Mastodawn

RE: https://mastodon.cc/@dtm/116266557872962801

David, do you feel bias is a good or bad thing in journalism - I didn't understand your point in terms of the piece I shared. https://mediahelpingmedia.org/ethics/unconscious-bias-and-its-impact-on-journalism/

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David Todd McCarty 4d ago

@MediaHelpingMedia I think bias is unavoidable. There is no such thing as objective journalism. The goal should be truth. Facts are useless without context. The public is incapable of parsing raw data. That was the point I was inelegantly making.

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Media Helping Media 4d ago

@dtm I agree on all the points you make. We all have to deal with our own biases, and context is essential when setting out facts. That is another issue we have tried to explore on MHM.
https://mediahelpingmedia.org/basics/facts-context-perspectives-and-the-truth/

Facts, context, and perspectives - Media Helping Media

The primary role of a journalist in covering a news story is to uncover verifiable facts, provide context and present the information to the audience.

Media Helping Media - FREE TRAINING RESOURCES FOR JOURNALISTS AND MANAAGERS

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David Todd McCarty 4d ago

@MediaHelpingMedia I’m not trying to.contradict anything you’re doing, but I would find Hunter S. Thompson more compelling than most of what amounts for journalism these days. We have convinced the public that they should want only reported facts, with no input from the journalist and I find that absurd. 99% of Americans don’t even know how the government even works, let alone the intricacies of foreign policy, economics, science, and history.

They need help understanding what to think.

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Media Helping Media 4d ago

@dtm I think you made an excellent point in an earlier post when you wrote about 'context'. We, as journalists, gather facts, check them, then add context so that the audience can draw their own conclusions. If news journalists soil the mix with their own subjective views then we are altering the picture. Our job is not to lead people to think in a certain way. There are so many angles to this discussion. It's all about impartiality. .
https://mediahelpingmedia.org/impartiality/

Impartiality - Media Helping Media

Media Helping Media - FREE TRAINING RESOURCES FOR JOURNALISTS AND MANAAGERS

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Rickd6 3d ago

@dtm @MediaHelpingMedia sounds a little like ‘both sides’ are good/bad. Not attributing a point of view or opinion can make everything bland, especially if you don’t have great insights, quotes or information presented on all sides.

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Media Helping Media 3d ago

@Rickd6 @dtm Hi Rick, I am not talking about false equivalence or false balance. Reporters should dig for facts from multiple sources and diverse perspectives, and that will involve attribution which is essential.
https://mediahelpingmedia.org/advanced/false-equivalence-and-false-balance/

False equivalence and false balance - Media Helping Media

Journalists can sometimes present an inaccurate or false version of events by trying too hard to 'balance' a story or incorrectly treating elements of a story as being roughly equal.

Media Helping Media - FREE TRAINING RESOURCES FOR JOURNALISTS AND MANAAGERS

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Rickd6

@MediaHelpingMedia @dtm I do enjoy reading old newspapers and seeing them give information on the two sides of a story, while still being able to indicate what side they were more in favour of. Tired of today’s entertainment ‘news’ media.