n October 17, local time, the local website AZcentral under USA Today published an article “”They defrauded the voters”: How Fox News, CNN and MSNBC reported on Trump and Biden’s Chamber Programs.” The article directly pointed out that the major mainstream news media in the United States lacked objectivity when reporting the same incident and generally showed strong political inclination.
△The AZcentral website published articles criticizing Fox News and CNN and other mainstream American media for being unobjective and showing strong political inclination.
Objective and fairness has always been the embodiment of Western media’s advertised value. However, the current mainstream news media in the United States has increasingly shown obvious political inclination. Some analysts believe that this stems from a serious ideological split among American social groups. It can be said that in USA Today, press justice and freedom of speech are turning into jokes.
The news media tends to be clear, left and right incompatible
Due to the cancellation of the second debate between the two candidates for the US election, President Trump and the Democratic candidate Biden appeared on the National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) and the American Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) at the time of the original debate. ) In their respective live broadcasts of the “Conference Hall”. The two confronted different hosts and launched a “spatial debate”.
However, the major mainstream media in the United States have very different attitudes towards reports on how the two performed in these two live broadcasts. Fox News host Sean Hannity praised Trump’s performance on the one hand, and called Biden’s live broadcast “a disaster” on the other. On the other hand, CNN host Chris Cuomo and MSNBC host Rachel Maddow believed that Trump was an “all-round disaster” and praised Biden.
In fact, the Fox News Channel in the United States has always been controversial because of its extreme ideological bias toward the conservative Republican Party (right-leaning). In addition to television media, a large number of local radio stations across the United States are also conservative. The public believes that inflammatory statements that are inconsistent with the facts appear in their content from time to time, so that Wikipedia decided in July this year to no longer label Fox News as a “trustworthy” media.
△American “Wired” magazine reported that Wikipedia decided not to mark Fox News as a “trustworthy” media
On the other hand, other mainstream media in the United States generally favor the Liberal Democratic Party. For example, CNN, NBC, and some mainstream newspapers such as “New York Times” and “Washington Post”. Most of the reporters and other practitioners of these media have higher education levels and rich incomes, and they are basically left in line.
It is precisely because of the phenomenon of “standing in line” in the news media that Trump has a soft spot for Fox while chanting that the media reports “fake news.”
In the week after Trump was discharged from the hospital on October 5, he intensively visited Fox News three times and received 4 hours of free live broadcast within a week, which enabled him to vigorously promote his image as a “triumphal” brave who defeated the new crown virus.
The people are “led by the nose”, and the media division leads the people to divide
The tendency of the media naturally makes the audience inevitably affected. The Pew Research Center of the United States conducted a special investigation recently. The investigator divided the audience of 30 news media into groups to study the relationship between their own political tendencies and selected media sources. It turns out that long-term audiences who have watched and listened to Fox News and other conservatively inclined radio programs generally show a clear right-leaning attitude; while the audiences of other mainstream media such as CNN and the New York Times have clearly left-leaning.
△Pew Research Center survey shows that the political orientation of the audience is closely related to the media source they choose. Fox audiences are clearly right-leaning towards the Republican Party; while CNN, “New York Times” and other audiences are clearly left-leaning towards the Democratic Party
Take Fox News, Trump’s “ally,” as an example. The Pew Research Center survey shows that among American adults, 43% of adults trust Fox News, while 40% of adults do not. Among them, Republicans tend to use Fox News as the only source of information, and their trust in Fox News far exceeds other media. As many as 61% of the Democrats distrust Fox News and call it “the least trustworthy media.”
The survey also found that most Americans have distinct preferences for mainstream media and even deliberately block other information channels. In addition, the audience’s age, race, and education level also have a certain impact on their media tendencies.
According to survey data, the audience of right-wing media is usually non-Hispanic white groups, among which elderly people over 65 account for a very high proportion of this group; African-Americans and Hispanics are more inclined to left-wing media, with universities and colleges. Audiences with the above academic qualifications are also more inclined to left-wing media.
Ideological differentiation accelerates social differentiation, and political polarization breeds civil unrest
The political tendency prevailing in the American media originates from the ideological differentiation of society, and at the same time it continues to contribute to social differentiation. At present, social chaos is emerging in the United States, and various social issues will be labeled politically, which intensifies the antagonism in the hearts of the people.
The recent extreme-right conspiracy to kidnap the governor of Michigan is precisely because conservatives and right-wing media have repeatedly publicly promoted “white supremacy”, which inspired the rise of right-wing forces and the rise of local terrorism. On the other hand, in protests initiated by left-leaning liberals because of the unfair treatment of minorities, extreme behaviors such as beating, smashing, looting and burning have also appeared, which is not unrelated to the extent of media reports.
△CNN reported that at least 14 people have been accused of participating in a plot to kidnap the Governor of Michigan
The mainstream view of American public opinion generally believes that the most critical role of the press should be to censor those in power. However, the current reality is that the news media “stand by themselves” and their mission has gradually deteriorated in order to serve the partisan struggle, and the public has undoubtedly become A “victim”. Under such circumstances, it is inevitable that American society will divide and tear further.
