The ‘False Balance’ epidemic in the press is causing extreme views to creep into the mainstream. It assumes that there is an inherent ‘flip-side’ to every story, which just isn’t true. It would be nice if the press would go back to just reporting the new and get of of the perception business.
Here is a message from Daily Kos:
Too many news outlets seem to consider it their job to tell the competing sides of any given story, instead of focusing on reporting the truth. No matter how unsupported by the facts one side may be, this widespread “he said, she said” journalism is how, for example, climate change deniers are treated seriously in the media.
In a positive move, National Public Radio recently issued new editorial guidelines rejecting this false balance. Disavowing the worst excesses of “he said, she said” journalism, NPR’s new code of ethics states that “if the balance of evidence in a matter of controversy weighs heavily on one side, we acknowledge it in our reports.” This is an important step to curing what has become an endemic plague of false “fairness” in American journalism.
Please, click here to sign the petition thanking NPR for this decision. We will send them the signatures.
Daily Kos
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