Comparison of two articles about bias in the News Media - Essay Example

Argumentative Synthesis All media forms practice large scale bias and lack objectivity. The media has become a platform to advanced skewed perceptions and opinions about the happenings in the society. From the onset, the output of the two essays aptly titled “Bias in the News Media” and “News Media Assumptions about Language and Discourse” make a case against lack of objectivity in the broader media practice. In their study about the biasness that permeates news outlets, Groseclose and Milyo contend that “ideological scores” reveal wide spread biases in the dissemination of news (1191). However, biasness does not imply unfairness or fallaciousness. Various types of biasness are common in the dissemination of news and communication and language plays a key role in framing the message to incorporate an aspect of bias. Objectivity is a rare characteristic in the society. It is difficult to come across a pure objective view form. The fact that we are generally ignorant emphasizes this outcome and it makes the introduction of bias even more unavoidable. The introduction of bias has further been compounded by the fact that individuals are “socially, economically, politically and historically” inclined to take certain view point that automatically introduced bias in their message (Rhetorica). This phenomenon is evident from the time when we are born and it is largely influenced by hereditary factors and the immediate environment. The profession of a journalist, albeit regulated by its own set of regulations and ethical guidelines, is not an exception. Journalists, just like everyone else, carry intrinsic biases which are structurally transmitted to their work environment. The author of the “Bias in the News Media” article coins the name frames to refer to this structural formations. The frames reference suffices because it is through such structures that journalists literally frame the messages that are carried in new media outlets such as television. It is the presence of these biases that always influences how the message is packaged. The author of “Bias in the News Media” then proceeds to list the various types of biases that influence how news is packaged by broadcast journalists and the possible causes for these biases. Notably, biases are popular in broadcast journalism because of the commercial nature of the media business. Capitalism dictates that only those messages, services or products which are likely to be popular among the majority of the customers should be given a priority. This is undertaken for purposes of profit maximization. The author employs logical rhetoric to further implore the readers that news outlets in their variant forms do introduce biases due to the internal supporting structures which are normally established with the profit maximization motive. According to the essay, the presence of these biases makes it impossible to have media outlets that can be deemed to be objective in news dispensation. The article titled News Media Assumptions about Language and Discourse slightly deviates from the previous article by associating the presence of bias in news media to avoidable inefficiencies in discourse and language, not structural limitations. The nature of human communication is such that it is wholly dependent on the various language forms. This makes language a very effective tool in introducing bias in the delivery of news by the various media outlets. In the essay, the author cites Goerge Lakoff’s deliberations in his work titled Moral Politics to further substantiate the arguments laid out. According to Lakoff, journalists falsely claim that their work is literal when in reality such work contains numerous figurative cues which are meant to influence the eventual conclusion that a reader or a viewer comes to. The article also faults the claim by journalists that the nature of language is that is always neutral. By its nature, the “conceptual system” that constructs language makes it very fluid in its interpretation. Just like in the previous article, the author similarly resorts to utilizing rhetoric to emphasize and strengthen the argument. Logical appeals have been made in both articles. Bias in the News Media captures how the visual components of media work to create bias. News channels are always supplemented by photographic coverage as a means of gaining credibility. The reason behind this approach to journalism is that news becomes more appealing if it is packaged visually. The emphasis on photographic coverage has thus led to a disproportionate attention, hence bias, to only those media items which are captured on camera. Narrative bias arises when news is packaged in a story line with the sole intention of creating villains and heroes out of the resulting coverage. Such blatant biases are the core reasons for the lack of objectivity in media. Whereas the previous essay drives biases from internal structural limitations at the media houses, this essay has dwelt on biased outcomes in journalism that results from the discourse, communication and language choices. Both articles however emphasize on the absence of an objective viewpoint in journalism. The articles are resultantly complementary due to the focus on the same thesis subject though with different approaches. Bias in the News Media article details the inherent structural biases that are present in journalism and especially the news media department; the complementary arguments in the News Media Assumptions about Language and Discourse dwell on the misleading assumptions on language choice which have been the main reason why objectivity and balanced viewpoint in disseminating news will always remain a mirage. The use of language always contain biases due to the fact that the information that is being passed will always be perceived to originate from a certain conceptual system. Thus what is being passed as reality will be received from different perspectives which have been influenced by leniency to either of the many opposing views. Therefore, both essays carry a persuasive argument to propagate the views therein. This has been done using different approaches but the common outlier remains the fact that both authors contend that objective viewpoints are nonexistent in the modern media setting. The propositions by the authors on the presence of biases all but point out the fact that divorcing the media and biased views will remain to be impossible. Works Cited Groseclose, Tim, and Jeffrey Milyo. “A Measure of Media Bias.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics (2005): 1191--1237. Print. Rhetorica. “Media/Politial Bias.” n. d., 2014. Web. 11 Jul. 2014. Read More