The News should be telling people what they need to know

[edhopper]

not what they want to hear. One is journalism, one is infotainment.

And this might be the downfall of our country.

For one thing, stop interviewing MAGATs and talk to the undecided voters.

[Silent3]

1. Most undecided voters are idiots

I suppose there’s some news value there, in that we need to get an idea how idiots, a pivotal demographic, are likely to vote.

[NoRethugFriends]

2. I'd up that to 99% from most

[unblock]

4. The media is completely uninterested in what black people have to say unless either

A) it outrages white conservatives or
B) it is critical of Biden and democrats

[edhopper]

5. Both things

can be true. Especially since the fate of the nation relies on them.

[unblock]

3. One of many major "journalism" fails is they keep interviewing republicans expecting news

They seek out "ordinary" people who are clearly trying to just parrot back the latest idiocy from the right-wing media.

Republican politicians aren't any more informative, they're just more polished. They get their scripts from Republican central and they all spout the same topic with the frame and the same catch-phrases and even the same adjectives.

Why bother interviewing these robots? Just get the damn script and report on that. Hey these are the Republican talking points for today. That's the extent of "news" from them. And even that is usually just lies and baseless smears.

Yet the media amplifies this and interviews several republicans to make it seem like many people independently reached the same position when in fact they're all spouting coordinated talking points.

[Ligyron]

8. This is precisely what is going on.

Well stated too.

[elleng]

6. I don't want anyone telling me what they think I need to know,

I want FACTS; I'll decide what to do.

[onenote]

7. +1

[edhopper]

11. The News should be reporting important facts

not what they think the viewers want to hear.

Is that better phrasing for you?

[unblock]

12. Ah, but which facts? Today's media is highly selective

For instance, it's a fact that Biden is old. It's also a fact that Donnie is old. But they report much more on one fact than the other. Maybe this week is an exception as they can't avoid talking about Donnie nodding off in court.

Anyway, news reporting is about more than reporting facts. The facts that affect real lives, the facts that help differentiate the candidates, the facts that matter and not bothering with the facts that don't, that's all a big part of journalism.

And this is what the media constantly gets wrong. Hyping the facts surrounding Hillary's emails while downplaying if not ignoring the facts surrounding Donnie's horrible business skills, Russian ties, secretive life, abuse of women, gross theft and ridiculous handling of classified materials, etc. they *still* call him a "successful businessman" despite all the facts to the contrary. Unaudited financials that seem to always show fraud whenever examined, a billionaire who is constantly grifting and begging for money and struggles to pony up a fraction of his supposed net worth.

They are hugely biased in which facts they push.

[elleng]

13. Tell me their age, that's all about that,

and then I'll examine/explore their behavior.

(I'm between the 2, agewise.)

[unblock]

14. Maybe a better example:

The media reported plenty of selective facts about Hillary's emails, all of them negative or at best neutral for Hillary. Another hearing, another investigation, another batch of emails to examine, no crime uncovered (yet).

But they underreported or ignored other facts, such as that the whole investigation was an obvious scam to smear a political rival, and that the emails showed she worked hard and well and helped many people as Secretary of State, and that the allegations against her were utterly baseless and were highly unlikely to amount to an indictment anyway OR new legislation, making it all an abuse of congressional investigative power.

They needed to report those facts. Indeed, that should have been the lede. That was the real story. Locking Hillary up was a ludicrous right-wing fantasy but the media chose to give it a ton of airtime.

At the same time, there are tons of facts that don't need reporting. Choosing which facts to report is hugely important. They can just report "all" the facts and let people decide, the facts need to be curated and presented in an informative way.

And it needs to be done in a far more responsible way than they currently do it.

[Beausoleil]

9. Democracy depends on an informed voting populace

Once the mainstream media doesn't abide by journalistic standards, the siruation is ripe for authoritarianism/fascism, which we have been witnessing at least since the mid-90's.

It's just mind-boggling how people's views of politics and current events have been warped by right-wing propaganda.

The newest danger is that an enormous percentage of young folks consider Tik Tok as their main news source. AFAIK, Tik Tok has no commitment to any journalistic standards.

[Meadowoak]

10. News doesn't get the ratings that infotainment gets, after all,

It's really all about those advertising dollars, isn't it?