We hear a lot about media bias these days. What is media bias? It seems that there is confusion about what it is and disagreement about if it exist. Here is my definition of media bias. Media bias is present when a news organization report not just what happens but inject a personal belief that taints the story. It also exists in what story gets chosen to be covered and the importance associated with a given story. To some extent, all newspapers and broadcast news are biased. As long as the information is disclosed, I don't see anything wrong with it. If the NYT states that it is a Liberal newspaper and state up front it has a certain liberal agenda, I have no problem with it.
The problem is making the claim that they are non-biased "all the news that fit to print" and yet writes stories that are clearly biased. I'm not talking about the Editorial page or Op-ed articles. These are expected to reflect a certain point of view and most readers understand this. What are not understood and more subtle are the front page stories. What gets covered and the tone it is written can influence what people think. That's the real danger and that is the indictment of media bias. In some cases, the reporter or news organization are not even conscious that it is happening. How can this be? It happens when a group of people are so inbred that they have lost touch with their readers. One term that describes this is "group think". When an organization such as the NYT employs people of similar beliefs and background, it creates a "biased" prone environment. When people agree on certain issue, they tend to take it for granted that it is a fact and not just a point of view. There is no dissenting opinion to check them. A prime example of this is the issue of abortion. Even though half of the American people disagree with the current abortion laws and practices of the land, the NYT thinks it is a universal right. Whenever a news story about abortion comes up, it will portray the pro life groups as extreme and zealous and out of the main stream. It never occurs to them that some people and in fact 50 percent of the population are pro life and some over 50% of physicians refuse to perform an abortion as a matter of conscience. When did you ever read about that? In the annual event "march for life" held in Washington DC, a crowd of over 100,000 people gathered to protest the Supreme Court ruling Row vs. Wade. You will never see a front page story about this and they will never report the actual numbers of people that shows up. Why is that? Here is where the bias comes in to play. They don't think this is news worthy and they want to down play the numbers so that people will think that these groups are small and a fringe group. They think this because they and all their friends and colleagues are all of the same opinion. By not covering this story, they have distorted the truth and therefore perpetrated media bias. On the other hand, they can take an issue and make it bigger than life. A good example of this is the Gay issue. Because they agree with the gay agenda, when a gay group marches for some event, they are covered wall to wall and portray the appearance that a large group participated. An unsuspecting public reading the NYT will think that this is a widely accepted phenomenon and mainstream. Again the truth was distorted to reflect a belief of a minority group. The way to combat media bias is to recognize that they exist and to keep an eye for it when reading the news. Try to get a variety of sources before making up your mind. Don't get your news from only one source. When you see it, write to the editor to file a complaint.

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