William McGowan opens the door to the newsrooms at “USA Today,” the “New York Times,” the “Washington Post” and other pillars of the “mainstream press” in this carefully researched investigation of how the quest for “diversity” has affected American journalism. Focusing on coverage of the “diversity issues” of immigration, race, gay rights, feminism and affirmative action, McGowan gives a fascinating analysis of what stories get reported and how. Along the way, h… More >>
Coloring the News: How Political Correctness Has Corrupted American Journalism
Like Goldberg’s recent book “Bias,” McGowan misses the point for these “liberal” biases.
Here’s the truth that Goldberg and McGowan either don’t understand or ignore because it’s too hot to handle (and therefore they would never find a major publisher).
The media stands for the status quo. The last thing the major media wants is societal instability. Why? Because the huge companies that own the media want you to buy or view all the other TV programs, radio shows, movies, music, books, etc. that they are selling. What happens if there is societal unrest because there is racism, homophobia, sexism, religious animosity, etc? People stop buying their stuff! People stop watching their shows and programs! And then what happens? These huge media conglomerates start losing tons of money! The peaceful status quo has to be maintained in order for this business model to continue.
Therefore, the media is “liberal” on social issues in order to keep everyone numb and fuzzy. The last thing the media want is riled-up and angry consumers. Second, the media is “conservative” on business issues. Ever see any positive reports on labor unions, anti-globalization groups or blue-collar workers? No! Why? Because big media is big business. They are not going to report on issues that would hurt themselves and their bottom line.
Unlike, McGowan you can now put one and one together to get at the real reasons big media reports the way it does.
As an addendum, I heard McGowan on NPR a few weeks back and was appalled by his callous unconcern toward Arab and Muslim Americans being attacked, taunted, discriminated against and victims of real bias after 9/11. Shame on you William for glossing over the number of attacks as “not as bad as one would expect.” Let’s hope your ethnic group is not singled out and targeted one day for misdirected revenge.
Rating: 1 / 5
McGowan is a shoddy reporter who twists facts out of context or leaves them out entirely if they contradict his thesis. That’s not just my opinion. It’s also the conclusion reached by a brilliant reviewer for The Washington Monthly, a highly regarded political magazine. He wrote :” McGowan’s book demonstrates an impressive ability to misinterpret and misreport facts. But McGowan, who seems to have begun this project with an ideological axe to grind, fails to even map the forest correctly. Coloring the News is filled with canards and an unsophisticated tendency to see conspiracies behind every door even as it fails to recognize the tremendous change that has occurred in American newsrooms over the past six years.” This book adds nothing to the debate over affirmative action that has generated so much heat in recent years.
Rating: 1 / 5
“Bell Curve” of the decade… By the way, Colin Powell and Clarence Thomas are beneficiaries of affirmative action — think about it.
Rating: 1 / 5
Suggesting that the press is liberal by looking at journalists is a little like suggesting the automotive industry is left wing by observing the work force. There are, of course, the CEOs and board of directors who decide what to make and how much. In viewing the press Mcgowan ignores the editors and corporate owners who went for Bush 2:1 last election. They of course have the ultimate say in what is reported and those distortions can be, and have been, more pernicious. Moreover, their bias is a market bias that seeks not to offend not because of a liberal bias but because of a bias for the bottom line.
Rating: 3 / 5
William McGowan begins this very intelligent work with a preposterous summation that seriously undermines the valid and insightful thesis he articulately presents throughout the remainder of the book. Despite his coherent arguments–amply documented with bountiful evidence–”Coloring the News” is never quite able to recover from its asinine beginning anecdote.
In his proem he engagingly relates several vignettes where genuine reporting was scarified to identity politics. All–save the very first one–bolster his case and show that aggrieved advocates have usurped the respectability of objective reporting in the name of that demagogue “diversity.” Incomprehensibly, his first tidbit concerns the Miami Herald’s coverage of the Elian Gonzalez tragedy. In remarks that could suggest racism, he says “Cuban journalists and newsroom staff fell prey to ethnic partisanship that diluted the newsroom’s professional detachment on the story.” He then writes disparagingly of a columnist being “photographed outside the house of the Gonzalez family in a prayer circle”–horror of horrors. Would Mr. McGowan expect Jewish reporters to have employed professional objectivity in covering the Holocaust? Would he have expected any decent human being to disinterestedly narrate history’s darkest hour? In reality it was not the Cubans who along with the frighteningly small parcel of other journalist who heroically strove to provide the truth, but the majority of mainstream sources who avoided plentiful facts on this incident that shamed America.
What makes this subconscious bias or debilitating naiveté all the more outre is that much of Mr. McGowan’s other findings contradict such a unfathomable viewpoint. Beyond that anomalous passage, he shows no indication of favoring totalitarian tactics nor racial discrimination. Much of his persuasion starkly defies such concepts. In a touching chapter on race relations, he discusses the disproportionate percentage of crack addicts who are Black and Latino and quotes photojournalist Eugene Richards who aptly states, “the last thing I noticed about the pregnant woman smoking crack, the addicts dying after shooting up, the young girls prostituting themselves, the drug boys with the automatic weapons, or the mothers grieving for their dead children was the skin color.”
On AIDS, he bravely points out how inaccurate much of the subject’s media coverage is. Discussing the power of the gay lobby, he laments that “this taboo against candor made it difficult to write about what was really driving the disease.” He again quotes a Miami Herald reporter (this time non-dismissively) who admitted that “dozens of stories didn’t make it into the paper or on the air because they might have offended the sensibilities of the pc police. ”
He explicates how capitulating to feminist orthodoxy has had some very dire consequences as the tragic case of the Navy’s first combat pilot revealed. Lieutenant Kara Hultgreen died in a training accident. Reports of her death skimmed over the fact that she had been given extensive leeway in the rigorous training because Naval brass was trying to placate PC bureaucrats. By glossing over this part of the story the innocent victim is sacrificed at the altar of feminism and journalistic integrity loses to popular fads. The author also discusses Kelly Flynn who became an icon for the alleged unfair treatment she sustained merely for … on the job. As he points out everyone from Trent Lott to Maureen Dowd came to the defense of this “wronged woman” but most neglected to get any facts strait.
These are just a tiny portion of the sapient points he makes throughout a well-researched and clearly organized treatise. However, leading with such an off-base assertion seriously damages the work. The fatuous claim calls Mr. McGowan’s judgment into question and even the behemoth of erudite reasoning that follows cannot quite alleviate lingering distaste.
Rating: 2 / 5