When are opinions biased and when are they unbiased?

There is no such thing as unbiased.

@mazingerz88: “Is there a news channel or internet based company out there that delivers only straight news?”

What would (or could) that even mean. Every piece of info has a context. And deciding what that context is (or isn’t) is itself a bias. The concept of “unbiased” news doesn’t make very much sense. It’s also not even desirable.

I think good reporting still gets done, and ubiased sources are still out there.

BUT almost none of that includes so-called “alternative” wamedia, or major broadcast news. Instead the most reliable coverage tends to come from old school print publications, and a few non-profit sources like NPR – all of them struggling financially.

I don’t believe there has been a real TV journalist out there since Mike Wallace. The rest are just talking heads.

When I say so.

Everyone has the bias of their own perspectives.

But on top of that can be layered intentional filters from a reporter’s employer, passed down from its owners and their political agendas, which control what is and is not reported, and in what way.

Traditionally, that’s not supposed to happen. Journalists are supposed to do their best to report information objectively from their own perspective as an impartial professional journalist.

The major global news agencies which are sources for most news stories aim to be objective.

There also used to be US regulation on truthful reporting, which expired some time ago…

No such thing as an unbiased opinion. You can try to be objective, but we all bring our point-of-view and preexisting perspectives with us. Unbiased reporting would not be opinion, it would be just relaying events. Even then there is a danger of the reporter’s commentary having bias in it. In today’s media there is a lot of reporters, or actors, giving the news who are giving their comments and opinions rather than interviewing people from different viewpoints of the same new item and getting different perspectives.

It is stunning me how my TV is full of talking heads asking each other questions like they are experts instead of asking actual experts. Like on fiscal matters and taxes, are they asking economists and accountants? No, they ask each other. I don’t think I have ever seen an accountant or a former IRS auditor on a cable news show. Why not?

There is still some good reporting, but mostly in print. Print reporters don’t really hold TV reporters in very high regard, it is theater most often, just reading from a teleprompter.

A Democrat, for example, that gives a positive slant on Democrats is biased. A Republican that gives a positive slant on Democrats is unbiased.

Journalists aren’t there to give their own views on a subject but to explain what the different views are and why people hold them. For example when it comes to the coronavirus I want to know what Dr Anthony Fauci has to say rather than any journalist or politician.

@hello321 The concept of “unbiased” news doesn’t make very much sense. It’s also not even desirable.

Huh?? Unbiased news is undesirable?

@smudges: “Huh?? Unbiased news is undesirable?”

Bias primarily manifests by omission and curation of “facts” to be presented. If you strip out the curation of what is and is not important, you’re left with a bombardment of “facts” where reporting on Aunt Jane’s bum knee is competing with a crime bill being debated in congress.

“Unbiased” is really a nonsensical concept that only exists because the concept itself is dripping with ideology, and is the very definition of bias.

What should be important, in my opinion, is identifying the biases that exist in every news source. For example, we should expect corporate news to present a right-wing, capitalist, Western-centric point of view. We’d expect their selection and curation of what is and isn’t news to fit this model. And it does not disappoint.

So, yes, not only is “unbiased” impossible – it’s undesirable. We shouldn’t wish for the flattening of concern. There are things that are more important for people to know than other things. Any attempt at creating an “unbiased” news would be surreal, inhuman, and immoral.

@hello321 – I expect that responses to posts like this one will always reflect several different viewpoints, and be based on a wide range of personal experience – good and bad. So we can (and probably will) disagree on what the best news sources may be. But it’s a good question that I think deserves some thought before firing off an answer.

Your own opinion is probably based on a critical look at the news that’s available to most of us from media that we can readily access, and your disappointment at what you’ve seen. So is mine. But I think it’s a mistake to substitute cynicism for skepticism.

Saying that lack of bias is both nonexistent and undesirable leaves nothing of value for anyone who’s really trying to make reasonable judgements about accuracy and fairness in reporting. It’s an extreme conclusion, and one that somebody looking for an argument could tag as “nonsensical” in its own way. My own feeling is that if all of us finally surrender our expectation of what unbiased and balanced news coverage is and should be, we lose our ability to judge whatever we’re told by anyone.

On this question the truth really depends on us. Once honesty and fairness disappear from our own thinking it ceases to exist anywhere.

@JLoon: “Your own opinion is probably based on a critical look at the news that’s available to most of us from media that we can readily access, and your disappointment at what you’ve seen.”

Absolutely not. It has nothing to do with expectations and disappointment.

@JLoon: “But I think it’s a mistake to substitute cynicism for skepticism.”

When you throw a ball in the air, it’s not cynicism to know it’s going to fall due to gravity. You’re completely misunderstanding what I’m saying.

@JLoon: “Saying that lack of bias is both nonexistent and undesirable leaves nothing of value for anyone who’s really trying to make reasonable judgements about accuracy and fairness in reporting.”

You haven’t given this enough thought. Lack of bias is not only nonexistent – it’s not a logical possibility. So, why would it be reasonable for people to want it?

@JLoon: “t’s an extreme conclusion, and one that somebody looking for an argument could tag as “nonsensical” in its own way.”

Is describing logical possibilities “extreme” to you? Is “extreme” a pejorative in your opinion?

@JLoon: “My own feeling is that if all of us finally surrender our expectation of what unbiased and balanced news coverage is and should be, we lose our ability to judge whatever we’re told by anyone.”

I think your own feeling here is completely wrong, and that is my assertion. If we are to pretend that “unbiased” news is possible – despite it being an impossibility – we abandon the entire project of determining what is true and false.

You are presenting your position here, which happens to align with the mainstream myth about bias and “news”. It’s an abandonment of skepticism (not cynicism) that is presenting as a reasonable quest for truth.

@JLoon: “On this question the truth really depends on us. Once honesty and fairness disappear from our own thinking it ceases to exist anywhere.”

You really need to think about what you’re asserting here. You’re literally asserting that we should ignore truth while making poetic appeals to truth.

@hello321 – Thank you for mansplaining my answer to me.

But I’m even more lucky, because your response could be a prime example what happens when someone gives up on finding or applying standards of fairness and objectivity in their own thinking -The only game left is verbal dodgeball. I was wondering if anyone would understand, now all they have to do is read your stuff.

Appreciate it bro ;)

And now that we’ve both won our sarcasm points let me suggest something : Part of the problem in answering this question might be that too few of us are making any clear distinction between opinion and facts. That might be because so much of the lousy “news” reporting found online and through broadcasts rolls over the difference as though it never existed. But it does. And it matters.

What I was referring to in my answer is basic rules for accuracy & balance in straight news coverage of factual events. Not commentary or editorial opinion. Standards like these, that reporters working for credible news agencies are expected to follow:

https://www.thenewsmanual.net/Manuals%20Volume%203/volume3_57.htm

So do I think these rules are foolproof, and guarantee fair and accurate news every time? No. That outcome still depends on the experience, skill, and judgement of sometimes fallible human beings working on the ground in the face of often confusing realities. But if the rest of us understand what the limits of bias and falsehoods should be, we can do a better job of holding news media accountable at every level.

@JLoon: “Thank you for mansplaining my answer to me.”

Ouch. This self-own aside, we are really talking past each other. My “mansplaining” was apparently a failure, as you went on to ignore the fact that your “unbiased” news, which has never existed and has never even logically been defined, is a valuable goal rather than identifying bias.

@hello321 – Ubiased news has never existed, or been logically defined??

This ^^^^^^ readers, is an opinion – and an argument.

This, on the other hand: https://www.oregonlive.com/coronavirus/2021/02/coronavirus-in-oregon-state-reports-393-cases-4-new-deaths.html

is something I read today in the online version of The Oregonian newspaper. It’s a fact, and pretty accurate & unbiased (for the daily O). The story is fairly straightforward I think, and doesn’t cry out for logical definition or metanalysis.

Besides that it’s the kind of reporting that people in the community can reasonably verify by checking their own experience and other local sources. It’s a straight news story providing what you could call useful information.

And it holds up because the reporter and the editor followed the rules and stuck to common standards for accuracy and objectivity. It does happen and it can be done.

So, what were saying about all that other… stuff?

Christ. I’m done. We’re not even arguing about the same thing.

This is like having a discussion about accents, where I’m asserting that everyone has one, while you’re stating that a specific accent is pleasant to listen to.

@hello321 – I hope you’re cute, because this kind of flirting gets me so excited ; p

We are talking about the same thing, but not thinking about it the same way. Probably because you don’t believe that fairness and objectivity are real things, or worth your time.

Oh well. Thanks for the fun.

For the broken link to reporting guidelines :

https://www.thenewsmanual.net/Manuals%20Volume%203/volume3_57.html