Robert Murdoch is hardly unknown. Anyone who tries can dig up information on his life. There weren't any real revelations in that movie, all that frightens me--and no offense meant--is the reaction of people who watch this movie.

Its shocking people don't know this stuff. FOX news has been criticized by every independent media out there for its bias. Even biased media criticize FOX for its bias because its so blatant and so political. Even the Christian Science Monitor which is nominally conservative has criticized FOX, so have other conservative media outlets which maintain that while its fine to have a conservative bias, one should not openly distort information or actively cover up information.

Then again, while FOX is bad its openly bad. I could say worse for the media that isn't honest about their bias, NBC or CBS feign independence but still distort and spin the news. They're just not as blatant and unafraid as FOX.

Oro's got it right. FOX is pretty bias, but a lot of places are. You'd be hard pressed to find a source that -wasn't- biased.

Well of course all news sources have a spin to them, but I never realized how much of a spin FOX News had. I always tuned into it and just went with it. I never thought of it until I saw this, and it was kind of scary how blatant FOX does it and still gets away with it.

if you didnt realize how much spin fox had, you must be watching with your ears closed!

seriously, i just find its packaged news more interesting. i dont plan on watching the antifox movie. i dont watch any political movie because im more interested in persuasion by written word than tv program. i read more political websites than any of you, its something im a bit of a junkie on.

the thing with fox news is this: they mix a lot of commentary in with their news programming. essentially the news is what goes on during the day or overnight, where the talking head speaks and the stock scroller scrolls. but they meld into commentary with maybe 75% of their programming, a majority of which is conservative.

so one thing needs to be kept in mind: when they talk about *news* only, and show car chases and what happened in baseball and who's having a summit about world debt, is it biased? when it goes to hannity beating up colmes at night, is it news?

difference i think.

i admit to being conservative, and im not ashamed, but people need to realize that "fox news" is minority share "news" and majority share "commentary"

basically any program that takes a topic, splits a screen, and has two to four heads sharing a screen yelling at each other isnt news.

I'd also recommend these documentaries for some similar ideas:

Control Room- An interesting look at Al-Jazeera, the arab news network. Takes the view that they're mostly a bunch of educated, arab intellectuals trying to bring fair journalism to a region where media is typically tightly controlled, and not Bin Laden's private propaganda outlet as the Bush Administration likes to depict them.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0391024/

The Corporation- Pretty eye opening. A frightening look at how business is run in the US and abroad.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0379225/

And the thing about OutFoxed is, it doesn't just show that FOX News is biased, it reveals that many of their practices are blatantly unethical by most journalistic standards.

Fox News: Fair and Balanced We Report, You Decide.

When you have activist media outlets feigning objectivity through clever sloganeering, democracy suffers. Journalists are supposed to act as the fourth estate, keeping the public informed on what government officials are up to. When the line between public relations and journalism blurs, citizens have to sift through miles of bullshit to make informed decisions.

If Fox News waved their conservative freak flag openly, I'd have no problem with them. While both Al Franken and Rush Limbaugh are skilled entertainers, they're so open about their political agendas that you know they're acting as mouthpieces for their respective parties. Bill O'Reilly claims to be an independent working in the no-spin zone.

See the difference?

What's so scary about Fox News is that their format is such a success that media owners around the nation have begun to copy it. Just look at MSNBC. The financial backers used to view objectivity as quaint.

Now it's a liability.

The truth has a pesky way of finding its way to the public. Let's just hope we can still recognize it when it does.

Thought I'd throw out a very brief view from a somewhat conservative side.

This goes both ways. FOX was created because of the growing bias of every other news source. Thinking that it's biased comes from the observer seeing from a liberal point of view. If you're looking from the point of view of the other newsgroups, yes, FOX has a pretty conservative bias. This can be related to people too, not only FOX or groups under the microscope.

Here's an example everyone can see. People's personal position (liberal/conservative) can be viewed very differently, depending on who's looking at them. To my conservative friends, they think I've got some pretty liberal notions in my head, though they'd say I'm still conservative. My really liberal friends think I'm just a few notches short of Stalin. My slightly liberal friends, and this is true in every instance, every single one of them is shocked to find out that I usually support the Republican party's views (though I find a lot of things... distasteful - I'm an independant conservative at heart).

Relate this to yourself, or people you know, or FOX, or even your own favorite national news network. If you're liberal, you probably think these news networks aren't that bad (or is bad because it's just another corporation and you find them alltogether distasteful). If you're conservative, you probably do. If you're independant like me, you rely on The Drudge Report.

Now, why I really started this post...

"If Fox News waved their conservative freak flag openly..."

What party do you think the directors and producers of both those films are, outcrowd? Sure, I'd probably agree that Al-Jazeera isn't that bad. I have no argument with you there, because I really don't know enough about Al-Jazeera. You could be entirely correct. But it's going to be biased; just from the start you kind of have to accept that. Who has more reason to make this kind of film, an independant producer or a producer who's trying to get you to agree with him? You can see it's going to be the latter, because you're pointing out the fact that it "Takes the view that they're mostly a bunch of educated, arab intellectuals..." Shouldn't this be done from an outsider's view, someone who is entirely disinterested in the reputation of either the Bush Administration or Al-Jazeera?

About The Corportation. You know what, even as a conservative, I'm not a huge corporation fan. It's all based so strongly in materialism, I think it's kind of silly. I don't hate them, want them all to burn or anything, I just think they're kind of silly. BUT they do create a lot of jobs, and that's a good thing. Men need work, that's jsut how it is. That all being said...

Who would write The Corporation? It's certainly not anyone who likes corporations. It's pretty certain that it's not going to be anyone who doesn't care about them. Hell, why bother making a movie about them if you didn't care one way or the other who's right about them. Again, you're looking into a biased view, and you're doing it on purpose what's more. Sure, it may have some truth, but what can you be certain about that can be taken to the bank?

Breen has a point that I didn't even think about- they really do have a lot more commentary than news. That's another big point.

Oro has a VERY good point. Most people just don't know. I'm not talking about FOX, NBC, anything in particular. I'm making a huge generalization. People just don't seem to care- look at election turnouts. It's pathetic that the freedom to elect officials and participate in government at an intimate level is so unappreciated.

When I get the chance, I'm gonna watch this. I love watching things for bias, logical fallacies, etc. from both sides of the spectrum! If you have some others, I'd love to hear about them, especially conservative bias. Not trying to make any stabs, but its just the truth that there are a whole lot more liberal flicks out there than conservative flicks. C'est Hollywood I suppose.

I agree that the films I recommended are definitely biased toward specific conclusions. That's a given. Still, the points raised by them are definitely worth considering. As for the supposed liberal bias of the mainstream press, well, that's a neat little trick isn't it? The major media are all in one way or another in the pocket of the wealthy elite and the corporations they run. At best their coverage of the issues (or conspicuous lack of coverage) is somewhere toward the center. Most of the time, however, the mainstream news has little to nothing to do with actual news and focuses on celebrity gossip and violent crime. Neither of these subjects can be said to belong to the left or the right.

So by calling the mainstream media liberal, when actually it's much closer to the center, you set the standard for "liberal" much further right than the reality. This allows anyone who disagrees with the far-right conservatives to be called liberal. Of course, I personally don't see anything wrong with being labeled such, but the hysterical propagandists of the ruling class have somehow managed to convince a lot of the US that anyone who votes Democrat (in actuality a fairly conservative party by any standards) is intent on giving bombs to terrorists, making your children gay and throwing out loads of drugs for everyone to get addicted to. Incidentally, there's solid evidence that the CIA, a favorite tool of the conservative elite, has done at least two of those things.

I proudly hold the beliefe that no one should be destitute while others are obscenely rich. If that makes me liberal, then Yay Liberalism! :P

It's a solid, well done picture, if a bit pointless. Who actually thought they were legitimate? People here watch it for a laugh, since it's so absurd.

Some of the shown evidence of specific blatant journalistic misconduct is pretty interesting, though.

EDIT Addendum:

I need to add, in comment to Bear, that I believe they have indeed reported news events in a clearly biased, distorted manner. I have no specific examples, but a lot of the terrorism/war coverage has not been impartial.

And it's not a matter of looking at things with a liberal/conservative point of view. It's an American preoccupation, I'm neither, and the ridiculous way Fox conducts itself is wholly evident. I'm not saying other news sources in the US are completely bias-free, I'm sure they're not since the vast majority are privately owned. However, Fox News is way above and beyond.

Also, when I lived in the US, I was regularly astonished at how many otherwise bright, intelligent citizens did not even know basic details such as Al-Qaeda being basically created and trained by the US government. Kind of scary, makes me glad that my national news service is publically owned : )

Communism for the win.

Bear didnt write on this thread! :P

Anyways you bring up the issue of war coverage being biased.

It just makes sense to me that American media would much rather see America successful in a military venture. Admittedly you cant hide the worst of it. But frankly I'd rather the American media be a bit more pro-America in matters of war. Call it what you wish.

But it is also a journalists responsibility to report the truth, and if the truth brings up doubts about the US leadership? The argument that because we are at war we should abandon any dissent and fall in line with our leaders or risk losing should be considered entirely unacceptable in a country that is supposed to be governed "by the people, and for the people."

outcrowd1 The argument that because we are at war we should abandon any dissent and fall in line with our leaders or risk losing should be considered entirely unacceptable in a country that is supposed to be governed "by the people, and for the people."

This is a far cry from what I said, and frankly a disappointing argument made by some critics of the war and Bush. The "any dissent squelched" is a Straw man. [Also, another disappointing straw man is the response to legitimate anti-war, anti-bush criticism as "an attack on patriotism." That one really irritates me. An attack on patriotism is calling someone an "America Hater" or a "Blame America Firster" or "you want the terrorists to win" which is usually what someone who has very little of a substantive argument has to say. I leave attacks on patriotism to the commentators.] Aside from maybe an extreme few, and perhaps reading into a comment made by a former press secretary, nobody in their right mind wants to eliminate the first amendment protections.

I'd just think it common sense that in a war of America v Anybody, American reporters would answer "Who do you want to win" with the answer "America." There is more going on in Iraq than the usual "death count = X+1 thanks to IED" or "car bomb kills N." I understand that news is oversimplified and compressed into 2 minute tidbits with heavy sound bites and out of context quotes and statistics, which is largely why I dont watch any TV news. I prefer internet news sites which allow me to consume and click at my own pace.

(edit: added "patriotism attack" straw man)

Dr Breen

I'd just think it common sense that in a war of America v Anybody, American reporters would answer "Who do you want to win" with the answer "America."

Reporters should be able to keep themselves, in their work at least, impartial. They need to be able to discover and report who IS winning, not who they think should be. When a biased press deliberately distorts or covers up facts in order to obscure the truth of what's happening in a war, it's no longer journalism, it's propaganda.

There is very little reported in the US about how the war is being conducted by either side. There is little mention of the large amount of evidence that the administration lied in order to convince congress to allow the war. There is almost no mention of the fact that Bush's cronies in the defense and oil industries are making immense profits from the war at the expense of American taxpayers. You are perfectly justified in finding your news online. I don't think it's necessary to eliminate the First Amendment when the press is perfectly willing to only report what the government would like them to.

outcrowd1

There is almost no mention of the fact that Bush's cronies in the defense and oil industries are making immense profits from the war at the expense of American taxpayers. You are perfectly justified in finding your news online. I don't think it's necessary to eliminate the First Amendment when the press is perfectly willing to only report what the government would like them to.

As per those who make money off the war, one reason i use online news. you can find that all day there. as far as the first amendment goes, nothing i advocated violated any provision of this:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

And as much as I know this isnt going on. Well, i take that back. I do take issue with "free speech zones" and some of the time place manner restrictions on protests. So I will grant that, though it is not a Congressional thing you would find in the U.S.C.A. Is the mass media lazy? yes. Are they interested in the whole story? No. They dont have time for it.

As for everything else, we agree to disagree.