Where Can You Find Free Unbiased News Sources?

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Ryan_m_b said:
I'm confused as to why you would avoid AlJezeera (IMO a great news source and one of the few not to give a standard western perspective) because it might have bias but still watch FoxNews...

i watch Fox News for the bigoted hillbilly redneck reaction to the news. CNN is no better to be honest. i mean in reality there's no such thing as "journalism" its all propaganda. But when it comes to the Syria crisis AlJazeera really is one-sided in their reporting cause they are backing the terrorist Al-qaida rebels, so i would stay clear for real news from them.
 
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ZeroPivot said:
i watch Fox News for the bigoted hillbilly redneck reaction to the news. CNN is no better to be honest. i mean in reality there's no such thing as "journalism" its all propaganda. But when it comes to the Syria crisis AlJazeera really is one-sided in their reporting cause they are backing the terrorist Al-qaida rebels, so i would stay clear for real news from them.

I won't let this thread become a Syria thread (we have some going already in Current Events), but I've never seen a slant towards terrorism in Al-Jazeera and I've read them for quite a while now. I equate them with BBC as far as quality of reporting, but of course their point of view is a ME one. I think it's good to know what that view is, even if you don't agree with it.
 
You can't remove bias from news reporting. (I prefer "slant" - "bias" implies inappropriate behavior). News outlets can't cover everything, and they certainly can't cover everything in the same depth. So they have to pick and choose.

Tuesday the local NPR affiliate preempted the end of the President's news conference to run a story on the Nobel prizes. Was this right-wing bias? They didn't cover the Speaker's news conference at all. Was this left-wing bias?

There are only 24 hours in a day, and there's more news than fits there. So they pick and choose. Give us their perspective - or slant - on what's important.
 
I like Google's news aggregator.

(Actually, I just believe anything anyone posts in [STRIKE]P&WA[/STRIKE]Current Events...)
 
Vanadium 50 said:
You can't remove bias from news reporting. (I prefer "slant" - "bias" implies inappropriate behavior). News outlets can't cover everything, and they certainly can't cover everything in the same depth. So they have to pick and choose.

Tuesday the local NPR affiliate preempted the end of the President's news conference to run a story on the Nobel prizes. Was this right-wing bias? They didn't cover the Speaker's news conference at all. Was this left-wing bias?

There are only 24 hours in a day, and there's more news than fits there. So they pick and choose. Give us their perspective - or slant - on what's important.

I think this point is often missed. The very moment a pen meets paper - or a finger meets keyboard - the slant is evident: the writer believed it deserved to be reported. When nothing is written, that too is a slant: the writer found it unimportant.
 
jhae2.718 said:
I like Google's news aggregator.

(Actually, I just believe anything anyone posts in [STRIKE]P&WA[/STRIKE]Current Events...)

I haven't tried that, I'll give it a try.
 
lisab said:
I haven't tried that, I'll give it a try.

Hopefully the former and not the latter! :biggrin:
 
scientific american
science daily
new scientist
nature
phys.org
 
I use the CBC, take advantage of the ten free articles per month on the New York Times' website, and check SciAm every now and then. That's really all I need.
 
lisab said:
I won't let this thread become a Syria thread (we have some going already in Current Events), but I've never seen a slant towards terrorism in Al-Jazeera and I've read them for quite a while now. I equate them with BBC as far as quality of reporting, but of course their point of view is a ME one. I think it's good to know what that view is, even if you don't agree with it.

the brainwashing has worked.
 
ZeroPivot said:
the brainwashing has worked.

Can you point to any specific examples where al jazzera has expressed support for al Qaeda?
 
ZeroPivot said:
the brainwashing has worked.

Or, possibly, you have some reason to be biased yourself and see bias where none exists.
 
phinds said:
Or, possibly, you have some reason to be biased yourself and see bias where none exists.
Again: bias exists everywhere. That attitude only makes you more likely to miss it.

While I can't comment on recent evolution of the network, the past anti-US/ anti-semetic bias is pretty widely discussed: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Jazeera_controversies_and_criticism

But in its way, it is actually ok: one of the reasons someone might choose to talk to a certain media outlet is because they like their bias. That would explain why terrorist manifestos often get submitted to all Jazeera first.

It is much better to seek out different biases then to fool yourself that the mythical bias-free source exists.
 
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There's a spectrum of bias. The minimal bias is to present facts, but you still express bias in the set of facts you choose to present, the order you present them, and the language you use.

But at the other end is dishonest bias, where loosely-associated facts are presented to imply meaning that's not there. Or opinion is passed as fact.

I don't check the news every day. If I hear about something interesting, I check a couple sources, but I also like to look at the comments and discussion on sites like PF/reddit because individuals tend to be more critical, and sometimes provide fact-checking sources.
 
lisab said:
I think this point is often missed. The very moment a pen meets paper - or a finger meets keyboard - the slant is evident: the writer believed it deserved to be reported. When nothing is written, that too is a slant: the writer found it unimportant.
That's probably the main reason I check Fox News: they report on different stories than the others and I want to see what I might be missing.