A long time ago, while I was working as a stringer for The New Straits Times during my summer holidays, I got into a heated discussion with a couple of my colleagues on whether or not the press should be objective and neutral. My position was, and continues to be, that newspapers always have a position and it should be explicit. Their position was that journalists should be objective and unbiased, reporting only facts and refraining from passing judgment.
This article published in The Economist makes a good case for why news outlets even in a free market are biased. It explains that what people really want aren’t objective, neutral newspapers, even if that is what they say that they want, but instead ones that reflect their own dispositions. According to the study cited by the article, analysis of the media in the U.S. indicates that even different ownership has next to no effect on the overall bias on the press. What does matter is what the targeted market wants.
As the article notes, ultimately the truth lies somewhere in between all these different points of view, and anyone seriously interested in the news should get it from a variety of sources. But allowing those different points of view to be represented is far better than trying to stick to some muddy standard of objectivity that fails to sufficiently inform the reader for fear of passing judgment, whether good or bad.
Hi Wan
I’ve briefly touched on this in comments in my blog.
Basically, the model that works is information that is freely available yet responsible, ie no reporting of falsehoods and opinions should be expressed as such. Market forces will usually dictate what ideas will survive.
In the UK, typically Tories read The Times, Telegraph while Labour supporters read Guardian. Intellectuals with a passion for the Arts like me read The Independent.
Are you coming back to KL soon?
We should meet.
I won’t be in KL until next year around Chinese New Year. Not sure about meeting as I’m not terribly sociable in real life. I’m just your typical closeted gaming nerd. But my wife says making new friends is good so I guess we could check out your mom’s flower shop at Times Square some time.
Absolutely. I used to read a daily investment column from an author who was always bullish on the subject. When, after a while, his positivity didn’t seem to match reality at all, I made a point of also reading the column of an author who was overwhelmingly bearish. The important thing is that I still feel better being told what I want to hear — I can’t really help it, so there’s no sense in trying to deny it. But of course, I realized I have to read the articles, not the authors, to get a clear view of everything. No matter what it is.