Fox Headline Paints Republicans as Only Victims
July 3rd, 2009 by Steven GardnerI generally resist the temptation to get into bashing Fox, or MSNBC, or CNN, Nick News, etc. For one, for me to make a claim of general bias would require extensive studying of said stations’ general news coverage, using up time I’m not willing to relinquish. I wouldn’t want to make any claims without ample evidence, and I’m not willing to take the time to compile it.
Second, I don’t care if Hannity, Matthews, O’Reilly or Olbermann are biased. Their names are on their shows, so I don’t take any of them as gospel. They do throw out ideas worth considering, but always demanding further examination.
Finally, I’m constantly worried about whether I’m in a greenhouse when I warm up my arm.
Nonetheless, I won’t refuse to lob something Fox’s way this time around. To make sure the evidence was there before it got changed, I did a screen grab of the offenses.
First, this is the headline that appears at the top of my browser for a story I was referred to:
I’m thinking Evergreen and Berkeley. But of course, you’ve got to read on if you want to know the details.
The subhead makes it clear it’s at two conservative colleges, but continues to only reference the Republicans as the subjects of the bans.
In fact, Democrats at Liberty University and Brigham Young University-Idaho were also demoted to unofficial status on both campuses. To know that, however, you’ve got to go to the body of the story.
Read the entire story to get the overall context, but even in the rest of the story there is scant attention paid to Democrats. These are both private schools run by churches. The decisions, in the end, were based on the underlying theology of the organizations funding much of the education. At Liberty there were instances on both sides of the clubs endorsing policies or candidates with viewpoints contrary to the school’s religious mission. At BYU-Idaho it was an issue of maintaining political neutrality, though only a few people know what the discussions were like behind closed doors.
In both cases, however, the schools were intent on holding all parties to the same standard. Whether you agree with how the universities chose to be fair is one thing, but it at least affected Republicans and Democrats equally.
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July 4th, 2009 at 7:37 am
I don’t believe Evergreen & Berkrely qualify as religious schools> Therefore One has to take your comments as Fox bashing.(thin at best) Nothing more. I did read the whole story, including the part about the Demo clubs being banned and didn’t find it bias at all. You need to learn to pick on somebody your own size. In your case much smaller.
July 4th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
laance,
On the Evergreen and Berkeley reference, you’re right. I missed the “religious” element in the headline.
As for the rest of my story, I qualify my Fox bashing by saying I’m loathe to do it. I think Fox’s story is wrong here and I don’t care how big Murdoch is or how small Gardner is.
Steven Gardner
Kitsap Sun