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Why Does Commercial News Suck?
This week, I watched the same piece of information reported on commercial TV and PBS. At 6:30, NBC's Brian Williams went into shocked-and-breathless mode to announce that American life expectancy had hit a whopping 77.9 years. Then at 7:00, I heard Jim Lehrer calmly announce the same fact and put it in context. While this is the highest life expectancy the US has yet achieved, it falls behind 40 other nations. The context changes everything. If you were watching Brian Williams, you'd be popping the champagne corks. If you were watching Jim Lehrer, you'd be contemplating moving to Costa Rica--one of several third world countries with longer life expectancies than the US.
The Brian Williams sound bite--which sounded like a press release from the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell's 1984--would be like Agence France-Presse touting the French economy's 1% growth rate. France's economy has indeed been growing steadily since World War II, but the central issue is why France's growth is so much slower than peer countries like Ireland, Sweden, and the United States. At least in France, for all its problems, they debate the real issues. Here, for lack of information and context, we don't.
Why not? There are a few theories:
1) People love fake news. No, I'm not talking about The Daily Show; I'm talking about FOX. Many Americans want to hear good news, and that's what FOX gives them. Tune in to FOX, and you'll hear, for example, that we're winning in Iraq. And as the older commercial networks try to compete with FOX, which has better ratings, many have slipped into an if-you-can't-beat-'em-join-'em strategy where they try to give people just as much fake news.
2) Self-interested corporate media. This one's a tad conspiratorial for my taste, but here's how it goes. The commercial networks are run by giant corporations which have never been more profitable. They need to keep people feeling either satisfied or powerless so nothing really changes. GE owns NBC. It pays Brian Williams's paycheck. It's also in the healthcare business. I know because I use their dental plan. So if word got out that the US had third world levels of life expectancy while spending far more than even its fellow wealthy countries on healthcare, people might dump the corporate healthcare system that GE's profiting off of (those profit margins are a big reason we pay more than everyone else). So GE's news division's job isn't to keep people informed, but to keep people happy--to "manufacture consent," as Noam Chomsky puts it.
I'm more sympathetic to theory #1 than #2, but I'd love to hear what readers think. And one caveat: pundits love to say it's either A or B--just watch The McLaughlin Group--when, in fact, it can be both. For example, are we in Iraq because of the oil or because of naïve neo-con theories about freedom or because the evangelicals think they're bringing on Armageddon and the Second Coming? I'd say all three. For Cheney, it's about oil; for Bush, it's about Jesus; and for Wolfowitz, it's about neo-conservative ideology. They don't all have to agree on the reasons, they only have to agree on a policy.
So what do you all think?
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If you persist in watching/listening to the corporate media, that's your problem. Whoever mentioned boycott - right on! I haven't paid attention to network or PBS news for years. I don't have cable or dish or disc. I do watch local news primarily for local weather. If they pick up network stuff, I use my remote liberally. I did like Ken Burns Baseball Series, especially the old,old stuff. PBS, even today, does show some good stuff - Bill Moyers, some historical stuff, Mystery. Pacific radio is also very good.
The simple reason that the news is misleading and bland is because the media is drinking from the corporate well. Why would Brian Williams bite the had that feeds him?
Of course all three! The average american prefers entertainment they can vote on, to the hard disturbing realities of global news. Cheney's march to Iraq was to pave the way for oil rights with the blood of unsuspecting american kids signing up, brainwashed into thinking they were defending "our freedom", plus college funding opportunity. Bush??? Bill Maher said it best, "that whoever gets into the oval office next, wont need a pastor, they're gonna need an exorcist." BIG PHARMA was one of the Bush Campaign's biggest supporters, thats why cable news is LOADED with drug ads--Bush admin deregulated so Pharma Corps have carte blanche to sell you dangerous side-effect pills, with only 5 neg side effects required by law. Kudos to UtahLiberal435 - I totally agree with that analysis as well.
Why one theory _or_ the other? It serves power to feed the people happy news. Less 1984, more Clockwork Orange with Alex's dotty parents consuming drivel.
Yes, Fox News most definitely IS FAKE news and that's ALL it is. It's not to be confused with GOOD news. Yeah, according to Fox, we're "winning" the war in Iraq, but anyone with a brain and who actually USES it knows what a crock of B.S. THAT is! Fox's news is fake because it's the "news" according to the Bush Administration, and we all know by now that this abysmal administration lies and tells half-truths as naturally as breathing.
Mr. Brook, I notice you didn't mention Charlie Gibson on ABC, or (GAG!) Katie Couric on CBS, does that mean those two mass-media TV news outlets are OK by your standards? I like Charlie myself; never could stand Couric. When she was over on NBC, I called NBC "(N)othing (B)ut (C)ouric" because it seemed like NBC was all Katie, all the time. Whenever I'd tune in to NBC, there she'd be. As the "Valley Girls" used to say, "Gag me with a spoon!"
I don't for one moment think that for W it is at all about Jesus, or anyone else but himself and his puppetmasters. Perhaps for Bush, it is about ego, but certainly not Jesus. Pandering to the socially ultraconservative Evangelicals for fun and profit is not the same as having an honest, spiritual belief system based on compassion, respect for all others (not just greedy, power mad corporate humanoids who think as he does, if in fact he can be said to think,) or any other noble sentiments. And while much of the populace does seem to like non-news, I do believe that the corporate owners of the media control the content of what we see.
Great post on the sad state of the MSM...
BUT it did make me think of this...
GE is NOT in the healthcare industry. They are in the credit card industry. Their Money Bank is NOT an insurance or healthcare plan -- it's a credit card (granted it is one that can only be used on medical stuff).
If people believe that having a credit card for dental stuff equates into having a "dental plan," (or vet plan, or lasik plan, etc. - GEMB covers these all) this is why we have the healthcare mess we have today.
(I will be the first to thank GE though, as I tapped the MB for a $5000 vet bill.)
Mainstream "news" is a product that sells stuff. "News" is spun to persuade consumers to buy something. Fox, NBC, CBS, ABC, and CNN are peddling (so-called) news, which is really infotainment. The media, once charged with playing a critical role in the maintenence of democracy, has become a corrupted parasite of democracy. The media tell us what they want us to know within a context they manufacture, to sell what they want us to buy. Read all about it.
Wow! There are a lot of tremendous comments here. We're nothing if not knowledgeable about the media, and why they are what they are.
And still it continues. We know it's wrong, and we even know why it's wrong, but nothing changes. I'm not sure a conspiracy is the right way to perceive it, although I believe there are extremely unethical elements that infect the atmosphere. For many, at all levels of the media, I suspect they feel trapped in a system engineered for profit, and would prefer a more high-minded approach just as we do.
Many of the problems we face today, such as Iraq and the erosion of civil liberties, demand immediate action. Other problems, such as the media, probably can't be resolved except over the long term. I think the most important starting point, for this and much else, is to establish full public funding for all elections, and vigorous oversight of all voting operations. Whether you're from the left or the right, I would like us all to get behind an effort to push this to the top of the agenda. If all our candidates are barred from receiving private funds, and we can guarantee fair elections, I believe this country will be a completely different place, and one where the real legitimate disputes between Americans will find open forums and real cooperation between reasonable people.
We have too long allowed a small fraction of our populace to entertain us with a dog and pony show to no one's real advantage but the very rich. The real America is far greater, and of sterner stuff. Liberals and Conservatives, support public funding of all elections now!
I think that just like the "liberal media" canard, continuously denouncing the "conspiracy theorists" does a great disservice to the truth.
Like nobody on this earth would ever get together with his buddy and "conspire" to make himself and his buddies richer. Conspiracies happen every single fricken day and just because the regressive right ridicules people who recognize them doesn't mean they don't exist.
What do you think a Republican Think Tank is besides a conspiracy theory machine!?!?
A bunch of spoiled old rich guys sitting around in their good ole boy's clubs coming up with ways to keep the money & power all to themselves and their buddies! That's all these people do all day, and yet even when the truth comes out (now we KNOW from the source the Iraq war was all about the oil) anyone who speaks these truths is still branded a "conspiracy theorist".
Well, I say I don't believe in conspiracy theories, I believe in conspiracy FACTS (or truths, if you like.)
If it's easy enough for a "conspiracy theorist" to come up with a powermad hairbrained scheme, it's easy enough for a bunch of old guys sitting around to come up with those schemes and attempt to act on them.
Pay attention people!
I'm originally from the UK and one of the first things I noticed upon arriving was the quality (or lack of) of commercial news. It doesn't matter if it's MSNBC, ABC, Fox, CNN - they're all as bad as each other, with the exception of Fox, which takes it to another level - the US version of Russia's "Pravda" - where Pravda was the official voice of Communism, Fox is obviously the voice of the far right.
I could make comparisons between the BBC and US broadcasters, but even commercial news organizations in the UK do just as good a job of reporting the news as the BBC does - namely Channel 4 and ITN. Fox is represented in the UK by Sky News and is just as bad as FNN here, but as a satellite only news company, it's reach is very limited, and with it's competition, it does tend to report actual news from time to time.
Ironically, the Daily Show, although "fake news" actually does a better job of reporting the truth, although satirically, than the major news networks here.
As for the differences, in the UK, news organizations tend to give the viewer the facts, then let the viewer make his or her own mind up on what's going on in the world, here on the other hand all we see and hear are opinions, usually from people not qualified to make judgements, and the viewer is constantly TOLD what to think - assuming the viewer does not have the ability to think for themselves.
On theory #1, YES many people are drawn to the "good news," but if you watch FOX Newspeak for example, you realize that their stories are not all "good." When they are not talking about Iraq (conflated with the war on terror), they have wet-your-pants horror stories about violent poor people, the evil Black men who were arrested after they held up a convenience store for $5, the newest street drug that will turn your princess daughter into a prostitute, and the scariest statistics on STDs/out-of-wedlock births/divorce rates, etc. etc. etc.
So, even when FOX is not reporting on issues that are political, per se, they are perpetuating and reinforcing a conservative world view where bad people are punished and good people are rewarded. There is no context. There is no frustrating journalistic nuance or sophistication. Nothing that even dares to create a moment of cognitive dissonance in the audience. Just more fodder to support our comfortable preconception that the people we see suffering on TV somehow deserve it.
That's the real problem with fake news.
How did we get here? Because somewhere along the lines the media moguls decided that viewership is the same as quality. When we 'let the markets decide,' it often leads to a race to the bottom. It's not a conspiracy, it's the banality of evil. No one person is doing any wrong, but the system, based on market principles and a lack of oversight, is rotting from the inside. When truth and commerce collide, truth comes out with a bloody nose every time.
What I think is that I am sick of the news we are subjected to in this country. I am sick of the spin, the lies, the whole shebang. The real question is what can we do about it?
Victim of Spin...unfortunately, you've swallowed more than a bit of it yourself....Middle East conflict is about Jesus to W???This is a "man" (word used very loosely) that when asked to name his favorite Gospel said "Psalms"!!!Couldn't even blow the answer in the same Testament!!!But, unfortunately, you seem to believe he is religious because he says he is....Hey, I've got a bridge I could sell you, but I think the Neocons already have.....
News is a product. Buyer beware.
Head-On -- rub directly on the forehead. It's all about business and eyeballs.
Head-On. Now there's the quintessential advertisement.
They don't tell me what's in it, they don't even tell me what it's supposed to do, but they sure want me to apply it directly to my forehead.
"News is a product."
As mentioned in other posts and articles, the news is not the product, it's the lure. The viewer is the product and the advertiser is the consumer.
News-On. Apply directly to the eyeball.
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