Media Bias

Media has been playing a significant role in our daily lives by developing our personalities, enriching our knowledge and providing us with different sorts of information. It has a tremendous power in framing cultural guidelines and shaping political dissertation. If the information provided to the U.S. citizens is distorted, then they cannot make informed decisions on the matters of public policy. Thus, it becomes vital to the American democracy that the news media and its institutions remain unbiased, fair and accurate. Media bias happens when a media systematically and persistently emphasize one particular point of view that is usually below the standards of professional journalism. There can be various reasons for media bias, some of

Such coverage, along with the vivid images that emerge on T.V. led to a serious rise in anti-war protest that was merely strengthened by the events of 1968. The Tet Offensive of 1968 marked the greatest conflict in beliefs of the United Stated government and the media. In January, North Vietnamese troops attacked the North cities of South Vietnam and the U.S. embassy in Saigon. The media and the television, however, portrayed the attack as a brutal defeat for the U.S, totally altering the outcome of the war at the very moment when government officials were publicly stating that victory in Vietnam was "just around the corner" (Wyatt 167)[8]. The media covered all the events that immediately followed the Tet Offensive and the American public began wondering whether this war could be won. Don Oberdorfer a Washington reporter said that “there’s no doubt Tet was one of the biggest events in contemporary American history, within two months the, American body politically turned around on the war. And they were significantly

During the Vietnam War, Americans were greatly influenced by the extensive media coverage of the war. Before the 1960’s and the intensification of the war, public news coverage of military action was constrained heavily by the government and was directed by Government policy. The Vietnam War uniquely altered the perception of war in the eyes of American citizens by bringing the war into their homes. The Vietnam War was the first U.S uncensored war resulting in the release of graphic images and unaltered accounts of horrific events that helped to change public opinion of the war like nothing it had ever been. This depiction by the media led to a separation between the United States government and the press; much of what was reported flouted

The Vietnam War had no restrictions on what the media could and couldn’t cover, making a very public war. Journalists from big companies and small towns went to Vietnam to cover what was happening. Some went for the excitement and adventure. Others wanted to be on page one and be part of the exclusive combat correspondent club. These journalists were taking any information they could get and were sending it back to for American people to view. These journalists could even go into North Vietnam, if they had the courage too. Some journalists, based of what they saw, believed that the war was unwinnable. The military ended up blaming the media for the loss because the turned the American people against the troops in Vietnam through the information

During this time period, the use of television boomed, and for the first time was depended on and trusted significantly more than newspapers. “[Even though] the coverage of the war was significant, a relatively small portion of the coverage was actually combat footage (Anderson). Although producers captured thousands of hours worth of combat footage, they could not push out all of the coverage they captured, “The purpose being not to avoid showing the ugly side of war, but rather to avoid offending families of war victims" (Hallin). The media did not intentionally try to turn america against the war, to the contrary the media saw the war necessary to national security. However, as the war continued on in vietnam and watched daily in living rooms across the country, both the american soldiers and the public became disillusioned as they did not see an end to the war

By 1968, more than half of the American people relied on television as their principal source of news. What they saw informed, engrossed, and unsettled them. CBS Evening News anchor Harry Reasoner referred to it as “horrors and failures.” The Vietnam War dominated the network newscast as it never had before. Suddenly the war was everywhere. The impact on the American public would indeed be great. It set off a critical reaction to the war within the American media and gave greater credence to arguments against the war that a vocal protest movement had been voicing for some time. The media coverage of the Tet Offensive had a great influence on the eventual outcome of the fighting and its aftermath. Clarence Wyatt, author of Paper

Due to the fact that Americans were exposed to these disturbing footages, many Americans started to think twice about the war and its cause. One of the responsible for showing these footages to the American public was American journalist Walter Leland Cronkite. He was the anchorman for CBS news during the years of the Vietnam War. To many american he became what many called, “the most trusted man in America” because of the transparency of the reports. Due to the huge amount of controversy, the was this so called,” Credibility Gap”, which consisted of various levels of credibility among the American public. People started doubting the cause of the war. Many Americans believed that their troops were fighting for a lost cause. As a result, many college students started protesting against the draft and the war in general because they believed that it was just going to keep costing the lives of many Americans. With the anti-war movement came the Students for Democratic Society (SDS). the SDS helped in many protests going throughout the United States in order to promote awareness against this lost cause we were fighting in Vietnam. In the years to come, many Americans continued to protest and tried to get the government to end the war in Vietnam. Richard M. Nixon

In the two months after Tet, television stories in which journalists editorialized news rose 14.1 percent. The most significant statement came from Walter Cronkite who concluded, ”that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate.” After Cronkite’s statement, coverage of American involvement in the war became predominantly negative. The press now began questioning the war. The New York Times, Newsweek and even conservative editors at the Wall Street Journal declared that the United States would never achieve military superiority in Vietnam. Combat scenes were more graphic, and films of civilian casualties increased from a pre-Tet average of 0.85 times per week

As more and more troops were being sent to Vietnam, and the casualties began to rise, people began to question the government’s involvement. “Even military troops came to mistrust their government’s reasons for keeping them there, as well as Washington’s claims that the war was being won”.(Vietnam War) The Vietnam war was the first war to be broadcast on television. This meant that for the first time the American people were able to see the war instead of just hearing about it on the radio. They were able to see firsthand the soldier’s faces, see the reality of where they were fighting and to see the

Whether it is news channels on the television or whether it is Twitter and Facebook news, the public will always have a way to find out current reports. Since society has become so dependent on technology, a greater amount of individuals get their actual news online and especially through social media. As many of the public know, you cannot trust what people online are saying. Since individuals are so accustomed to getting the news online, many of them tend to believe what they just happen to scroll across on Twitter and Facebook or any other sort of social media. Finding actual facts and truths on the news have become so difficult now, due to all of the millions of different sites and places where we can get our news from. The news online tend to be biased and untrue due to how openly and freely individuals can create their own site and “reports” on current events such as a real news channels would. Social media has just made it more complicated to find the actual accuracy of current events but with enough research, dedication, and using the SMELL test, finding the right information would not be as

In today’s society, remaining connected and knowledgeable of current events and the newest trends is vital to staying ahead in business, education, and social standing. This information is supplied to everyone through the internet, newspapers, television, and radio. One can tune into stations such as CNN, NBC, Fox News, Al-Jazeera, and many others (“SQs of Media Outlets”). In order to meet the needs of viewers, readers, and listeners, the ideal media system would contain accurate, quick information, with a purely impartial view on the facts as they are known. However, this modern media system has not maintained an objective view, pushing opinionated and slanted reporting onto the population in order to create profit and gain customers. The exploitation of information media for personal gain has created a toxic and inaccurate present, constant in today’s society.

Before the invention of Television, most people could not possibly be completely cognizant of events going on overseas or even on the other side of the country and therefore had to rely on the Presidents’ word. In 1968, the Vietnam War was at its peak. President Johnson held fast to his belief that we would be able to win so the American people continued to support him. However CBS’s Walter Cronkite decided to make a trip to the war-torn country of Vietnam to see the current situation with his own eyes. When he returned he announced to the American public that the war was hopeless and there was no way that military victory was possible. Johnson knew that the American people greatly respected Cronkite and that they would all believe the war was hopeless. So the only thing for him to do was to pull troops out of Vietnam and call the war “an honorable attempt to defend democracy.” I believe that Cronkite’s coverage of the war was a good thing because it allowed the American public to see exactly what was going on and make their own decisions about the situation. People no longer had to rely only on the President. Cronkite’s documentary was also an important deciding

The coincidence of the growth of television with the first military defeat for America was used by the government to explain why the war was lost: it wasn’t because of government policy or by underestimating the enemy but because television journalism and lack of censorship that undermined the whole operation “by ‘graphic and unremitting distortion’ of the facts, pessimism, and unvarnished depiction of both Americas youthful casualties and American ‘atrocities’ inflicted on the Vietnamese.” The amount of televisions in America was on the increase; ‘In 1950, only 9 percent of homes owned a television. By 1966, this figure rose to 93 percent.’ This alone shows the sheer coverage that the news had and the potential influence that it could impose upon the minds of the people. Not only did more people have television sets in their homes but more and more people were relying on television over any other medium to obtain their news. The survey conducted by the Roper organisation for the Television Information Office in 1972 shows us that 64% of people got most of their news from television, an 8% increase from the survey conducted in 1964. Another factor in the power of television was not just the fact that it reached a wide audience, it was also the fact that people were more likely to believe what the television news said over reports in the newspaper or radio, especially if the reports were conflicting in nature. This was due to two factors; the personality who

At the beginning of television news an arrangement existed between television journalists and the public. It was look at as that in modern times promotion journalism was normal. The United States was the modern, broadminded leader of the free world. When Walter Cronkite reported on the daily count of deaths of American soldiers in Vietnam, in lead to the antiwar disapprovals of the 1960s. One man changed how the United States look at the war with his power and influence to change people opinions. (Mann)

Although the public did view the war in Vietnam first hand, the picture was black and white and the quality was poor. The news was also at least 24 hours old when the public received it since the tapes were shippied from Vietnam to the United States. This allowed for more editing then the instantainous news that the public is accustomed to today. The editors and the