SnipeMe - Guest Rants - Journalistic Integrity is Dead

“CAN YOU SPELL FRAUD?”

Those are the words boldly displayed on the front page of the Philadelphia Daily News.

The article in question is about a local radio DJ (whose mugshot is also displayed on the front page) committing some type of fraud. This is apparently big news, but I know none of the details. Quite frankly, I don’t care to know them.

The back cover of the newspaper is dedicated to local sports teams. This page has a picture of the Philadelphia Eagles with the words “BOMBS AWAY?” bombastically displayed beneath the team. Philadelphians really love their sports. In fact, it’s all I ever hear my coworkers talk about. “Hey man, how about those Birds/Phils/Flyers?” People will buy an entire newspaper just to discard everything but the sports section. I outgrew watching sports when I turned 13, although I confess that I will watch the occasional hockey or football game with my friends. There’s just too many damn rules in sports today. You have a bunch of large strong men making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year (sometimes millions), and they aren’t allowed to be too rough with each other? That’s crap.

I digress.

The cost of the aforementioned newspaper: $1. One dollar to read a bunch of sloppily-written sensationalistic stories with spelling errors that both confuse and infuriate. I ask myself if this is what the people really want, if maybe the world has just a shred of dignity left within it. Are people so ignorant as to enjoy this moronic mass of mush written for people with a 4th grade reading level? My question is immediately answered by a loud ignorant voice beckoning across the work area: “HEY MAN HOW ABOUT THAT GAME LAST NIGHT?” Yeah, how about it?

I hear your dissertation now. “But AJ, that’s just the Daily News. There are other papers that are much better, like the New York Times or the Washington Post!”

No. Stop right there.

Yes, the New York Times and the Washington Post are written a little better than the Daily News. Yes, they focus a little less on sensationalistic stories. If we were to judge it solely by its reading level, it would definitely outrank many papers in the country. Not to say much for the quality of American media.

Their biggest and most glaring flaw is the obvious political slants that pollute their articles. Here’s an excerpt from the first article I saw on the New York Times’ website:

“Dozens of Iranian protesters screaming ‘death to England!’ stormed the vast British embassy compound in central Tehran on Tuesday, tore down the British flag, smashed windows and ransacked the offices in what appeared to be an officially sanctioned protest of Britain’s particularly tough economic sanctions against Iran over its suspect nuclear energy program.”

“…in what appeared to be an officially sanctioned protest…”. Okay, so obviously the author of this article has some form of proof that these protests were sanctioned by the Iranian government, right? Nope. Here’s the author’s rationale for his claim:

“Although the official Iranian media characterized the protest as a genuine outburst of popular anger against Britain, it was clear that the event had been ordained by the authorities, who in the past have orchestrated attacks on embassies, storming in only at the last minute. Iran’s security forces and its Basij militia have maintained strict control over mass protests in Iran since the disputed election of 2009.

Images transmitted from the scene showed riot police standing by during the assault and later helping protesters inside the embassy grounds go back to the street outside. Press TV, a government news web site, said police dispersed the demonstrators and were ‘protecting the embassy building and the documents inside.’”

So the author’s claim that the protests were sanctioned by the government is based on the past behavior of Iranian security forces? This is what passes for evidence nowadays? You’re writing an article meant to be accepted as truth, you pompous jackass. Unless the Iranian government explicitly came out with a statement saying that they supported the attack, this is only your opinion. Opinion has no place in an article meant to be accepted as a factual account of an event, and only serves to influence the weak-minded. What’s so hard about telling us what happened without inserting your opinion into the story? Yeah, I would probably draw the same conclusions myself, but those conclusions don’t matter. Your job is to report, not to commentate. Just shut the fuck up and tell us what happened without giving us your asinine analysis.

This is the biggest problem that plagues the media. We can never just hear what happened. We have to hear it from a liberal or conservative point of view. Obviously we’re too stupid to form our own opinion based on evidence, so the reporters have to form it for us.

I guess that’s why they make the big bucks, right?

Fuck the media, and fuck the retards who buy an entire newspaper just for the sports section.

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