Bruce Deitrick Price
Why our journalists are so awful
By Bruce Deitrick Price
Many people, especially liberals, were surprised that Trump won the election. The surprising thing for me was that so many people were so surprised.
What, do liberals actually believe their own lying media? That is shocking. The media have an approval rating below 20%. Surely anyone confronting this stat must conclude that the media are hopelessly incompetent and/or crooked.
The New York Times went way off the deep end, announcing a few months ago that defeating Trump was more important than telling the truth. So they had to send a post-election apology to their readers: we're sorry, we'll try to be better in the future. Good luck! That's like a prostitute announcing she wants to be virginal again. The sad truth is, it's been decades since the New York Times tried to practice real journalism.
Okay folks, given the total confusion in the journalistic profession and among the public, I want to present a simple explanation of why our journalists are so awful. Every Social Studies class should cover this material.
Here's how the situation is supposed to work. Real journalists, when they hear an assertion, immediately try to determine whether the assertion is true or false. This is exactly what journalists should do. It's what scientists do. It's honest, valuable work. We need much more of it.
Unfortunately, liberal journalists operate in another world. They do not care about true or false. When they hear an assertion, they immediately try to determine whether it will help their agenda or not. If it won't help their agenda, they know they must immediately attack it (often by declaring it "thoroughly debunked" or "fake news.") Or they simply ignore it. You see how eagerly they turn themselves into hacks. They are not journalists at all, rather they are counterfeit journalists. They understand spin and propaganda. They are best suited for work at marketing agencies and PR firms.
To take one small example. Many peoples noted that for years Obama claimed on his literary website that he was born in Kenya. Is that claim true or false? A real journalist would ask President Obama, "What's this about being born in Kenya?" However, a liberal journalist knows immediately this claim is a major problem. There might be a contradiction in Obama's life story. Mentioning this will hurt the liberal agenda. So here is the obvious answer for these people. Don't mention it. Look the other way. Attack the President's critics as "birthers," apparently a horrible group although clearly Obama was one himself.
There are dozens, perhaps hundreds, of similar assertions, important points that have never been discussed in our liberal newspapers. The newspapers pretend that anything they don't want to hear is foolish, irrelevant, blatantly false, or whatever a gullible public will accept on a given day.
In an ignorant world, any reality can be sold to the public. That's our world.
One of the most startling examples occurred during the recent election, when Hillary was observed to stutter or stumble. Liberal journalists declared that any discussion of Hillary's health was insane, conservative conspiracy, or sexist. She was announced 100% healthy and any deviation from that view would not be permitted. And this against a backdrop where many millions of people had seen videos of Hillary experiencing health problems. Do you wonder that the public was ready to accept Trump's criticism that the media are crooked?
The real damage that people like Obama and Hillary do is they encourage bad journalism, because they can't survive without it. Liberal journalists are mainly obsessed with protecting liberal leaders. These fake journalists lie and break the rules. Then they have to lie and break more rules. You could see the corruption spreading through the politicized people around Hillary, and then among people in other agencies.
You might expect politicians such as Hillary to break rules and tell lies to protect themselves. But it's the job of the journalist to protect the rest of us from these liars. Journalists should be like the referees in a football game. They must be impartial. They must strive to be objective. They must not belong to political parties or factions. They must not, in effect, be secret agents working against this country. That is when the Fourth Estate (press) becomes a Fifth Column (traitors).
The New York Times and the other mainstream journalists behave like floozies. Being objective is hard work and no fun; but jumping in bed with your favorite candidates is a thrill. The New York Times bragged years ago that objectivity was impossible. Reclaiming any sort of legitimacy will be difficult. Their subscribers are deserting and their stock is dropping.
I was hopeful that the setbacks to our newspapers would be a catalyst for epiphany. They would realize they are committing suicide by not reporting honestly. But so far I haven't seen any improvement. Has anyone?
© Bruce Deitrick Price
December 8, 2016
Many people, especially liberals, were surprised that Trump won the election. The surprising thing for me was that so many people were so surprised.
What, do liberals actually believe their own lying media? That is shocking. The media have an approval rating below 20%. Surely anyone confronting this stat must conclude that the media are hopelessly incompetent and/or crooked.
The New York Times went way off the deep end, announcing a few months ago that defeating Trump was more important than telling the truth. So they had to send a post-election apology to their readers: we're sorry, we'll try to be better in the future. Good luck! That's like a prostitute announcing she wants to be virginal again. The sad truth is, it's been decades since the New York Times tried to practice real journalism.
Okay folks, given the total confusion in the journalistic profession and among the public, I want to present a simple explanation of why our journalists are so awful. Every Social Studies class should cover this material.
Here's how the situation is supposed to work. Real journalists, when they hear an assertion, immediately try to determine whether the assertion is true or false. This is exactly what journalists should do. It's what scientists do. It's honest, valuable work. We need much more of it.
Unfortunately, liberal journalists operate in another world. They do not care about true or false. When they hear an assertion, they immediately try to determine whether it will help their agenda or not. If it won't help their agenda, they know they must immediately attack it (often by declaring it "thoroughly debunked" or "fake news.") Or they simply ignore it. You see how eagerly they turn themselves into hacks. They are not journalists at all, rather they are counterfeit journalists. They understand spin and propaganda. They are best suited for work at marketing agencies and PR firms.
To take one small example. Many peoples noted that for years Obama claimed on his literary website that he was born in Kenya. Is that claim true or false? A real journalist would ask President Obama, "What's this about being born in Kenya?" However, a liberal journalist knows immediately this claim is a major problem. There might be a contradiction in Obama's life story. Mentioning this will hurt the liberal agenda. So here is the obvious answer for these people. Don't mention it. Look the other way. Attack the President's critics as "birthers," apparently a horrible group although clearly Obama was one himself.
There are dozens, perhaps hundreds, of similar assertions, important points that have never been discussed in our liberal newspapers. The newspapers pretend that anything they don't want to hear is foolish, irrelevant, blatantly false, or whatever a gullible public will accept on a given day.
In an ignorant world, any reality can be sold to the public. That's our world.
One of the most startling examples occurred during the recent election, when Hillary was observed to stutter or stumble. Liberal journalists declared that any discussion of Hillary's health was insane, conservative conspiracy, or sexist. She was announced 100% healthy and any deviation from that view would not be permitted. And this against a backdrop where many millions of people had seen videos of Hillary experiencing health problems. Do you wonder that the public was ready to accept Trump's criticism that the media are crooked?
The real damage that people like Obama and Hillary do is they encourage bad journalism, because they can't survive without it. Liberal journalists are mainly obsessed with protecting liberal leaders. These fake journalists lie and break the rules. Then they have to lie and break more rules. You could see the corruption spreading through the politicized people around Hillary, and then among people in other agencies.
You might expect politicians such as Hillary to break rules and tell lies to protect themselves. But it's the job of the journalist to protect the rest of us from these liars. Journalists should be like the referees in a football game. They must be impartial. They must strive to be objective. They must not belong to political parties or factions. They must not, in effect, be secret agents working against this country. That is when the Fourth Estate (press) becomes a Fifth Column (traitors).
The New York Times and the other mainstream journalists behave like floozies. Being objective is hard work and no fun; but jumping in bed with your favorite candidates is a thrill. The New York Times bragged years ago that objectivity was impossible. Reclaiming any sort of legitimacy will be difficult. Their subscribers are deserting and their stock is dropping.
I was hopeful that the setbacks to our newspapers would be a catalyst for epiphany. They would realize they are committing suicide by not reporting honestly. But so far I haven't seen any improvement. Has anyone?
© Bruce Deitrick Price
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