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Could it be that the media is biased based on catering to the majority of their viewership, rather than biasing their coverage for "racist" reasons? I haven't done the research on this, but I'd be willing to bet that a vast majority of those who watch the news regularly are white, and therefore the stories are biased in that direction- it's not "racism", it's "business". One could argue that the news is supposed to "be for everyone", but it's a business just like all others, and relies on ad revenue.
Look at what happened for years in the publishing industry- we had rags like Woman's Day, Family Circle, blah, blah, blah, and they all catered to the whims of middle to upper class white women. Then along came Jet, Ebony, and even O, all catering to either the black reader or at the least a more balanced readership (in O's case). No one accuses such magazines as being "biased toward blacks"- they're simply "reaching out to the previously unrepresented audience". If, however, someone created a magazine called "Whitey", there'd be holy hell to pay for that one.
Could it be that the media is biased based on catering to the majority of their viewership, rather than biasing their coverage for "racist" reasons? I haven't done the research on this, but I'd be willing to bet that a vast majority of those who watch the news regularly are white, and therefore the stories are biased in that direction- it's not "racism", it's "business". One could argue that the news is supposed to "be for everyone", but it's a business just like all others, and relies on ad revenue.
Look at what happened for years in the publishing industry- we had rags like Woman's Day, Family Circle, blah, blah, blah, and they all catered to the whims of middle to upper class white women. Then along came Jet, Ebony, and even O, all catering to either the black reader or at the least a more balanced readership (in O's case). No one accuses such magazines as being "biased toward blacks"- they're simply "reaching out to the previously unrepresented audience". If, however, someone created a magazine called "Whitey", there'd be holy hell to pay for that one.
Jet and Ebony are very established magazines, and yes, they're known for catering to the African American community. These magazines were established at a time when stories affecting blacks were not well-covered by the mainstream media; also many mainstream media outlets aided, directly and indirectly, in spreading misconceptions of black Americans. Hence, those magazines were not established to exclude any other groups, rather they were established to fill a void.
You are somewhat correct in insinuating people's bias towards others that look or talk like them. However, it's hard not to wonder whether journalists and media outlets are violating journalism ethics or principles in regards to inherent bias in their coverage of missing persons.
On a final note, the media's apparent favoritism of missing persons cases involving missing young white women echoes this country's long myth of the young, innocent white girl and the threat posed by ravenous black men. Also, in the past, many white segregationist southerners opposed integrating schools primarily because they believed that black boys would have their way with their white girls.
Last edited by south-to-west; 12-07-2007 at 03:44 PM..
You are somewhat correct in insinuating people's bias towards others that look or talk like them. However, it's hard not to wonder whether journalists and media outlets are violating journalism ethics or principles in regards to inherent bias in their coverage of missing persons.
"Journalism ethics"??? Isn't that one of those oxymorons like "military intelligence"????
Quote:
Originally Posted by south-to-west
On a final note, the media's apparent favoritism of missing persons cases involving missing young white women echoes this country's long myth of the young, innocent white girl and the threat posed by ravenous black men. Also, in the past, many white segregationist southerners opposed integrating schools primarily because they believed that black boys would have their way with their white girls.
How did we go from "missing white women" to an infatuation with "ravenous black men"? Not a single one of the 5 or 6 missing white women you listed were in any way tied to any black men- especially not any of the "ravenous" variety. I'm thinking you're connecting dots that are on different puzzle book pages there..........
"Journalism ethics"??? Isn't that one of those oxymorons like "military intelligence"????
LOL!!!
Quote:
How did we go from "missing white women" to an infatuation with "ravenous black men"? Not a single one of the 5 or 6 missing white women you listed were in any way tied to any black men- especially not any of the "ravenous" variety. I'm thinking you're connecting dots that are on different puzzle book pages there..........
Sorry if my post sounded misleading, but my main point wasn't about black streotypes, rather it was mainly about the myth of the young, innocent white girl and this country's historical obsession with protecting the virtue and innocence of white women.
Last edited by south-to-west; 12-07-2007 at 03:44 PM..
Could it be that the media is biased based on catering to the majority of their viewership, rather than biasing their coverage for "racist" reasons?
I'm not at all saying this justifies the mainstream media's lack of missing persons coverage for anybody that isn't a young, beuatiful, middle-class, white female, but Bob might be on to something...
Let's look at the U.S. poulation:
White Population: 74.7% (215.3 million)
Black Population: 12.1% (35 million)
These numbers don't change the fact that the media should treat all missing persons cases in a similar manner, but if the majority of the viewers are white the stories are probably going to be geared towards the demographic. Likewise, as South-to-West pointed out, magazines such as Jet and Ebony are geared towards the black demographic to fill the void. It sucks that is divided this way, but as long as people feel a connection to others that look or talk like them it probably won't go away...
It sucks that is divided this way, but as long as people feel a connection to others that look or talk like them it probably won't go away...
Yup- BET needs to start their own news network (they could call it "BNN"....lol) that caters to their viewship. Unfortunately, as was discussed in another thread, if the owners of BET thought there'd be money in such a station, it would already be in existence. Instead, BET keeps showing all the crap programming that so many educated blacks take offense to, but which the marketing polls show to be the biggest draws.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve_W
Obviously there is plenty of media bias, but for you to suggest the bias is directed against blacks is absurd.
I don't think the suggestion that it's possible is absurd, but it would be nice to see some basis for the assertion other than "it must be happening".
Some of the postings made later in this thread provide links which appear to suggest that there might be something to it.
Of course, not all biases are negative. I tend to be postiively biased towards friends and family members and negatively biased towards mass murderers, for example.
I read one stat that showed missing people, broken down by race/ethnicity. Missing whites (including Hispanics/Latinos) was about 62%. Missing Blacks was about 29%. If you look at the per-capita, there are more Blacks missing than Whites.
And I'll bet that a Nexis search of news stories involving missing people, would undoubtedly show more coverage dedicated to missing Whites than anyone else.
Be careful with statements like that, unless you've got some unbiased statistical data to prove them. For example, on the death penalty numbers, are you basing your statement on the number of black executions vs the number of white executions? If so, would it stand to reason that perhaps that's due to the number of blacks that commit capital-punishment crimes being higher than the number of whites (I don't know the answer to that, btw)? It's statements like that which are often taken out of context and make an issue seem different (or worse) than it really is.
Are there mental health issues that prevail in poor black communities that don't exist in poor white or hispanic communties? Again, I don't know, but maybe there's something to that statement- if so, I'd think some research would have been done on it, and there would probably be someone crying out about it somewhere.
Unbiased statistic. Kinda like you said, military intelligence...
Extremely hard to come by. In any case, the Human Rights Watch has some very detailed reports about United States crime statistics, race, gender, and punishment. If your're interesting is seening some obvious disparities, take a look at the report titled, "Percentage of Drug Offenders Admitted to Prison by Race". Another example coming from one of the reports notes that blacks make up nearly 17% of current drug users(1998 data), but nearly 40% of the drug arrest. Whites make up nearly 83% of the drug users, but only 61.5% of the arrest. After looking at that, take a look at the rate of drug offenders admitted to state prisons. Most of the black male numbers are in the 200-600's(??), but white males admission rates for drug offenses are in the 20-30's for most states. How could this be possible in 2007? Is this data pulling a race card? For the sake of my boys, I hope so. United States - Punishment and Prejudice: Racial Disparities in the War on Drugs
I'd like to note, incase someone is freaked out that their is an organization that charts Human Rights issues in 2007 and gets skeptical about the validity of the above data, the majority of the stats come straight from our government. The organization has simply made it readily available to those who care.
I also found this exerpt interesting: Drug Offenders as a Proportion of Total Black Admissions
The high and disproportionate number of blacks who are sent to prison should be a cause for national concern regardless of the crime for which they are convicted. What may be most troubling about black incarceration, however, is that it is propelled by nonviolent drug offenses. In other words, but for the war on drugs, the extent of black incarceration would be significantly lower.
Drug offenses accounted for nearly two out of five (38 percent) of all black admissions (Table 15). The proportion of sentenced drug offenders among all black offenders sent to state prison ranged among states between a high of 61 percent in New Hampshire and a low of 16 percent in Oregon, with a majority of the states falling in the range of 30 and 40 percent. In contrast, drug offenders constituted 24 percent of all whites sent to state prison nationwide and in more than half of the states that submitted data to the NCRP.
More blacks were sent to state prison nationwide on drug charges than for crimes of violence (Table 16). Only 27 percent of black admissions to prison were for crimes of violence -- compared to 38 percent for drug offenses. If all nonviolent offenses (property, drugs, public order, etc) are combined, 73 percent of all blacks sent toprison were sentenced for nonviolent crimes. Seventy-three percent of whites admitted to prison were also sentenced for nonviolent offenses.
Last edited by otoatlanta; 12-09-2007 at 09:24 PM..
backfist, do you have any good examples to back up your claims?
Optimism can be blinding. Here are some statistical examples of media bias:
A mug shot of a Black defendant is 4 times more likely to appear in a local television news report than of a White defendant
The accused is 2 times more likely to be shown physically restrained in a local television news report than when the accused is White
The name of the accused is 2 times more likely to be shown on screen in a local TV news report if the defendant is Black, rather than White
While Black actors are now more visible in films, it is an open question as to how well they are being represented. Compare, for example, how Blacks and Whites are portrayed in the top movies of 1996.
Black female movie characters shown using vulgar profanity: 89%
White female movie characters shown using vulgar profanity: 17%
Black female movie characters shown being physically violent: 56%
White female movie characters shown being physically violent: 11%
Black female movie characters shown being restrained: 55%
White female movie characters shown being restrained: 6%
2000 by Robert M. Entman and Andrew Rojecki. This text appears on the University of Chicago Press website by permission of the authors.
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