That’s what Cynthia Boaz asks in an opinion piece about how Fox News uses several propaganda techniques to get its message across. I wonder if watchers are aware that any of these are being employed or whether they just see this what good news coverage is supposed to be. Styles of news reporting change over the decades. Maybe this is where we’re at for a generation or two of news consumers.
Panic mongering, character assassination, confusion, rewriting history, etc. Here’s one of Boaz’s examples that’s bothering to me:
12. Disparaging Education. There is an emerging and disturbing lack of reverence for education and intellectualism in many mainstream media discourses. In fact, in some circles (e.g. Fox), higher education is often disparaged as elitist. Having a university credential is perceived by these folks as not a sign of credibility, but of a lack of it. In fact, among some commentators, evidence of intellectual prowess is treated snidely and as anti-American. The disdain for education and other evidence of being trained in critical thinking are direct threats to a hive-mind mentality, which is why they are so viscerally demeaned.
Don’t even get me started, David.
I agree some commentators on Fox disparage some academics. I think it it important to note that it occurs during the opinion segments and not the news.
Unfortunately, I have not been sufficiently impressed by holders of academic degrees to necessarily equate higher education with analytical thinking. I only wish it were true. That is not to say that higher education is not worthy of pursuit but it too often centers on the irrelevant.
Give me a high schoolers with critical thinking skills and good work ethics anyday.
I’ve never watched Fox News (I don’t have cable) so I have no idea what portion of the programming is what you consider actual news instead of people spouting opinions not based on facts. Since you’re a fan, tell me approximately what percentage of Fox News programming should get their “fair and balanced” motto.
I’m not sure how to answer that. it is a 24 hour channel and I really don’t take the opportunity to watch it much until after work in the evening. I’ve looked through some of the show titles and descriptions and would guess much of the morning line up is current news/affairs and entertainment, similar to the Good Morning America format. I would not call that serious news.
I would hope they run a serious news segment around the noon hour but really am not in a position to make a judgement there. Late afternoon they run Beck, at least they did, which I would call conservative commentary. Neil Cavuto hosts a business commentary at 5:00pm. I guess if you are against business then you would not consider his fair and balanced.
I’ve seen much more of their 6:00 and 7:00 pm slots. I consider both of those serious news. 8:00, 9:00 amd 10pm they run all commentary shows; O’Reilly, Hannity, VanSusteren and then rerun those programs twice over through the night and early morning. That is there Monday-Friday line up and I really don’t know what they run on the weekends. Mostly commentary I think.
There may be two questions to consider. Is it a hard news program and are the news and commentary programs “fair & balanced”?
In my estimation they run 2-4 hours of hard news per day. Just because a show is commentary I would not automatically disqualify it from “fair & balanced”. Part of the qualifier is your definition of fair and balanced. The context that Fox seems to use the term is that they regularly have guests that debate the issue from at least two perspectives, progressive and conservative with a libertarian thrown in once in a while. I don’t think they use the fair and balanced label to imply that their hosts do not have a political leaning.
I may get some flack for my opinion but I would consider O”Reilly and VanSusteren to be fair and balanced in the contexts that they daily debate both sides of the issues with guest on the shows.
Hannity is extremely right wing conservative, Beck is or was liberterian/conservative. A lot of the morning programming is GMA style so I would put the news and fair and balanced label on less than 50% of a 24-hour weekday cycle.
Since Sybil has been a victim of forced indoctrination of Fox, perhaps she could offer another perspective and then this blog segment could be “fair and balanced”.
I’ve just spent far to much time on your question, David.
This is a silly question, but I have to ask to get my point across. What percentage of Fox viewers know when to start and stop accepting what they hear as fact? Do you know yourself or do your family members know when to turn their internal fact-meter on and off?
When someone provides inaccurate, misleading information on a popular nation-wide TV program and it goes unchallenged, then you have the perfect propaganda machine. Propaganda has no respect for knowledge. Knowledge only gets in the way.
It leads back to the old Daniel Patrick Moynihan quote: Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.
I understand your point and obviously I have no definitive answer. My question to you is why is it any more important for Fox viewers to have this ability to sort out propaganda than it is for any other person deciphering any information source?
Do you somehow think that viewers of Fox News need to be more astute than viewers of other cable or broadcast news outlets? Certainly what you read on the web needs examination. I would put Fox News up against any other news outlet.
I also challenge your statement that opinion or propaganda goes unchallenged on Fox. I watch some other cable news programs and can assure you Fox News has substantially more debate on its programming than many other “news” stations.
Without being a cable viewer yourself how can you think you are equipped to cast judgement? You are simply passing on second hand opinon.
What would you suggest I watch?