essay: looking at media
Critically assess and evaluate a media piece
The media is our portal to the world. Before the internet become popular, the media was, in fact, the only portal to the world. All news reports and opinion pieces could only be distributed by the media. Back then, using Gillmor’s metaphor of information as an ocean (Gillmor 2004), big media companies were truly the only ports where one could access the oceans. With prevalence of the internet, the recipients of information have also become the contributors. The oceans have flooded the ports, and now almost everyone can reach out to the ocean if they cared. However, the entrenched notion that traditional media companies are correct and authoritative in their reporting has remained with us to this day. This is extremely dangerous because, as our readings have shown, the advertisements and big corporations have power like never before to influence, or filter, what gets published and what doesn’t. Most of us have failed to critically think about what the news tell us, sometimes unconsciously, and how our opinions are altered. We usually do not have enough time to research into every piece of news and make an informed decision. One particularly interesting scientific study has shown that even the subtle facial expressions of a news reporter on television can influence people’s votes on presidential candidates in the United States, regardless of how neutral the news report was (Mullen 1986). The written word, such as using “loot” instead of “find”, probably has an even larger effect than facial expressions.
To investigate, I chose the news topic of Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. Objectively, this should be a relatively neutral piece of news; there’s no denying that Al Gore has made a huge impact with his documentary “An Inconvenient Truth”, whether one agrees that global warming is man-made or not. Also, past Nobel Peace Prize winners, including a nuclear energy developer, generally did not receive much attention, therefore, I would expect the same with Al Gore. However, I was very wrong: a random sampling of the news that came out on the day the prize was announced shows that there were reports on all ends of the spectrum, from relatively neutral to extreme bias. I chose two articles: a neutral one from the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) and a right-leaning one from The Economist. It is to be noted that all both sources have high circulation rates, and have a wide influence over a large audience. In particular, The Economist is read by many powerful international CEOs and policy makers (Wikipedia: The Economist).
The first piece is from the BBC, titled “Gore and UN panel win Nobel prize.” Using the Framework for Critical Evaluation of Information, first I evaluate the source. The reporter that wrote this piece seems to have balanced, normal senses and was logically sound for interpreting the news. From the grammatically correct writing and cohesive content, the reporter should have been free from substances that affect perception. BBC itself is a reputable source, known for its relatively unbiased reporting and fair representation of various view points, although this does not necessarily mean that this particular report is also reputable. The BBC is owned by the British Broadcasting Company, in which General Motors, AT&T Bell Telephone, and various other companies have vested interest (Wikipedia: The British Broadcasting Company). These companies would probably, generally, favour a more right-winged approach to economics and politics, as “Manufacturing Consent” suggested. However, whether these commercial influences had an effect on this article is not clear since, consciously, none can be seen. The Nobel Prize committee, that provided the source, consults many experts in the respective fields of the prizes before voting on a winner, thus should be considered as a respected and authoritative decision to award the prize to Al Gore and the IPCC. The statements quoted by the article are consistent with other reports by various media outlets.
The statements are free from internal contradictions and logical errors, as far as I can tell. The goal of the piece seems to be to report rather than persuade. Unlike most other news sources, the BBC provides an approximately equal presentation between Al Gore and the IPCC’s response. It does not dwell on the presidential campaign between Gore and Bush a few years earlier and provides most of the details about the responses from different parties without leaning towards any side.
However, a few details do catch my eye: one, a box with a comment from an unhappy reader that says, “The liberals and the PC crowd now have their delusion raised to Nobel status” is placed right next to the IPCC statement that hoped “the award would bring a ‘greater awareness and a sense of urgency’ to the fight against global warming.” If this was done on purpose, then it is a tactful way to represent the different views on global warming, albeit some might argue that global warming is a fact as concrete as the world is round. Secondly, this report chose to write about a statement that none of the other news reports I researched wrote about. It cited a Whitehouse spokesperson saying, “the president was not about to change his more sceptical stance on global warming to a more ‘Gore-style’ approach.” This seems to polarize the views on global warming into just the view of the current administration and the view Gore is promoting. Where, in fact, global warming should be a scientific consensus by scientists based on data and theory, not one a political debate. The report contains two neutral pictures of the IPCC chairman and Al Gore. Since any argument for or against global warming is cited in quotes, no judgements or beliefs of the reporter is presented in the article.
I am biased for statements that confirm anthropogenic global warming since I have researched and made an informed decision based on rational scientific knowledge. Thus, I am most likely to lean towards any report that agrees with my views. However, since I am open to new sources of evidence that counter my view, I should not be extremely biased in my interpretation of the reports.
On the other hand, comparing the BBC piece with the following article printed in The Economist, one finds restrained, but clearly present, bias. The article is titled “Peace man: Al Gore and the IPPC win it,” note how IPCC is spelt wrongly. It starts off by saying that the Nobel Peace Prize has a tradition of awarding “bizarre choice[s],” including “Wangari Maathai, a Kenyan woman who plants trees,” with the exception of “the International Atomic Energy Agency.” There is an obvious bias against environmentalists and support for technological or economical solutions to world problems.
The article chooses to talk about the uncertainties of the IPCC report, instead of talking about both the accuracies and uncertainties. Also, the report mentions that some skeptics claim the IPCC is alarmist, but fails to note how small a portion these skeptics are in the scientific community. It fairly mentions that “An Inconvenient Truth” won two Oscars, but has to put in brackets that one is for a music award, but does not mention the award for best documentary. It also makes the claim that Gore’s “film is propaganda rather than documentary,” because a British judge ruled that there were 9 inaccuracies, not bothering to mention that many scientists have already researched into those inaccuracies and showed that they do not disprove the theory of anthropogenic global warming.
The tone of the article and the words chosen also reflect a biased ridicule. For example, suggesting that the Nobel Peace Prize be renamed as “the Nobel Prize for Making the World a Better Place in Some Unspecified Way,” as if all the laureates had done nothing to promote peace at all levels. Stating that after the 2000 elections, “Mr Gore refused to disappear into the political wilderness,” and that “he prowled the country in the guise of an Old Testament prophet with audio-visual aids, warning of the dangers of climate change,” as if Gore is some backwards, attention-seeking politician that bases his claims on pure prophecy, not concrete science.
Why are these two articles so different? Both are backed by multinational companies that would benefit from conservative governing; both get their news from the same source, the Norwegian Nobel Committee; and both gain revenue by advertising. I think the reasons are twofold: firstly, The Economist is an advocacy journal (although it claims to be a newspaper) and the BBC is a regular newspaper. Secondly, The Economist is targeted at “the high-end “prestige” segment of the market and counts among its audience influential business and government decision-makers (Wikipedia citing The Economist website),” while the BBC targets a general, international audience. The Economist exists to promote free market values to society, and in the article analyzed, it can only do so by downplaying the significance of global warming’s dangers and Gore’s award. Unlike in the scientific community, global warming is probably viewed as alarmist or “controversial” in economical and political sectors, and the article has to cater to those beliefs in order to attract readers. The BBC, on the other hand, strives to provide neutral reports, not opinion pieces. Although there are traces of biased report as mentioned before, most of the article provides a balance representation of all sides of the argument. Thus, I would conclude that in this case, audience provides a much stronger incentive for reports to become biased, rather than the background of the company itself.
References:
The Economist article: http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9968899
The BBC article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7041082.stm
Mullen, Brian et al., “Newscasters’ facial expressions and voting behavior of viewer: Can a smile elect a president?” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (1986), vol. 51, pp. 291-295.
Gillmor, D. (2004). “The gates come down.” and “The former audience joins the party.” In D. Gillmor, We the Media. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly. (pp. 44-65; 136-157).
Other articles I compared to: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A07EFDC1430F930A25753C1A9619C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=46d1e620-cb1f-4c58-841f-c2acfc7e2023&p=2
This one is an especially interesting report that my friend described as “the bias is so thick you can’t even cut it with a knife.”
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/10/12/nobel.gore/index.html?iref=newssearch
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