It’s in the news so it must be true!

Have you ever wondered what kind of world we might think we live in if a large industry with a lot of influence could manipulate and speculate on truth, twisting it into something it's not in order to sell their product or pursue their own agenda? The original purpose of news media was to present the facts to the people and any opinion expressed by the author was meant to be illustrated as exactly that, an opinion. Yet increasingly over the years some large news corporations have been wandering away from this purpose, liberally injecting their opinion into news stories and presenting it as fact. Writing short and catchy but misleading news titles, and blatantly pandering towards the masses at the expense of the truth.

One of the most recent examples of this can be found in The Sun newspapers handling of the imprisonment of Sean Duffy, a so called Internet "troll". Sean Duffy was accused of "sending malicious communications" in the form of mocking comments and video's on Facebook memorial pages created to pay tribute to individuals who had passed away. The article immediately shows its bias labeling Duffy as a "web fiend", and the first sentence of the article brands him as a "sick Internet "troll". Part way through the article there is a brief three lines which notes he was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and has lived a "miserable life". Such blatant bias is a common feature of what they proudly boast is "the number 1 newspaper in the UK". Whether that has anything to do with the topless female models on page 3 or the fact that their "news" blatantly panders to a majority opinion, one can't help but wonder.

Another example of misleading media can be found with the BBC, a state news corporation. Browsing the BBC web site I noticed an article with the title “Nearly half of parents' back corporal punishment". Intrigued, I clicked to read more about it only to find that the "Nearly half" was 49% of one survey involving "more than 2,000 parents”. How many more? It doesn't say. It could be 2 or it could be 2 million. Or maybe the entire world was surveyed and I just didn't get the memo. This is a perfect example of misrepresenting the facts in order to pack concise and catchy snippets and paragraphs into the titles, or descriptive text of articles in a vain attempt to attract attention. In addition to not revealing the exact number of participants, it also doesn’t say where this survey was carried out. This kind of writing has become characteristic of the BBC specifically and the media generally. The general speculation and the manipulation of factual evidence, sometimes (In the case of The Sun and other newspapers) injected with opinion to be passed off as fact by news corporations in their news (not opinion) section is reminiscent of the South Park episode Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow. Here's a little transcript for those who don't want to watch the whole episode (2:10 – 2:18):

Tom: Peril, crisis and fear tonight as what appear to be a massive flood has overtaken the town of Beaverton, Colorado, home of the worlds largest beaver dam. Earlier today a break in the beaver dam which protected the town broke open trapping people inside their houses and destroying their lives.
Mitch: Tom, I'm currently 10 miles outside of Beaverton, unable to get inside the town proper. We do not have any reports of fatalities yet, but we believe that the death toll may be in the hundreds of millions. Beaverton has only a population of about 8,000 Tom, so this would be quite devastating.
Tom: Any word on how the survivors of the town are doing Mitch?
Mitch: We're not sure what exactly is going on inside the town of Beaverton, Tom, but we're reporting that there's looting, raping and yes even acts of cannibalism.
Tom: My God! You've actually seen people looting, raping and eating each other?!
Mitch: No. No, we haven't actually seen it Tom, we're just reporting it.

Selective reporting is another problem with news corporations. A big example is news stories which involve computer games, often portraying them as evil and how they corrupt young minds. Titles such as “Ban These Evil Games” (credited to the Daily Mail) are catchy and sell newspapers, but completely deny/obscure all possibilities that computer games can have positive effects. Ashly Burch has released a project called How Games Saved My Life which accepts submissions of gamers stories and how gaming has helped them through tough times. Stories range from how games have helped gamers cope with mental problems to trauma and depression. There are some truly inspiring stories which smash the general media opinion that all computer games are bad and must be banned.

Now let's not tar all news corporations with the same brush. Some do present the facts and then offer objective opinions which are clearly marked just as they should be. In fact, many of the major scandals in Britain over the last few years have only been uncovered due to the efforts of legitimate fact-finding journalists. But it is becoming increasingly common when presenting the news, to liberally mix fact and opinion whilst making no distinction between the two. News corporations will also pander to public opinion or simply resort to trying to generate as much interest as possible with article titles being deliberately misleading/eye-catching, often with the primary goal in printed media to simply "sell more newspapers". News corporations possess tremendous power to influence public perceptions and opinions. Many people look to the news to keep them informed about events in the world and often forming opinions and making decisions based upon the information presented. When the media abuses that powerful and influential position to demonise an individual, misrepresent the facts, mislead and generally misinform the public it can have far reaching ramifications. These can lead to multi-billion pound illegal wars gaining public support whilst the west siphons off 30 years of profits from oil, instead of worldwide condemnation. Who knows what else could be produced from this? One thing's for sure, tighter regulation is required of news corporations to ensure that “fact” is kept separate from fact, opinion is not passed off as truth and that the public is informed, not influenced by the news.