Back when I was thinking about majoring in journalism, my dad, who spent 43 years with the AP, encouraged me to major in English instead, saying that journalism would be too narrow. He insisted that I take one class from a woman he knew. The whole gist of the class was how to slant the news and how inaccurate reporting is. She proved it to us by running films of different news events and having us do a write-up of what we saw. The results were stunning - nobody saw the same thing.
The recent episode where I was interviewed by a local news station merely demonstrated that you shouldn't believe what you're being told. I was asked by the reporter what I thought about all the trees on Main Street being cut down (150 Ficus trees). I said it was controversial, one side was in favor of keeping the trees, "they provide shade, they provide a wind break" but, the other side pointed out that the roots were breaking through the sidewalk, invading the sewers and becoming infected. I went on to explain that the program took 4 years of study and they came up with a very good plan to replace the trees and beautify the city. My remarks - the ones in quotes - were sandwiched between 2 loud-mouths who were chaining themselves to the trees. The mayor and a couple of city councilmen are friends of mine and were not happy to see me on the news. What I was quoted as saying was not refective of what I really said.
There have been many times when I've witnessed something in person and later seen it on the news - completely slanted to sell the news.
A recent example was the strikes at LA Harbor. On the news you saw what seemed like hundreds of strikers blocking the gates to the docks when in fact it was a group of about 70 men carrying the signs. I was across the street at a marine store when one of the clerks said "watch what's going to happen - the news trucks just showed up." About 15 minutes later, there were indeed about 100 extra people that showed up with signs and started marching back and forth and yelling. After the news crews got their shots - they packed up their signs, got in their cars and left.
News programs create the news. Editorializing in a straight news report is more the rule than the exception. It's done through the use of certain words that are masked as being politically correct and quoting out of context. Reporters draw conclusions for you by simply asking a question at the end of their report - after presenting only one side of the argument. |
