1 post tagged “media bias”

How liberal, conservative or neutral a newspaper is might be important to you in choosing if a newsroom is right for you, especially when you're just starting out.

Richard Benedetto (pictured at the right), national political correspondent for USA Today, addressed this topic when I met him at a forum in college. By the way, he's one of the most charismatic, intelligent and articulate people I've ever encountered.

Anyhow, although thorough research and reading editorial pages helps, Benedetto offered a specific way of determining a newspaper's leaning (he admitted that USA Today favors a liberal perspective).

He suggested that readers cut out all the headlines in a newspaper, and place them into categories: liberal, neutral and conservative. Whichever pile has the highest number will probably indicate its bias, according to Benedetto.

I thought it was a really smart idea.

If you don't have the time to cut out each headline, you could probably achieve the same by going through a newspaper and placing tallies in the three categories on a piece of paper. Either way, I think Benedetto's idea is worth practicing, if bias is a concern to you.

-Kim Hartman