Abstract
Big media houses control mainstream media in the whole world. What happens in one country can be easily known all over the world. In the United States, media houses control what the citizens receive and what can be readily available to them. In the study conducted at the University, it was found that about 77% of the population believed that big media houses were biased, 13% of the population said the media houses were not biased. The remaining population out of the 258 questionnaires collected did not support any position. It was concluded that big media houses are biased on politics and this gets even worse as the years go by.
When it comes to politics, there is no doubt that people are bound to take sides. In a nation such as America where one has limited options; you are either a Democrat, a Republican or do not have interest in politics at all. This position leaves citizens with no choice but declare their political affiliations and allegiance to a particular political group. College students are among the most vibrant populations that are interested in politics. Students are always spotted in small groups discussing their views on certain politics or sharing posts on social media to share their views on certain political issues. The media plays a significant role in relaying the necessary information students discuss about. This gives the media a lot of control over the discussions since most media houses dictate what people discuss. In lieu of this, the information provided by the media houses can either be biased or not. According to Journalistic ethics of objectivity and fairness, journalists are supposed to take a neutral ground on their views and opinions since they are relaying information to millions of viewers who have varied views. This calls for most journalists to maintain fairness and professionalism when delivering news. This position triggered me to research on the students’ perception regarding political bias in large media houses.
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Prior Research
The question whether media houses are biased has raised a lot of concern over the years. Inasmuch as the press is supposed to be fair, some attempts clearly failed and a person’s political affiliations cannot be dismissed. An article written by Seth Ackerman for Fair; ‘the most biased name in News’ revealed that Fox News channel is conservative and their journalists are usually aligned to the Republican side of politics. Roger Ailes is the founder of Fox and he has been a diehard conservative for the longest time. Ackerman also mentions popular names such as Tony Snow, Andrew Kirtzman, Mort Kondrake; only to mention a few; he says that these journalists work with Fox and are known for their inclination towards Conservatives. Media houses are also rated in terms of the accuracy of the information they share. A recent study at the Quinnipiac University revealed that Fox News was more trusted than CNN News. Fox News was rated at 29%, 22% for CNN, CBS and NBC News at 10%, ABC News and MSNBC News at 8% and 7% respectively (Student Daily News, 2015). Media houses also control the news that is aired online. Whether the information is for security reasons or simply because of bias is always upon the media houses management. Francis Melisa, a financial news reporter and anchor at Fox News Insider revealed that she was silenced when she questioned about the mathematical facts behind Obamacare while she worked at CNBC. She says, “And when I did that, I was silenced. I said on the air that you couldn't add millions of people to the system and force insurance companies to cover their preexisting conditions without raising the price on everyone else”. She was summoned by the management and told that she was disrespecting the office of the president and she had to put a stop to that (Fox News Insider, 2014). A research conducted by Tollini Craig at the Western Illinois University showed that students had varied definitions of political bias. What seems to be biased to one person may not necessarily be biased to the other. Students often posted their accusations depending on what they considered to be biased (Tollini, 2009). Some posts go viral and attract large numbers of students. In this way, political ideologies, thoughts and inclinations are shared. This tends to affect decisions made by students and this can be attributed to the news released by press.
Several incidents of political bias can be seen in popular media houses in the world today. If one pays attention to the current trends in politics in the media houses, journalists show bias using several structures. For instance, there is commercial bias, temporal bias visual bias, bad news bias, narrative bias, glory bias only to mention but a few (Rhetorica, 2015). Take an example of polls. Journalists thrive in numbers, and numbers always tend to create conflict and discussions; conflict is good in media. Journalists often structure questions to create discussions. The nature of the questions determines how people will respond; most of the questions are usually biased and require one to take sides. Journalists are people with feelings, attitudes, believes and also have their ideologies. Most of them are icons celebrated by many people making their comments and opinions on varied issues important to their followers. Inasmuch as one can be inclined to dismiss the fact that journalists maintain their professional ethics and keep information bias, this is not entirely true. A journalist will be interested in a certain line of politics and will dig deeper to find out the details. News reporting is not always about the facts and figures on the ground, at times the views of the journalists are also aired which means that the views of the journalist are shared. It is increasingly difficult to maintain ones cue, especially when one has to maintain a neutral ground for the sake of eliminating bias. A journalist may pick a political discussion depending on what he or she desires as opposed to what the population wants to know. Viewers cannot control what they listen to; on the contrary, media houses have control over what they choose to share. The power to control conversation and dominate the minds of people entirely depends on what the press chooses to share. Any information that is not brought to the limelight will remain in the dark, this position gives media houses the power to choose what the people will feed on; this position rarely eliminates bias.
Nevertheless, the fact that some journalists are opinionated does not dismiss the liberal journalists. In the article by Timothy Carney on liberal media bias suggests that most journalists are open-minded and do not have a fixed mind on politics. He says, “the vast majority of journalists at major outlets are generally liberal and this slants their coverage”. This liberal nature gives journalists grounds to slant on one side of the news thus making it bias altogether. For instance, a journalist who is considered liberal will ask challenging questions to politicians who are pro-life but will rarely corner politicians who are pro-choice. This makes journalists as questions that are often silly or rather irrelevant; the liberal nature of the discussions is slanted more to the right. The truth is media bias is real and it affects how people think and discuss political matters. The study conducted was based on the following research questions;
Does political bias exist in big media houses?
Does this bias affect how political parties are viewed?
Are the trends on political bias worsening?
Methodology
The study was conducted at ….. which has a population of about …. The study targeted students taking degrees in political science since it is assumed that they are more keen on political analyses and thus a would provide an in-depth study. A one-page questionnaire that had both closed and open ended questions was circulated among the students during a class. The students responded to the questionnaire purely based on willingness; no one was coaxed or forced into answering the questions. The questionnaire was issued by ten data collectors who later collected the filled questionnaires. A total of 258 questionnaires were collected. The data was analyzed using SPSS and the results were shared to students who were interested in the findings of the study.
Results
About 77% of the participants agreed that the media is biased, 13% said the media is not biased and the remaining population were not sure whether the media houses were biased. Thirteen percent of the participants who said media was not biased said that mainstream media such as CNN, FOX and CBN had similar results when it comes to issues such as elections and polls. Sixty five percent of the population agreed that media affects how they perceive information and what they discuss in their groups. If the media does not air the news, then they would not know what is going on in the political world. Fifty four percent of the population suggested that the trends in media bias in mainstream media houses is worsening.
Discussion
From the above discussion, it can be seen that a majority of the population believes that media houses are biased when it comes to politics. This can be seen through the questions asked on polls and the direct interviews done by media personalities. Despite the fact that the press tries to get varied information from people from different political parties and affiliations, they still ask questions that tie the participants to specific responses. To add on this, it the press affects political discussions by many people in various places. It is however not clear if the trends in political bias is worsening by the day. This entirely depends on the perception of the individual and how he or she perceives media bias. The students are a representative sample of the population, which shows the general perception of the public.
Technology has made it easy for media houses to share information and streamline their news and this means that they can share information among media houses. It can be said that journalists share information and they pay attention to other media houses. This means that the nature of questioning tends to be similar across the board. In some occasions, media houses even go to an extent of sharing journalists who write in various columns in newspapers, magazines and journals. This culture creates an open environment, which consequently affects how information is shared. Regardless of the liberal nature, it is evident that journalists are inclined to a certain line of thought, which generally affects their outlook towards life. Overall, we cannot dismiss the fact that the press affects the way people perceive politics and this generally affects politics. Political bias is real in mainstream media and it may be getting worse by the day due to the liberal nature media houses are adopting.
References
Ackerman, S. (2001). The Most Biased Name in News. Retrieved July 30, 2016, from http://fair.org/extra/the-most-biased-name-in-news
Tollini, C. (2009). The Behaviors That College Students Classify as Political Bias: Preliminary Findings and Implications. Teaching Sociology , 37(4), 379-389. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/25594032
Fox News Insider. (2014). Bombshell: Francis 'Silenced' by CNBC for Criticizing ObamaCare . Retrieved August 6, 2016 from; http://insider.foxnews.com/2014/11/16/bombshell-melissa-francis-says-she-was-silenced-cnbc-criticizing-obamacare
Carney, P.T. (2015). Yes, liberal media bias is real, and here's how it affected the CNBC debate. The Examiner. Retrieved August 6, 2016 from: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/yes-liberal-media-bias-is-real-and-heres-how-it-affected-the-cnbc-debate/article/2575340
Rhetorica. (2015). Media/ Political Bias . Retrieved August 6, 2016 from: http://rhetorica.net/bias.htm
Schmidt, H. C. (2015, January 1). Student Newspapers Show Opinion Article Political
