Rambling Rhodes

The Comment That Became a Post

I posted this as a comment over at Joshua's, but I think it warrants being a post here as well.

I'm just curious here, Joshua, but how many newsrooms have you been in? I mean, I'm not touting myself as a grizzled veteran of the newspaper newsroom. Hell, with about three years writing for newspapers under my belt, I know enough that it's terribly stressful work for terribly low pay. But, here's what I noticed in those few years; my co-workers were overwhelmingly liberal. The dismissive sneers bandied about regarding Republican office-holders, whether national or local, could practically be snatched from the air and stored in tupperware containers they were so tangible. You don't think that kind of bias doesn't sneak its way into news content? At least when it comes to conservative bias, such as that found in the Washington Post and Fox News, you don't have them pretending to be otherwise. newspapers like the New York Times and, more locally, The Star-Tribune, put themselves forth as bastions of non-biased news, when they quite obviously are anything but. When I cry foul about liberal bias, I'm not saying that news organizations consist of little Marxists advocating so-boner-pill-ism. I am saying that, given that newsrooms, by and large (again, from my experience, or phoney baloney streed cred; your choice) consist of staffers who bend to the left politically, their reporting and editorial content tend to reflect those leanings, despite their protestations. I believe that there is groupthink that exists in most newsrooms.

As an example, Time magazine last week ran a cover story about Bill Gates and the upcoming new XBox. This paragraph jumped out at me:

Bill Gates' time is valuable. There are Microsoft employees who wait their whole career to be alone with Gates for 45 minutes. As the richest man in the world and, arguably, the greatest philanthropist in history, at any given moment Gates could and probably should be off feeding the hungry or curing some horrible disease.

Why that whole thing about feeding the hungry and curing disease? It's been established that Gates is possibly the greatest philanthropist in history, yet the author opines that gates "probably should" be off doing more. Well, guess what? That's not Bill Gates' job. It was completely unnecessary editorializing on the part of the writer. And perhaps just as telling, that little bit about the hungry and curing disease made it through several tiers of editing. No one stopped and thought, "hmm, that part really doesn't belong there." I see that as a classic example of liberal groupthink in action in a news organization. Sure, it's a minor example, but I think it's indicative of a very real affliction in newsrooms today. Could I be wrong? Absolutely. But, again, from my phoney-baloney streed cred experience, I think my position is pretty well justified.