Why Has Trust in the News Media
Declined?
Half a century ago young people protesting
authority
enlisted
the news media in their fight, chanting “the whole world
is watching.” This week, anti-racism demonstrators
at the University of Missouri angrily denounced journalists.
Vice President Spiro Agnew articulated the most
memorable Republican criticism of the media until last month, when candidates’
denunciation of reporters
was central to the
presidential debate in Colorado. But polls show that trust in the news media has
generally fallen. Why do so many people say they don’t trust the news media, and
what does that mean?
* protest = 항의[반대]하다, 이의를
제기하다/ authority = 당국; 지휘권; 권한/ enlist = (협조, 참여을) 요청하다; 입대하다/ chant = 구호[성가]를
외치다, 연호하다/ anti-racism = 인종 차별 반대주의/ denounce = 맹렬히 비난하다/ articulate = (생각・감정을)
분명히 표현하다[설명하다]/ denunciation = (공개적으로 하는) 맹렬한 비난/ central = 가장 중요한,
중심되는
어째서 많은 사람들이 그들은 뉴스 매체를 믿지 않는다고 말하며 그것의 의미는
무엇인가요?
1. Young Black People See the News
Media’s Double Standard
It is hard to trust an institution
that ignores you unless you are perceived as causing a problem for "the rest of
us."
2. ‘Trust’ Has Come to Mean Affirmation
Americans say they want accuracy and impartiality, but polls
suggest what most of us want is to hear what we believe.
3. Liberal News Media Bias Has a Serious
Effect
Clustering left-of-center viewpoints in newsrooms
leads to a cloistering, with reporters unfamiliar with conservative
viewpoints.
Sample
Essay
‘Trust’ in the News
Media Has Come to Mean Affirmation
Trust in the news media is a sinking ship. Three-quarters of Americans
trusted the news in the post-Watergate years, but, according to Gallup, that
plummeted to 44 percent in 2004. Weirdly, it rebounded to 50 percent in 2005,
but ever since its drifted gently downward. Why? What do the people want from
the news?
Americans say they want accuracy and impartiality, but the
polls suggest that, actually, most of us are seeking affirmation. Americans want
the news to be patriotic, which explains the big drop in 2004 when stories
abounded about Abu Ghraib, the 9/11 commission’s slam on the government’s
handling of terrorism, and the Senate Intelligence Committee finding that the
White House “overstated” the threat of weapons of mass destruction. Plus, it was
an election year. Trust in news media always dips in election years.
The
news media is most valued when it reflects our best selves, which explains that
pop up in 2005. Often, the coverage of Hurricane Katrina was wildly inaccurate,
but reporters (especially on TV) used their airtime to yell at the authorities,
expressing our collective pain, and shame. Yay, Anderson Cooper! Yay, Shepherd
Smith! We trust you!
But more important, the Internet has changed
society's relationship with the news. For one thing, it’s enabled us to
construct digital silos, battlements from which, like the French in Monty
Python’s Holy Grail, we fire invective on the people below.
Some news
organizations base their business models on denouncing “mainstream media." A
particular example is the top-rated Fox News channel, which flogs its “outsider”
status. True, the political right has claimed victimization by news media since
at least Nixon, but that 45-year defamation campaign reached peak force when the
Internet shrank the public square.
But there is ample proof that the
Internet has also really “leveled the playing field” between the most powerful
and the least. Now the marginalized can speedily gather, demand recognition and
challenge the prevailing narratives. This happens every day and it’s far better
than the alternative.
Let’s not forget that most institutional entities
have taken a public opinion hit. Public faith in organized religion has dipped
to 42 percent, the Supreme Court to 30 percent, the presidency to 29 percent,
the banks to 26 percent, big business to 21 percent and Congress, to 7 percent.
By that measure, news media is doing pretty well. (Not TV or Internet exclusive
news — that’s in the teens.) But essentially the crisis, if there is one, is
elsewhere — everywhere.