Do you believe that political cartoons (about the media) are accurate or do they go too far? Here's one to think about.
Lawrence Sung
Nov 11, 2019
Discussion
I came across this chart while searching up media neutrality: It got me thinking--is there even such a thing as unbiased media? To that, I say no. Every human being grows up in a different set of circumstances and is exposed to unique stimuli that contribute to the development of a person's personality and beliefs. Over time, those solidify as one constantly uses them as a framework through which one interprets the environment around them. Thus, no matter how hard people try to be neutral when disseminating information, there will always be a slight bias towards one region of the political plane (I prefer not to use the spectrum notion since it generalizes too many political traits) because of the built-up habit of using one's belief system and personality to analyze the world.
Is this bad? Absolutely not. In fact, I think that this is great for democracy! With the notion of media neutrality gone, news agencies are free to express their own opinions about the world around them. Furthermore, the power of interpreting the media no longer is in the hands of the media themselves; rather, the democratization of media will allow the people the chance to interpret both sides of the news, for once, and will grow the public's ability to think for themselves. Thus the common people will be liberated from the vices of a monotonous press.
On one hand, I understand where this specific cartoon is coming from. It feels at times that the only stories being covered are ones about Trump, whether they're of great importance or not. However, I empathize with the media in that, at this time in the United States, so much occurs and changes within a mere 24 hours, and it's difficult to give every story the attention it deserves. I don't believe that the media, specifically sources like NYT and CNN, which I assume this cartoon is directed at, intentionally disregard stories that don't affirm their biases. I believe that we, as consumers of the media, are responsible for seeking out a variety of stories and sources--a "balanced media diet," if you will.
I definitely agree with you on that. At times, it may seem difficult to easily seek out a "balanced media diet" but using websites like Allsides.com or subscribing to news alerts from news sources from across the aisle is worth one's time.