment upon the heinously racist attitudes of Candidate Obamas longtime friend and mentor, Jeremiah Wright.

 

[madness]

To take another case:
There was an embarassed silence from the MSM when Anita Dunn hailed chairman Mao as one of her heroes.

The "crackpot" right wing media had termed her a maoist long before she blooped herself, but before that, she was a heroine in the new Obama administration.

Listing specific examples isn't enough. We need to see that the media leans systematically towards liberal viewpoints. Surely its possible to find anectodal evidence of the media leaning either way on selected issues?

 

[arildno]

Systems are nothing more than specific examples sewn together.

 

[Galteeth]

In order to ascertain the possibility of bias, you first need a meaningful definition of liberal and conservative. For this discussion, you also need an objective definition of "crackpottery."

 

[shoehorn]

Americans are very peculiar.

 

[ibnsos]

Maybe my liberal bias is showing, but a lot of what conservative crackpots might consider liberal crackpottery IS mainstream. It's not just a matter of the media treating it as if it is mainstream. It actually is mainstream. I

'll give you an example. In what I consider mainstream society, acceptance of gay people is mainstream. To some people, acceptance of gay people is liberal crackpottery. When a newspaper shows a picture of two members of the same sex in a loving embrace, mainstream society goes "aw, isn't that cute," while conservative crackpots go "wharrgarble!"



This is where we disagree.

I would say that's a good example of liberal crackpottery. The implication is that conservatives hate homosexuals, which just isn't true. The push from liberal media against people voting against gay-marriage is directed specifically towards creating such bias against conservatives. Totally ignoring that the majority, including Obama himself, is against it.

How is an idea which has the support of the minority of society in general become the main stream? I don't suppose it could be a result of the majority of the media supporting said idea?

 

[Gokul43201]

Systems are nothing more than specific examples sewn together.

But unless you sew in every different type of example, all you have is a bunch of gaping holes. =D

Does your case get defeated if someone here provides more examples of a lean to the right?

Examples are meaningless when used to support statements of a statistical nature.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

Maybe my liberal bias is showing, but a lot of what conservative crackpots might consider liberal crackpottery IS mainstream. It's not just a matter of the media treating it as if it is mainstream. It actually is mainstream. I

'll give you an example. In what I consider mainstream society, acceptance of gay people is mainstream. To some people, acceptance of gay people is liberal crackpottery. When a newspaper shows a picture of two members of the same sex in a loving embrace, mainstream society goes "aw, isn't that cute," while conservative crackpots go "wharrgarble!"

I would call California a fairly "mainstream" society. CA gave Obama 8.2 million votes compared to only 5 million for McCain. On that same ballot a proposition for a state constitutional ban on gay marriage received 52.47% of the vote. It has been hypothesized that this was due to the heavily anti-gay sentiment among two major demographics in the Democrat's local base, specifically latinos and blacks.

One of my local (Los Angeles) conservative radio shows received a call from a woman who was cheering at the "victory" and the conservative hosts called her a horrible and disgusting person and told her that they would be very happy if she would stop listening to their show.

As already noted Obama has yet to come out in support of gay marriage and Clinton, an icon of the Democratic party, fully supported the "Defense of Marriage Act".

If anything the best we can say is that it remains a contentious issue without clear dividing lines.

 

[Jack21222]

Nowhere in my post did I say anything about gay marriage. I was talking about mere acceptance that gay people exist.

I was referring to this:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ombudsman-blog/2010/03/readers_react_to_photo_of_two.html

If a newspaper had shown a male and a female performing such an innocuous kiss, nobody would have batted an eyebrow. Since it is two males, people went berserk. Some conservatives may say that the Washington Post was promoting liberal "crackpottery" by running the photo. I argue that a photo of a gay couple touching lips is accepted in the mainstream.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

Nowhere in my post did I say anything about gay marriage. I was talking about mere acceptance that gay people exist.

I was referring to this:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ombudsman-blog/2010/03/readers_react_to_photo_of_two.html

If a newspaper had shown a male and a female performing such an innocuous kiss, nobody would have batted an eyebrow. Since it is two males, people went berserk. Some conservatives may say that the Washington Post was promoting liberal "crackpottery" by running the photo. I argue that a photo of a gay couple touching lips is accepted in the mainstream.

I do not think that even the most right wing, cross burning, hood sporting, bigot denies that gay people exist. You say that it is a "mainstream" response to think "aww how cute" when shown a photo of gay people kissing. I am using the issue of gay marriage as a political barometer on the general attitude towards homosexuals. I would imagine that if it were mainstream to see two men kissing as "cute" then there would not be so much hoopla over gay marriage particularly in such a left leaning state as the one I live in.

Society realizes that gay people exist. Society even has decided that arresting, lynching, and just generally abusing people for what they do behind closed doors is not a very civilized way to live. This certainly may mark a "mainstream" tolerance but I think we are still a little ways off from "mainstream" acceptance.

I see nothing in your article to indicate that acceptance is mainstream, nor do I see anything in it that says conservatives accused the Post of pushing "crackpottery".

 

[jgens]

Chomsky's assertion that this means nothing is ridiculous.

Perhaps I misunderstood Chomsky's point (which is entirely plausible), but it seems to me he was arguing that strictly speaking, it isn't evidence that the information put out by the media itself has a liberal bias. Now, it would seem to suggest that the media has a liberal bias, but then a number of other factors also need to be taken into consideration. First, not all people who vote for the Democrats are necessarily liberal (in fact, some people I know who vote Democrat are mostly moderates)*. Next, consider that the journalists don't really have control over what's published; the journalists’ articles need to satisfy the publishers. So if the publishers have a right-wing bias as Chomsky suggests, then this bias is potentially reflected in the journalists’ work (a lot of this would depend upon the specific publisher). Therefore, all-in-all, the media is a lot less liberal than you might think based on the statistics.

This is how I interpreted Chomsky's argument, which (assuming that some of his assertions are correct) seems plausible to me. However, I'll concede that I didn't listen too closely and well could have misunderstood him. But I'll agree with you that the 80% figure does mean something. I just don't think that it means quite as much as it leads people to believe.

*I just wanted to add that a number of people I know who vote Republican are also mostly moderate. I'm not trying to argue that one political party is closer to the center than the other.

 

[ibnsos]

Nowhere in my post did I say anything about gay marriage. I was talking about mere acceptance that gay people exist.

I was referring to this:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ombudsman-blog/2010/03/readers_react_to_photo_of_two.html

If a newspaper had shown a male and a female performing such an innocuous kiss, nobody would have batted an eyebrow. Since it is two males, people went berserk. Some conservatives may say that the Washington Post was promoting liberal "crackpottery" by running the photo. I argue that a photo of a gay couple touching lips is accepted in the mainstream.

After reading the article, I would say it argues against your point. If acceptance was main stream, I wouldn't expect to see such outrage. One could even argue it's a perfect example of journalists activley participating in social engineering (of course that's right wing, racist crackpotery.)

 

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I do not think mainstream society has a response of "Aww, how cute" regarding two people of the same sex together. I'm not saying people think gays are evil or anything like that, but mainstream America is a pretty conservative country, look at what happened when Janet Jackson revealed her breast on TV for a few seconds or so. BIG MISTAKE. Then when there was an issue of some baby magazine, and on the cover they put a picture of a baby sucking a mother's breast. Again, BIG MISTAKE. A picture of two gays, outside of San Francisco or California overall, I think most people would just see it as someone trying to ram homosexuality down their throat, even if they have no problem with them (that's how I would interpret it).

As for media bias, IMO just look at how the mainstream media treated Barack Obama versus Sarah Palin and you pretty much have a basis.

I saw an interesting segment earlier on O'Reilly where he said much of the mainstream media consider Fox News to be veeery far to the right, and as such, see it as their job to be the leftwing counter to what they see as the extreme right-wing Fox News.

Of Fox News itself, I think the hard news aspect is center to center-right, and the infotainers, like Glenn Beck, Hannity, and O'Reilly (the first two in particular!), are very far to the right.