Is the So-Called Media Bubble Real?
Data analyzed by Politico reveals that the national media
really does work in an extreme political and geographical bubble and there are
no sign things are changing. More than ever, media organizations are concentrated
on the coasts, which are decidedly politically liberal. This was not quite as
true prior to 2008. Due to a steady rapid and steady rise in internet publishing
and broadcasting, jobs in this field have grown from 77,900 in January 2008 to
206,700 in January 2017. Currently, 73 percent of internet publishing and
broadcasting jobs are concentrated on the coasts. In contrast, newspaper jobs
are spread around the country. However, Internet publishers are now gaining workers
at twice the rate of the loss of workers of struggling and failing newspapers.
Why does this media
bubble matter? Well, the political and geographical media bubble likely played
a huge factor in the 2016 presidential election, for one thing. Donald Trump’s
surprise win revealed a deep confirmation bias in the election coverage by most
of the media. It was overwhelming assumed by the majority-liberal press that
Hilary Clinton would win by a landslide. This failure to maintain objectivity
reveals how untrustworthy the media truly is.
The most
important reason why the media bubble matters is that journalists working on
either of the coasts for big network media outlets appear to be out of touch
with the average American experience. This trend is troubling, to say the
least, because it begs the question: does the news really reflect what is going
on in our country?
Can the media
bubble be deflated? And does the media even recognize this as something that
needs to be fixed?
Let me know
your thoughts!
I believe that for the most part, the news media has wholesome intentions. I believe that many corporations desire to share information as accurately and clearly as possible. But I do realize that journalist bias and controlling corporations do exist. I understand that as the article says "the media is not just guilty of confirmation bias but complicity". I think that many times, journalists report on the bandwagon type topics.
ReplyDeleteI believe that our news semi-accurately reflects what is truly going on in our country. It is impossible to be completely objective, but it seems as if news information and the journalist who write/post this information now-a-days really are not trying as hard as they can to give the most unbiased opinion possible. Furthermore, I do believe that the media bubble could potentially be defeated, although I think it would take a large amount of work to do so. It is especially hard because I do not think that a lot of the media recognizes it as something that needs to be fixed or that even exists.
ReplyDelete