BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Dec 16 - 10:38 PM

a message to all good folks

what ever your local paper buy a subscription. NEWS papers will be able to hire more talent just as the Washington Post is doing

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 28 Dec 16 - 11:56 AM

HEIL T-BIRD!!

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Teribus
Date: 28 Dec 16 - 02:25 AM

Greg F. - 27 Dec 16 - 03:07 PM - Totally misinterpreted, or deliberately misunderstood what Akenaton said there Greg F - Perhapps you should toddle off and learn to read posts then respond to any point made, instead of merely reacting and putting booth feet in your mouth.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Thompson
Date: 28 Dec 16 - 01:32 AM

An interesting piece by Monbiot on corporate manipulation of news.

Sample quote:

The less transparent [corporate-funded 'thinktanks'] are, the more airtime they receive. The organisation Transparify runs an annual survey of thinktanks. This year's survey reveals that in the UK only four thinktanks – the Adam Smith Institute, Centre for Policy Studies, Institute of Economic Affairs and Policy Exchange – "still consider it acceptable to take money from hidden hands behind closed doors". And these are the ones that are all over the media.

When the Institute of Economic Affairs, as it so often does, appears on the BBC to argue against regulating tobacco, shouldn't we be told that it has been funded by tobacco companies since 1963? There's a similar pattern in the US: the most vocal groups tend to be the most opaque.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 05:30 PM

The anti-vax scare tactics were very harmful

Were? The brain-dead anti-vaxers haven't gone away, Joe, and are very much still with us. And doing immesurable harm.

whose parents knew better than the doctors.

Of course they did, Joe - damn those educated elitists anyway - and then the same idiot parents elected Trump.

God Help AmeriKKKa.

HEIL TRUMP!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 04:35 PM

Donuel says: You can get diseases other than the flu from vaccine preparations.

I think I'd say: In rare situations, some people can get diseases from some vaccines and other injections. But for the most part, the vast majority of vaccines are rigidly tested and proven to be safe - far safer than going without the vaccine.

The anti-vax scare tactics were very harmful, causing disease and sometimes death to thousands of yuppie children whose parents knew better than the doctors. I had two anti-vaxers in my house at one time. They were more evangelistic than religious extremists.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 03:39 PM

Greg it was perceived that a autism conspiracy was arising even by the MMR lobbyists. Today we know there is no connection.
Insiders may remember that Dick Army did his best to protect big Pharma from lawsuits by changing a bill in the dead of night.

You can get diseases other than the flu from vaccine preparations.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 03:07 PM

Ache:

You

Cannot

Get

The

Flu

from

being

vaccinated.

Now toddle off, like a good idiot.   ;>)

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 02:43 PM

Trouble with deciding not to be vaccinated, or not to vaccinate your children, is that if you or they come down with a particularly horrible virus that you've failed to vaccinate against, you or they may recover, but may cause others to be infected and die or be badly damaged.
But I didn't really intend to divert this into a vax/anti-vax debate. Really, what I wanted to say was that journalists generally are typical of the rest of the population - some right-wing, some left-wing, some a-bird-never-flew-on-one-wing, plenty not particularly brighter than the rest of the population. They're the most normative group you could find - much more so than many other professions. The one thing they're good at is interpreting difficult stuff so it's easy for everyone else to understand.
But back to the chicken; it won't roast itself, you know.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: akenaton
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 01:47 PM

Well I don't know Greg, I have no views on the MMR debate, but I decided not to have the flu vaccination. My neighbour had been having it for a few years then developed a super flu which he only just managed to recover from.....I'll take my chances! and I know you wont believe this, but I'm not stupid...or a "loonie" :0)

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 12:08 PM

Q:does opposition to MMR vaccination really equate to a conspiracy theory about autism?

A: Yes, in most cases. Sometimes its just simple stupidity.

Good, kind people find it just as easy to believe lunatic theories

Then the least they can do is accept responsibility for the very unfortunate outcomes of so doing - in the spirit of goodness and kindness, of course.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: akenaton
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 12:03 PM

I suppose that if anyone had complained about Thalidomide they would have been looked upon as "loonies".....and does opposition to MMR vaccination really equate to a conspiracy theory about autism?

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 11:31 AM

Greg F, in the immortal words of the prophet Bonzo Dog, "My wife said: 'You're so gullible'." Good, kind people find it just as easy to believe lunatic theories ("Don't get your kids vaccinated! It's all a plot for control and will make them autistic!") as bad unkind people.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Mr Red
Date: 27 Dec 16 - 05:26 AM

you can quite often block the source of information and then you won't see any more posts they put up -
I do it as a policy. Mind you my Farcebook account is for Folk information, so I "Friend" good sources and hide all else. Farcebook hasn't really figured my preferences - It still fires the most varied ads at me. Fair mix of music, rarely Folk!

One day I will hit their limit on "hides" - a sort of challenge!

But, and it has to be a prominent BUT:
I am using a process that others use and have since the dawn of language, the end result is divisive. Farcebook & Twatter moreso.

The difference now it that newspapers have to be paid for, can be re-read and the content digested. Farcebook is free and worth a little less than that. Throwaway, the content is linear and not digested to such an extent. And not disseminated with much thought.
Farcebook is doing what has always been done, but doing it far faster with infinitely less oversight. That makes it insidious.

The lunatics have taken over the asylum. And we (how can I not be included?) are the loonies!

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Dec 16 - 12:37 PM

"Journalism is, almost by definition, a reasonably well-paid middle-class profession which requires a reasonably good education."

That's a bit like saying footballers by definition earn massive amounts, when in fact that's only true of a small elite. The large majority of journalists work in understaffed local papers earning pretty low wages.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 26 Dec 16 - 10:56 AM

Apologies, but one wonders if truly "dear, kind people" would deal in that sort of lunatic garbage and the very real damage that it causes.

YMMD

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 26 Dec 16 - 10:54 AM

"Over the years, we've effectively brainwashed the core of our audience to distrust anything that they disagree with. And now it's gone too far," said John Ziegler, a conservative radio host, who has been critical of what he sees as excessive partisanship by pundits.

"Fake news was a term specifically about people who purposely fabricated stories for clicks and revenue," said David Mikkelson, the founder of Snopes, the myth-busting website. "Now it includes bad reporting, slanted journalism and outright propaganda. And I think we're doing a disservice to lump all those things together."

The right's labeling of "fake news" evokes one of the most successful efforts by conservatives to reorient how Americans think about news media objectivity: the move by Fox News to brand its conservative-slanted coverage as "fair and balanced." Traditionally, mainstream media outlets had thought of their own approach in those terms, viewing their coverage as strictly down the middle. Republicans often found that laughable.

As with Fox's ubiquitous promotion of its slogan, conservatives' appropriation of the "fake news" label is an effort to further erode the mainstream media's claim to be a reliable and accurate source.

"What I think is so unsettling about the fake news cries now is that their audience has already sort of bought into this idea that journalism has no credibility or legitimacy," said Angelo Carusone, the president of Media Matters, a liberal group that polices the news media for bias. "Therefore, by applying that term to credible outlets, it becomes much more believable."

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/25/us/politics/fake-news-claims-conservatives-mainstream-media-.html

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Thompson
Date: 26 Dec 16 - 12:47 AM

No! This friend (and indeed another) send me emails with nutty links! And since they're both dear, kind people, I put up with it, and rarely even say "Ah wouldjever have a bitta sense".

I ditched Facebook years ago after a single week in which I had to change my privacy settings several times after 'updates' - each time, they'd hidden the privacy settings in a new place. I figured that any organisation that wanted my account not to be private so badly wasn't for me.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 09:28 PM

Thompson, I have a couple of friends who do that also. If you are looking at facebook when they do it, you can quite often block the source of information and then you won't see any more posts they put up from that publication. Right click the upper corner of the post and you have options to block the person, block the entire post, or block the originating source. That third one will spare you reading a lot of nonsense.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 03:59 PM

"But individuals, be they genuine or not, will not be filtered." writes Mr Red, and this is true. I have a beloved friend who sends me "inside stories" regularly, one madder than the next. I don't know how this friend, a sensible and sane thinker on everything except politics, got hooked into this nonsense.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 02:16 PM

Meanwhile the "press" must include Farcebook and Twatter. Not because we think it must, but because they are what people are exposed to en mass

People, of limited education, who have no critical thinking skills, who have no interest in whether or not the Farcebook Spew thay read has any basis whatsoever in fact and who are generally idiots.

God Help AmeriKKKa.

HEIL TRUMP!!

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Mr Red
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 12:13 PM

Facebook itself is trying to filter the fake news

News maybe, I doubt they will be successful. But individuals, be they genuine or not, will not be filtered. Idiots re-posting will only re-inforce the stories. The number of re-posts seems to be a measure of their veracity. In the minds of too many idiots.

I am very careful what Farcebook thinks I am looking at, but as my cursor moves and hovers Farcebook is thinking, and getting it wrong. Algorithms can't be that clever until they reach the event horizon - the Ray Kurzweil definition of same. And then the genie is out of the bottle and we will all be fucked.

Meanwhile the "press" must include Farcebook and Twatter. Not because we think it must, but because they are what people are exposed to en mass and it is driving a wedge between factions. And that leads to war. Recent history proves it.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 11:12 AM

I agree largely with Thompson, and have a variety of news sources, several he named. I also worked reporting the news for a number of years. I love Twitter for news because I follow the kinds of places that send out reliable news, and individual reporters or columnists. Facebook itself is trying to filter the fake news, but I don't use the Facebook "news" feed as a source, instead, I look to see who of my more reliable friends share creditable news sources and stories. Every so often one of us will post a Snopes link to debunk a story making the rounds.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Mr Red
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 05:40 AM

but I don't think I have ever heard them wilfully broadcasting anything that is incorrect or twisted

The BBC get pilloried from the left and the right, and any other greedy politician who claims they are not being represented enough. On that score alone we have a window on their landscape. And it is lush.

Mind you I distinctly remember them reporting the occurrence of the infamous poodle in a microwave court case, way back. And years later I was told they had retracted it about 18 months later.

BTW if you ever heard of a case of a guinea pig in a microwave, I am afraid that is almost certainly true. A first cousin (once removed) told the story of the time she was in an employment agency and refused to deal with a guy because she recognised him as the perpetrator. Three of her siblings were in the same trade, one still. It is her own business and looks to be thriving.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Dec 16 - 03:02 AM

I worked in the press for most of my working life. Journalists aren't evil cackling people out to twist the truth. They are stupendously ordinary and average. Some may be stupid and make mistakes - the same as in any other job.

As for the BBC, I like it a lot, especially the World Service; I'm listening to a programme at the moment which has been in Naples talking to local people about the novelist Elena Ferente, and has gone on to cover the Swedish practice of broadcasting a Donald Duck film at Christmas, with people phoning in in their thousands with messages; now it's about a man preserving the music of his native Asturias. Oh, dear, what can be their sinister underlying message!

When it's reporting on Ireland I often get annoyed by its patronising tone and its simply wrong idea that the British in Northern Ireland were the centre of good, for instance; I assume people in other countries feel the same about their countries - but I don't think I have ever heard them wilfully broadcasting anything that is incorrect or twisted.

When anything's going on in the Middle East, I turn on Al-Jazeera, which has excellent on-the-spot reporting.

I like the New Yorker and New York Times, Washington Post and LA Times for American news.

I listen to some French radio stations, with a little but limited ability to understand, ranging from France Inter and France Info to the rather intellectual and sophisticated Paris left-wing station Radio Libertaire. (The mainstream stations have introduced me to fabulous music tracks like Paris s'Eveille and Dans le Radio.)

I don't do Facebook - can never get the thing to work - but Twitter is fantastic for early and on-the-spot news (either by witnesses or by people quoting their local newspapers and radio and TV stations) of any breaking story. Sure, there are nutcases, but it's usually easy to hear their axes grinding from something as simple as the language they use ("cucks", "sheeple"…)

Mostly news is straight enough. Grains of salt and the sense your mother raised you with are a useful tool for filtering it.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 24 Dec 16 - 01:13 PM

Not half as good as Fox News[sic] or Breibart, tho.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Acorn4
Date: 24 Dec 16 - 12:26 PM

I love oxymorons:-


"BBC News" is one of my favourites!

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Dec 16 - 03:13 AM

I had never heard of the pineal gland so I looked it up. Interesting to note that the hag fish does not have one. Do we have a new term for such people? :-)

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Dec 16 - 12:36 PM

History doesn't really repeat itself but sometimes it does rhyme.

But in a very rare kind person born without a pineal gland it produces a non empathetic creature full of hubris. Such a creature would seek revenge even with nukes as a simple and first choice.

Such a creature would attack anything that defied it, like Trump personally decrying the press.

Now who else would you suppose lacked a pineal gland?

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Mr Red
Date: 23 Dec 16 - 05:01 AM

Farcebook and Twitter are GOSSIP.

Their proprietors are making noises about checking for Post Truths* but they won't be deleting posts from us, the plebs. Because it will kill the genre. And the real problem is the cloned accounts that look to be real. They are spreading whatever their paymasters wish. It pays well at election time!

Newspapers and there lowly cousins - the Comics - have always been partisan. Some are unspeakable turncoats. When I was at Uni the Times was always regarded as supporting the party in power. And who owns it now? Plus ça change! But that was a formula we could equate. Farcebook is non-commutable (as the mathematicians say).

*pun acknowledged - which is more than the general cognizance.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Greg F.
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 10:30 AM

I think that most people understand that Facebook and Twitter feeds are simply not to be trusted.

Not. Just ask 62,904,682 Trump voters.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 08:43 AM

The same does indeed apply to online posts, Howard, but as you have so ably pointed out, online reportage is not yet as credible as the traditional press. It does not therefore carry the same weight and while many people will dismiss online headlines as a flight of fancy, or at least check the facts, many more see the newsstands and take it to be established facts. Just my 2p.

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Howard Jones
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 07:51 AM

I agree about headlines, but doesn't the same apply to online posts? I'm not sure a headline on a newstand necessarily has any more impact than a link to the same headline in a paper's online edition shared on social media.   People will see a dramatic headline but often won't bother to click on the link to read the article, and the link can rapidly be re-shared with hundreds of others.

Clearly the future is on-line for both the established and alternative media. What matters is authority. The established media have earned that over the years, whatever you think of an individual paper's stance. Up to now, not many online news sources have earned the same degree of authority, although no doubt some will over time. However amongst so many competing alternative news sources it can be difficult to pick out the authoritative voices.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Mr Red
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 07:35 AM

anyone ever had a call from some outfit calling themselves "Southern News" or some such?

When they ask your age*, and you decline, and they get right pugnacious and aggressively persistent, (despite getting data for free): it will end up in a Comic like the Sun.

Trust me.

* They made up a figure there and then and insisted I agree. I didn't but they published a number anyway. I have since had spurious contacts asking about being involved in this and that. My reply didn't put them off immediately:
eg "I am not that interesting, and you lot want it all for free and don't use the true bits etc".

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 05:05 AM

Thanks for the measured and sensible response, Howard. I am glad that you agree truth can be variable and that we should not blindly trust any source of information.

While I agree with you to a certain extent about online media versus printed news issue I feel that you are missing a vital point in your analysis. That is the already mentioned 'headline syndrome'. Many people see headlines and rarely go behind them to find what the real story is. While online I think that most people understand that Facebook and Twitter feeds are simply not to be trusted yet, for the very reasons you mention, they believe everything they see in hard print and on the newspaper stands. Thus, the headline in yesterday's 'Sun' will have had far more impact than a copy of the same pasted into a Facebook status or even onto a political web site.

I must add that this analysis is based purely on my own experience of people which, while extensive, is far from authoritative. I would be interested to see any scientific study of this phenomenon and, should my judgement prove to be faulty on this issue, I will be happy to be corrected.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Iains
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 05:03 AM

It is also pertinent to note that some items of news get little or no coverage. Events in Mosul for example, or the government ploy of burying bad news among a surfeit of headline grabber events. The military do not like the press up close and personal and the police also have reservations. I can well understand why. Wars and riots have a tendency to be brutal and photos and video can be presented with accompanying dialogue in ways to create a total distortion of events. The press may claim impartiality but in this day and age it is increasingly hard to accept. In the UK D notices have been used to control the press where it suits the government agenda. If publication is prevented for certain items, it is equally probable that other items are given a government bias, or deliberate lies are presented. Sexed up dossiers and weapons of mass destruction spring to mind.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Howard Jones
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 04:29 AM

DtG, everyone tells their own version of the truth. This is equally true for alternative online media as for the established media - in some cases, perhaps more so. As your original linked article admits, alternative media does vary in quality and can be fake, politically slanted and not sufficiently fact-checked. I checked out a number of the alternative media websites suggested in that article, and most of them seem to be opinion platforms rather than reporting hard news. It's hard to know which are run by authoritative professional journalists and which by crackpots, and it's even harder to know where their funding comes from. They are completely unaccountable.

We are flooded with information, and we have to be selective. I prefer to get mine from sources which have decades, in some cases, centuries,of experience behind them and which are broadly accountable to regulators and the courts. That they are subject to a range of influences is well-known, and is hardly new, but every mainstream newspaper's position is well-known and can be taken into account when deciding how much notice to take of them - as your response to the Sun demonstrates. The same cannot be said for most on-line sources, and frankly I have neither the time nor the inclination to conduct due diligence every time an article is brought to my attention.

We shouldn't blindly trust any source of information, but so far as I am concerned that applies even more to alternative media than it does to the mainstream.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: robomatic
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 07:07 PM

Hearst newspaper artist cabled his boss from Cuba that there was no war.

Hearst cabled back: "You furnish the pictures. I'll furnish the war."

This was the power of communications using the high tech of the period.

Words are tools.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 05:38 PM

Every crime or misdemeanour, every social experiment(especially those involving children) is promoted

BBC Radio 4 promotes terrorism? Hate? Pedophilia? Surely not. There must be some mistake. If it did I think it should be closed down! Have you reported this to the police? What are they doing about it? Has anyone else noticed this or is it just you? As I said before, I do not listen to Radio 4 but if it does, as you say, promote crime, why are there not more people complaining? Can you provide any examples of this crime promotion? If not then I think that I, and many others, will be happy to treat it as much of a scurrilous claim as many of the other unsubstantiated allegations made.

I wait in hope...

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: akenaton
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 05:24 PM

No, BBC 4 has no connection to, nor does it promote the ideas of the hard left.....I doubt if there is one media outlet which does.

It is much more dangerous and insidious than that I'm afraid Unregulated "liberalism".....or mad people in a crowd.

Every crime or misdemeanour, every social experiment(especially those involving children) is promoted   and we are advised not to be judgmental or to stigmatise as everything is always somebody else's fault......or society's.

This stuff is what Orwell visualised though he cloaked it in totalitarianism.    Insidious in the extreme

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Iains
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 10:42 AM

Oh Dear. They missed that last vital piece of info. Counts me out i'm afraid

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 09:30 AM

Only if you take membership of a left wing party as well, Iains :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Iains
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 09:23 AM

Did I hear correctly that the Guardian is offering a free pair of sandals with every one year subscription?

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 09:08 AM

Sorry, I was lost for words for a minute... :-)

Pray tell, ake, what manner of social experimentation is promoted by those evil Guardian readers on Radio 4? I will happily admit that I have progressed from R1 to R2 but I never made the leap to R4. I am sure a lot of other people, particularly in the USA, must be intrigued as to what type of brainwashing this organ of the hard left is up to. Enlighten us all please.

Thanks in advance

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 08:56 AM

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 08:54 AM

Howard. Me jumping to the conclusion that the Sun is trying to stir up hatred is far more grounded in reality than someone jumping to the conclusion that British Muslims must be involved in the German tragedy because a headline in rag tells says so. And both things will happen again and again with no consequence for the former and terrible ones for the latter.

Still, I accept your point and you have made me go and read the full article. Damn your eyes :-) It is, as I thought, a mixture of supposition and vague hints. Phrases like "A SUSPECTED British terror cell may have been groomed by the ISIS commanders who plotted the Berlin Christmas truck massacre. Sources say the five men and a woman arrested in Derby and London last week are suspected of being lined up for an international wave of attacks." and "Police believe the British cell were on the brink of being "operational"." ensure that the paper is not in breach of any regulations. (Weasel words highlighted by me). Where the letter of the law may be kept, the spirit has long since departed. And the obvious intention is unforgivable.

I think you may have also jumped to the conclusion that this was some sort of left wing diatribe against the right wing press whereas in fact it was no such thing. Had you read it more carefully, you may have seen that it was pretty well balanced. And in penance for making me read the Sun, I suggest you re-read the article I linked :-)

As to your point about 'new media' being an unknown and not knowing if it is "genuine and reliable news or complete bollocks", I suggest that it is far easier to check the integrity of a web site, by reference and cross reference, than it ever has been. The first thing I do on seeing a new site is Google it and check out their credentials. It is not ideal but it has saved me from going down a blind alley on a number of occasions.

Feel free to continue enjoying your 'daily'. I am sure many people do the same. But please remember that that they may be telling their own version of the truth. There are always other points of view.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: akenaton
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 08:51 AM

BBC radio 4 is very biased indeed especially the overseas service.
Guardian reading lefties does not quite cover it IMO.

Social conservatism is hardly ever given any sort of platform, while all manner of social experimentation is promoted.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Howard Jones
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 08:24 AM

Dave the Gnome, perhaps not but it is usually the left who complain about the "mainstream media" and the majority of newspapers shown in the OP's link lean towards the right.

In some cases bias is probably in the eye of the beholder. The BBC is criticised by the right for being full of Guardian-reading lefties, and by the left for being biased towards the Tories, which suggests to me it's got the balance about right. Most newspapers take a particular point of view which is well known - you wouldn't expect the Guardian to report or analyse something the same way as the Telegraph would, and actually that's no bad thing.

It's not my intention to defend the Sun, but as you haven't read the article how can you know that their headline wasn't correct, at least at the time it was published? The online report says that "sources" say that some people arrested in the UK are being connected with attacks being planned overseas. Now I agree that's pretty vague and the headline may or may not be making a mountain out of a molehill. My point is that with even fewer facts than the Sun you appear to have jumped to a conclusion simply because of your prejudice against the paper. Just because you don't like what a paper reports or how it says it, doesn't necessarily make it wrong.

I agree that online media is taking over. I haven't bought an actual printed newspaper for several years, I download a digital version onto my tablet. The problem for any new entrants (whether in print or on line) is building up trust. The established media have built up their reputations (good and bad) over a long time and you know, more or less, where you stand with them, but anyone can set up a convincing-looking website and you have no way of knowing whether they are providing genuine and reliable news or complete bollocks.

I'm not saying that the established media are perfect, far from it, and there are plenty of examples of where their behaviour has been questionable, to say the least. However if I have to choose between getting information and analysis from a reputable journal with a long history and someone who's popped up on the internet I'll generally prefer the former, until the latter can convince that they're worth paying attention to, and I can probably only do that by comparing his reporting against the established media.

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 04:58 AM

Howard - I do not believe that any conspiracy to keep left wing papers off the newsstand was mentioned or implied.

While it is true that newspapers do report the facts it is how those facts are presented that must be called into question. I just popped out to check out today's headlines and the massive one in the 'Sun' is the one that caught my eye. "British IS cell linked to truck horror". Now, I am not even going to read the weasel words that justify this headline as it is known that German police do not even know who the driver was. But, sadly, many people will pick up on it and get incensed against British Muslims. This is what they want and what their owners are trying to achieve.

I am not sure why you think that online media is not mainstream but the links provided in the article provide plenty of good alternatives to the usual unreliable social media sources. Online media is soon going to, if it has not already, replace what you are referring to as 'mainstream' media.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Good reasons to mistrust the press
From: Howard Jones
Date: 21 Dec 16 - 04:40 AM

There's nothing in that article which is startling, or new.

Newspapers' political allegiances may vary, as this graphic shows. That may be partly determined by the owners' views but also by commercial considerations about what its readers want. There is no conspiracy keeping left-supporting papers off the newstands, and if their circulation is much lower than that of the others is because not enough people want to buy them. Despite the numbers joining Labour to support Jeremy Corbyn, the socialist Morning Star (which didn't make the list in the OP's link) has a circulation of around 10,000, less than a third of the Beano's.

Journalism is, almost by definition, a reasonably well-paid middle-class profession which requires a reasonably good education, However many middle-class journalists come from working-class backgrounds.

I trust most mainstream newspapers to report the news reasonably accurately. I don't trust them unreservedly, I don't expect them to be 100% accurate, and neither do I expect to agree with all their opinions. I don't expect them to deliberately lie, but this doesn't happen very often and is usually an individual journalist's deception rather than editorial policy. They are more usually guilty of reporting other people's lies, which is not quite the same. To give one example, Lance Armstrong's insistence he wasn't guilty of doping is sometimes claimed to be something newspapers reported as fact, but it was a newspaper which uncovered him.

I can obtain a range of opinions (often in the same paper) and make up my own mind. I certainly prefer the mainstream media to most of what is reported on line.