Do we really want neutral news?

The only news I watch is The Daily Show, so I'm not qualifiedd to know. The only news I think is unbiased is local news, and that's because it's usually hard to be biased. I mean all they tell you is the fact that so and so got shot and there's a free kitten giveaway at some shelter. Even when my local news talked about abortion laws being passed, they just said who said what.

@ Matues: Maybe we're just talking about degrees of bias — after all, let's just say that British Television News is legally required to be unbiased; of course, there still is bias, but we're working to a matter of degrees — compared to the US, here in Britain it is a magnitude more unbiased than you are used to*

Of course we don't. We just pretend we do because what we actually want is news that agree with our perspectives/delusions.

I would like it if there were some less-biased news outlets around here. I vastly prefer facts over someone short-stroking my worldview, and there have been dozens of times where I did some further digging into a subject and found that even sites that are biased in my favor have left out pertinent information.

No, I for one prefer the media to report facts, all facts and nothing but the facts.

No music or Conspicuous CG, either? Presumeably delivered in an unemotional, neutral accent, too? Just the facts, nothing else. I'm just wondering how far you'd take "just the facts" — would you remove music too, and explanations of the events, or even reports from the scene?

Actually, that is exactly what some people want here — and they are the type to complain about it to The BBC.

edited 14th May '12 3:02:26 PM by Greenmantle

That'd be the infamous Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells again, right? They've always got a bee in their bonnet, that one.

Yep, there were complaints about sending Major Presenters/Reporters overseas to cover live events — mostly because they thought they didn't need to be there, and that it cost too much money. Others regular complaints include basically spending too much time on any one story, or on sport, and especially on anything about entertainment. You get the idea...

Then again, we have this for The BBC:

edited 14th May '12 3:24:53 PM by Greenmantle

@Greenmantle

I don't mind if there's only a small amount, that's inevitable.

It's like you order a hamburger, and ask for no mustard. Someone puts mustard on it anyway, but you're hungry and there's only a small amount of mustard there..

Then, you go to this other restaurant and they dump so much mustard on there that you have to send out a search party to find your burger. It makes for an unpleasant dining experience.

edited 14th May '12 3:21:31 PM by Matues

You have music and CG on your news? Goodness.

And yes to all those points.

edited 14th May '12 3:26:37 PM by IraTheSquire

See the theme tune above — ITV's and Channel Four's News Themes are more traditional, though. But yes, The BBC have reporters on the scene just about everywhere — and CG — we have that too, especially on Election Night.

In other words, you'd just have a person at a desk...no remove that, just a voiceover, right? Basically Radio News (I'm talking Radio 4 here, not Radio 1, by the way), on Television.

I mean, there's (low-budget) CG on the Daily Politics too, right? Along with quite a few other not-so-serious segments*

Five Live? I've never managed to listen to Five Live! I can't get it on my car radio. Personally, I listen to Classic FM.

edited 14th May '12 3:41:43 PM by Greenmantle

Ira, you should see Election Night Special. 'Tis something else. (Usually really amusing, as the effects —not fantastic, even though CG, to begin with— and the presenters get more disjointed as both the production staff and the presenters themselves start to fatigue badly.)

What's wrong with 5Live? Uh... no guessing of my station of choice, now...

edited 14th May '12 3:41:04 PM by Euodiachloris

Wow. And here I thought that our ABC and SBS is not good enough for omitting stuff from politicians' interviews. (And let's not get into our commercial current affair shows because, frankly, we the normal people watch them for entertainment and lulz)

Double yes. TV news report is just rushed anyway so might as well as make it lines at the bottom of other shows. If people care try can look it up themselves (or read a newspaper, which is usually far more detailed than tv).

And I've seen news like that (Hong Kong news broadcasted here are trimmed to fit into the time slot, and that's what you usually end up).

edited 28th Jun '12 3:08:41 PM by IraTheSquire

And then there's Glenn Beck...

Love him or hate him, he's hardly unbiased.

Yeah: when something big comes up, the Beeb pulls the stops out, and expects overtime of its staff across its platforms.

Specials of all kinds can last hours. Things like floods, wars, riots or spree-killings will provide spontaneous coverage like that. The number of times various poor academics from most sides have been rounded up and shoved, blinking (with minimal make-up) in front of cameras and microphones to expound on various topics at a moment's notice (but, with some very nice graphs taken from their work, spruced up and supplied with their words)... can't count 'em.

Sky News tries the same, but... just doesn't quite manage to do it the same way (spiffier graphics, more make-up, arguably slightly less content with a more right-wing —if you really, really squint— "agenda"). It just doesn't have quite the global caché to get everywhere. Uh... that is, unless some dictator doesn't like your guts. (Say hello, Mugabe: the Beeb got kicked out first, but Sky wasn't very far behind.)

To be honest: CNN's got nothing on both of 'em. Sorry.

edited 14th May '12 4:09:22 PM by Euodiachloris

It's always funny when I hear one of my comrades talk about the liberal media giant, and then turn on fox news.

The reverse holds the same with some of the more liberal news outlets.

Me? I watch it all, depending on what I want to know. If it's in the middle east and has nothing to do with America, Al Jazeera is a pretty good news source. But I know that as soon as us heathens get involved, even if we didn't do anything this time, Al Jazeera will lie and slander their asses off.

If it's something going on in Europe? I'll listen to the BBC. They are kind of 50/50 on reporting about American issues though. Sometimes they do a really good job on neutral reporting, and other times it's like an inverse America hating version of Fox News.

My general rule of thumb is that the more biased I think my initial information is, the more news outlets of varying sensibilities I need to look at. Then I take all their bullshit, pull out the information that they have in common and take that as the facts, and the rest as speculation.

Liberal... Fox... hmmmm... *chokes*

Cloudcuckoolander-mode engaged: I wonder what a liberal fox wears to smart-casual events?

Nah, I get your point about the Beeb and American coverage. Mind you, it's an improvement on some other European coverage of the same. A lot of the time, you'd not think America existed for Switzerland, for example.

edited 14th May '12 6:24:37 PM by Euodiachloris

But they revolted over British tea! Of which, the taxes were totally justified.

(I kid, I kid. I don't know that much of Imperial British history)

The taxes were justified, colonialism and imperialism were not. 13 Colonies had the moral right to secede if they wanted to.

Oh, man, I accidentally a Flame War.

-takes cover-

@ Barkey

You know Al Jazeera is run by an ex-CBC (Canadian state news) guy and a bunch of BBC employees? I always found that funny.

@ Thread

What I am disappointed by, even for BBC and CBC, is the lack of bravery in journalism. They're so afraid of looking "biased" that they try to keep their news "neutral" and as someone pointed out very early in this thread, those two concepts are incredibly different. This combined with a population so ingrained with the notion of "look out for bias" that any time they see news that isn't neutral, they think it is biased.

Look, if someone, like say Harper, rigs the frigging elections, that's what happened. Reporting it is not bias. Not being neutral about how the Tories stole the election, ruined Canadian democracy and was found two times in contempt of parliament due to his flagrant disregard for the democratic processes of my country... that's what the news should talk about. But it doesn't. Because both the news media and the people aren't willing to accept that type of news because it's not neutral.

I want unbiased news. To the point where I won't read news that looks like it's been "spun" to be more interesting. If it's not interesting on its own, it's not news.

How much longer until your next elections again breadloaf?

Well according to the constitution it is no later than May 2016. According to Harper's law (which he already broke previously, so it's of dubious worth), no later than May 2015.

May 2015?

That's the same time as our general elections!

How funny that the two Tory parties on either side of the Atlantic, in two very similar countries are planning to hold an election in the same month of the same year!

edited 14th May '12 9:42:47 PM by Inhopelessguy