The Dangers of Unbalanced Reporting - Essay Example

The Dangers of Unbalanced Reporting Even though it does its best to appear to be presenting news in a non-biased way, the media has a large tendency to slant stories to reflect their own viewpoint, either consciously or unconsciously. There is a great deal of danger in assuming that the information provided in the media, even information provided in a 24-hour real-time scenario, is the only ‘true’ understanding of what is happening. Some people, realizing that the media must necessarily take up some position or another, attempt to make up for this bias by obtaining their information from a number of sources, but this also does not guarantee balanced reporting. However, obtaining this information is often the only means by which a society can hope to operate successfully as it is through the media that the society defines itself. The effect of the media is a cyclical process in which programs are produced based upon a particular understanding of the social structure. This understanding of the social structure, fed back through the media, informs society of how things are supposed to be. Society, reacting to this portrayal, works to change the definition in some way, which then becomes reflected again through the media. When adjustments are made based on faulty or heavily biased information, social reaction becomes severely flawed, leading to disastrous decision making and erroneous assumptions regarding others. Unbalanced reporting can be accidental, based upon the reporters’ misunderstanding of an event, or deliberate such as in the withholding of information or refusal to report, but both can lead to severe consequences such as the declaration of war, the loss of thousands of lives and the economic collapse of a superpower nation. The philosopher Edward Said indicates that misrepresentations of the ‘Oriental’ image continuously used in Western media outlets are not necessarily deliberate. In Orientalism, he points out that there can be no pure knowledge because “no one has ever devised a method for detaching the scholar from the circumstances of life, from the fact of his involvement (conscious or unconscious) with a class, a set of beliefs, a social position, or from the mere activity of being a member of a society” (Said, 1979, p. 10). Because the idea of the classic Arab or Muslim is so ingrained in the thoughts of the Western world, Said indicates it is impossible for a Western journalist to provide a balanced viewpoint. These concepts are best related to the school of deconstructionists in which it is argued that “texts cannot be deconstructed from ‘within’ … any such attempt would also be an epistemological impossibility, since (as Derrida would point out) authors cannot fully understand what they have written: the deep ground of the ideas which underlies the text is forever invisible and inaccessible to the author” (Chandler, 1995, p. 228). Although Said applied these ideas to the concept of the ‘Oriental’, they are equally applicable to just about any culture or social group that is singled out as different in some way from the dominant. The danger of this kind of unconscious unbalanced reporting can be seen in comparing two media images of Saddam Hussein that were taken during his final trial that emphasize the difference in cultural perspective. In the West, Middle Eastern peoples are shown to be either unjustifiably threatening or profoundly inferior. Pictures of Hussein shown in the West during this time period focused on his negative side. They show him as angry, perhaps yelling, his face turning red, his neck muscles bulging, his fist in the air or pointing a finger in the direction of the camera. These kinds of pictures reinforce the idea that this is a man incapable of repenting his misdeeds appropriately and thus must be eliminated. In direct contrast, images used by the Al-Jezeera network during the same time period and the same event tend to illustrate a much more thoughtful and intelligent man sitting calmly at his trial and studiously attending to the proceedings. He wears glasses, he reads, he takes notes, he concentrates, he is calm and composed, representing a very different man from the one pictured in the American media. Although he might not be contrite, he is a man carefully considering his defense, intelligently listening to his accusers and studiously representing his country. The significance is not in the different moods and expressions of Saddam during the course of the trial, but instead in the choices made by these media outlets in the visual messages sent based upon their own unconscious understanding of events as well as their own deliberate biases in presenting the news. The danger in these types of biased portrayals is that neither media agency is capable of illustrating the entire truth yet both are used by society as a means of defining and understanding their world, thus shaping their actions, beliefs and behaviors. Saddam Hussein’s history demonstrates him to have been an inordinately sadistic individual as he seems to be in the Western press, but also an intelligent individual with reasons and justifications for his actions, as he seems to be in the Al-Jezeera network. While these dangers seem obvious and relatively easy to circumvent simply by including a wide variety of sources in one’s collecting of the news, there is a more insidious approach taken to unbalanced news coverage. This occurs when the other side is simply not reported on at all and an example of this can be found much closer to home. Looking back upon the events as they transpired, it seems clear to most people that former President Bush’s handling of the war on terror served to promote terror rather than reduce it. Three facts stand out: Bush launched a sustained military action against an enemy that had not attacked the U.S., the rationale for the invasion of Iraq was not based on fighting terrorism and it has provided fresh examples of U.S. brutality for al-Qaeda recruiters. The illegal war in Iraq has caused terrorist attacks to increase worldwide even as it continues to sacrifice many thousands of Iraqi and Allied lives and has cost the U.S. dearly as far as international respect is concerned. Additionally, this ‘war’ has monetary costs reaching into the hundreds of billions of dollars which has crippled the U.S. economy and will continue to for many years in the future. It has caused the U.S. national debt to skyrocket, which will have to be paid instead of spending federal revenues on needed programs such as healthcare, welfare programs, education, defense systems, etc. The U.S. military is crippled as well, both literally and conceptually. It could not respond to a crisis of any size which potentially could result in a disastrous situation. As the war progressed, the Bush administration continued to lose confidence among the American public who now better understand what the rest of the world has known since Iraq was first invaded but was not reported in this country until recently. Bush’s foreign policy is based on greed, was promoted by lies and has cost the U.S. worldwide respect that may never be recovered even with the eager-seeming Obama actively working to set things right. Thus, the dangers of unbalanced reporting can lead to something as disastrous as the death or severe decline of a nation or nations if not corrected in time. The reporting provided is necessarily biased to some degree as a result of the reporter’s own understanding of the world and the degree to which he or she can attempt to adopt another person’s perspective. Because no one can completely dissociate themselves from their previous understandings of the world, though, there is no means by which this sort of bias can be completely removed from the equation. However, the attempt to provide balanced reporting to both sides of an issue or event is important in ensuring that the public has a strong understanding of the dynamics and processes involved. When only one perspective is offered, as in the Saddam example, society can develop a severely warped sense of another culture that may have irreparable consequences well into the future. When the other perspective is never offered in any media channels to make up for this bias, entire nations can be duped into behaving completely opposite from their own ideals and standards with an entirely different set of disastrous consequences. Works Cited Chandler, Daniel. The Act of Writing. Aberystwyth, University of Wales, 1995. Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York: Vintage Books, 1979. Read More