The debate on whether the media have a liberal bias is common in all societies, especially among politicians who feel that the media does not favor them. The claim of liberal media bias can be traced back during World War One when the Nixon administration alleged that the media was biased against the US war that was taking place in Vietnam. Recently, during the 2008 US presidential election, media was accused of helping Obama win the presidency by negatively portraying McCain. Therefore, based on the previous evidence and the difficulty in maintaining perfect objectivity, media always have a liberal bias (Carney, 2015).
The main reason why media can hardly avoid liberal biases is that they are themselves liberal and they rarely recognize or give a fair portrayal of the conservative perspectives (Finsterbusch, 2014). It is very hard for many journalists to see issues from the conservative perspective, making them be liberally biased. Conservatives are strange things to many reporters and many media houses, and they treat them with some hostility or unfairness. Therefore, the fact that many journalists are not familiar with conservative viewpoints liberal media bias persists, especially in the mainstream media (Carney, 2015). In addition, media pay a lot of attention to issues that can attract the attention of the majority of the target audience. For instance, it is likely for the media to give extensive coverage to a controversial politician than a conservative politician, which explains why Donald Trump received wide media coverage. Therefore, the desire to remain liberal and attract the attention audience is the main reasons why liberal media bias is inevitable.
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However, there is a need for the media to attain a high level of accuracy and balance in their reporting in order to remain a watchdog over government and leaders. Media should equally expose all sides of the political divide and have a better understanding of the conservatives. To achieve their roles and objectives, it is important for the media to be trustworthy and be fair to all.
References
Finsterbusch, K. (2014). Does the Media have a Liberal Bias? New York: McGraw-Hill Create.
Carney, T. (2015, December, 21). Liberal News Media Bias Has a Serious Effect. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/11/11/why-has- trust-in-the-news-media-declined/liberal-news-media-bias-has-a-serious-effect?mcubz=0
