Talk:FOX News

Greta Van Susteren

It strikes me as quite inappropriate to cite the political activity of Greta Van Susteren's husband as evidence about her beliefs. Wives are now allowed to hold views and vote independently of their husbands. I notice that there is no corresponding discussion of the political activities of any male's spouse.

Views of FOX News outside the US

There seems to be no discussion of how FOX News is viewed outside the US - i.e. that many consider it very patriotic - that is to say, a mad raving looney right-wing neo-con propaganda tool. Mostly people who tune in consider it hilarious - just as a Canadian journalist suggested (when it was announced Canada was to get FOX News). For me, it's quite humorous until one realises that there are many who take it all entirely seriously!

The "not biased" allegation is the worst attribute - I could stomach it otherwise to some extent. In fact, this applies to US foreign policy too - people could accept it more if they weren't so adamant about "We're right, we're doing this for the greater good, we've a God-given duty".

So, to conclude - I think it's important to mention the strong feelings that this channel stirs up! Certainly the whole incident with that Canadian guy and the ensuing hate-mail from FOX News viewers should be mentioned.

I'm not putting in anything myself into the article though - because I realise this is probably extremely contentious. In fact, there's probably many who find my above comments appalling. Still, you've got to face reality!

zoney ▓█▒ talk 13:41, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

If such views, justified or otherwise, have been documented by a reliable news source, they should be added under "Allegations of bias" with a link to the relevant article(s). Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 17:38, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Given that many outside the US still haven't gotten over the habit of getting their news from various fronts for the Novosti Press Agency and the KGB's Service A, any news organization that allows those to the right of Pol Pot to express their viewpoints in debate will be seen by these people to be "a mad raving looney right-wing neo-con propaganda tool". - Fogger 00:19, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

There are plenty of people who don't just get their news from one source. People who watch FOX News and laugh are likely to be among them.

FOX News gives a lot of time to minor issues and tabloid stories. This makes FOX News seem sillier than foreign news organisations that mosly report real news. Some of FOX News seems calculated to make people laugh. O'Reilly is little more than a shock jock.

I am not sure where Pol Pot belongs on the political spectrum, but many British news sources present a range of views, though, like FOX News, they underrepresent libertarian (with a small l) views. FOX News looks especially silly to foreigners because of its "patriotism" and claims like "we killed some bad guys today!" Obviously, FOX News describing soldiers who share its nationality as "us" or "our troops" (yes yes in its opinion sections) makes more sense to americans, but the BBC would not usually do the same regarding British soldiers.

Some critics of FOX News seem to mistakenly believe that other US news channels are much better. They are not, but this does not make FOX News "fair and balanced" and it claiming to be makes it a target for criticism.

Even if FOX News is not guily of bipartisan or partisan opinion and ideologically cherrypicked news stories, it does appear to many foreigners to be a joke news source.

Tim Ivorson 09:45, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Recent POV additions

I have just reverted a few edits which I feel introduced unnecessary POV into the article. The first (diff (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=FOX_News&diff=5659714&oldid=5648813)) connected two paragraphs to make an extremely long paragraph - bad form, even without the POV - but the transition line was "Meanwhile, critics contend that FOX has a conservative bias. Critics whose claims, on November 1, 2003, were undeniably supported by a report in the Los Angeles Times that quoted Charlie Reina..." That FOX "undeniably" carries a bias is not for an encyclopedia article to judge.

The second edit (diff (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=FOX_News&diff=5683743&oldid=5683732)) cast doubt, without a source, on the legitimacy of the liberal FOX anchors. These claims should certainly go under "allegations of bias" and not in the section about personalities, if, indeed, they merit inclusion at all. I don't think they do unless they generate sufficient controversy to be reported by a mainstream news source. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 17:38, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

"relatively right-wing"

Egad, now there's another one which an anon has restored after I removed it once (diff (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=FOX_News&curid=11121&diff=0&oldid=0)). I don't want to get into an edit war, but to say, without qualification, that FOX News presents a right-wing viewpoint, and call it neutral, is absurd. The fact is that they have been accused of bias. It is not for us to make a value judgement on a channel. Despite my beliefs, I would never write "It is noted for putting liberal spin on the news" in the CNN article; I would instead document accusations of bias. Consequently I'm going to revert it again. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 12:22, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'm not quite anon; see my user page. Btw, 81.168.80.170 and 195.167.169.36 are both me: I put that statement in originally and I restored it in modified form after it was removed. The statement I made is not quite what you state above: I wrote "It is noted for presenting a much more right-wing viewpoint than most news channels.", which is a comparison with other news channels rather than an absolute statement. Critics say that Fox News has right-wing bias, whereas supporters say that other channels have left-wing bias; the sentence I added makes neither of those contested statements, but states only that Fox News is further to the right than other news outlets, which is true regardless of which news outlets one considers to be neutral overall.

I haven't seen anyone dispute the accuracy of this comparison. Your example of a statement that "CNN is noted for putting liberal spin on the news" is a correct analogy for the statement that you attributed to me, but is not a correct analogy for the statement that I actually wrote. 195.167.169.36 15:58, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I see your point: it is FOX's relative right-wing-ness (surely there's a better term for it!) with which your statement is concerned. While FOX may present a viewpoint closer to that of an average Republican than to that of an average Democrat, and while its slogan "Fair and Balanced" actually markets to those who believe CNN is liberal, I think that the statement as you have worded it is unverifiable and prone to misinterpretation (to which I fell victim). I do not believe that it is possible to determine, beyond doubt, that FOX News is to the right of CNN; indeed, I beleive that any judgement of where FOX lies on the political spectrum does not belong in a Wikipedia article. I maintain than NPOV only permits such statements when another notable source has said so.

If a professional study is done which compares stories run by FOX and its competitors and attempts to methodically determine a bias or lack thereof, I will welcome the mention of the study in the article - cited as a study and not as unqualified fact. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 01:15, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I've been pondering introducing terms such as "relatively right-wing"; perhaps a clearer wording of my statement could be based on that. I'm surprised that you consider in "unverifiable", however. It seems to me that it's not in dispute, which is why I haven't looked for an authoritative source for it. I certainly disagree about it being POV: whereas absolute descriptions such as "right-wing" depend on where one's POV deems the centre of the political spectrum to be, comparative descriptions such as "relatively right-wing" or "further to the right than" depend only on which way round one perceives the spectrum to be and on perceiving a difference between the news sources.

Is there anyone claiming that Fox is to the *left* of (for example) CNN, or that it is at the same place on the political spectrum? I think the (relative, at least) political position of a news source is relevant basic information about it that should appear in an encyclopaedia article. Furthermore, in this case, the political position is particularly important: it is widely remarked upon, hence the "it is noted for ..." comment. All of this is entirely independent of absolute political position and bias in reporting. 195.167.169.36 11:55, 9 Sep 2004 (UTC)

What about a compromise, which I suggest should be written into the first paragraph of the "Allegations of bias" section:

FOX News asserts that it is more objective and factual than other American networks, and its promotional statements include "fair and balanced" and "we report, you decide." The network thus intends to provide an alternative to such news sources as CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, or CBS, for those who believe that the other networks are dominated by a liberal bias. Observers agree that FOX lies to the political right of other prominent news sources; there is much dispute, however, as to whether the channel is actually a neutral source, or carries a bias in favor of right-wing, conservative, or Republican interests.

What about it? It makes your point clearly - that FOX is more right-wing than CNN & Co., relatively speaking - but avoids language that would lead a reader to misinterpret the meaning, i.e. it clearly attributes outright accusations of right-wing bias to other sources. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 01:37, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I like "Observers agree that FOX lies to the political right of other prominent news sources.". It seems a very clear way of stating it. I agree that that should be stated in the "Allegations of bias" section, but I think that because of its importance it should also appear in the lead section. 195.167.169.36 09:00, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I have edited the paragraph under "Allegations of bias" accordingly, but I still do not believe that the information belongs in the intro. I tried to put it in as best I could in a number of ways, and couldn't help but think each time of a reader seeing "It is generally agreed that FOX presents a viewpoint further to the right than most other prominent news sources" and disgustedly writing off Wikipedia as a liberally-dominated load of bilgewater.

The fact, I think, is that the difference between that statement and saying "it is generally agreed that FOX carried a right-wing bias" is so subtle, and blurred to such an extent in other media, that it requires immediate clarification which does not belong in the intro paragraph. I also don't think that FOX's relative political position is its most significant political attribute, and is certainly less "noted" than the various accusations of bias already mentioned in the intro. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 01:52, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Not all "Observers agree that FOX lies to the political right of other prominent news sources." Extreme leftist made a fuss, so people have that perception, but evidence that it's conservative is almost always taken out of context. I started watching it to see what all the fuss my liberal friends were making about it; the only stance that seems to be nearly universal of its reporters and commentators is that they're pro-American and proud of it. That, in itself, does not make them conservative; I think it's almost as far to the left as CNN, but if prominent news sources means CNN, NY Times, LA Times, etc., then yeah, I guess it would be, but I think most people (Americans, anyway) get most of their news from local broadcasts and local papers; there is no major prominent news organization in the US the way there is in other countries. If you mean only other cable news channels, there aren't enough for a fair comparison.

Title of recent edit

A recent edit of the article was called "Personalities - So...Chris Wallace has a main job at Fox News which means he is automatically "conservative?" quickly glance his bio no affiliations with a political party...." I don't think that being a conservative necessarily means supporting a conseRvative party. Tim Ivorson 17:19, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Chris Wallace has never made his political preferences public and appears to have had no affiliation with any political organizations at all, parties or otherwise. (See his thoughts (http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A27027-2003Oct27&notFound=true) on the subject in a Washington Post article).

Personally, I think grouping the commentators by political affiliations is inherently POV. It appears to be because FOX's journalistic neutrality is a hotly contested issue - but the same is true of CNN, the New York Times, etc etc etc. I would prefer a bulleted list of personalities, with political affiliations, when relevant, mentioned briefly. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 02:01, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Fair enough. I just thought that it was an opportunity to encourage people not to use conservative to mean Republican or openly supportive of any party. It seems to generate some confusion elsewhere. In the UK we speak of "conservative with a small c" to distinguish from the Conservative Party.Tim Ivorson 07:33, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Material which has fallen by the wayside

I notice that some material has been lost from the current revision. The 19 August edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=FOX_News&oldid=5320323) by 64.109.128.86 included:

Some mention of PIPA and FAIR.

"...unlike reports on the Arab-Israeli conflict from the BBC, and US channels such as CNN, Palestinian and other Arab militants are generally referred to on Fox News as "terrorists." Many other channels tend to use the generic word "militant," or descriptive words such as "gunman" and "suicide bomber." ...."

and a passage describing Ofcom's ruling against FOX News for John Gibson's criticism of the BBC (moved further down the page for further editing).

I'm not the kind of FOX News expert who can tell whether these assertions are true, but as a Brit who has watched FOX News, they look worth re-including. Can any of the above be salvaged? Tim Ivorson 22:04, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

User:Thejackhmr wiped out half the article, mostly the criticisms section. While I disagreed with this, I have enough other worries to want to fight it out. See User talk:Thejackhmr. VV 23:45, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

The FAIR and PIPA reports probably merit re-inclusion, but it must be done carefully (there was a big argument on the subject before their disappearance). As for John Gibson - his "My Word" is an opinion segment of an analysis show which is reproduced online as a column. FOXNews.com provides both the original column (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,109821,00.html) and Gibson's response (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,122935,00.html) after he was censured by the British government. This was not an "allegation of bias" against FOX; it was simply the BBC getting offended at Gibson's opinion. No-one has asserted that his statement was anything but one man's opinion. Thus if the incident is to be included in the article, it should probably not go under "allegations of bias" - maybe there needs to be a general controversy section. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 00:19, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure that I agree that it was simply the BBC getting offended at Gibson's opinion. I believe that Gibson mischaracterised the events according to the dislike of and rivalry with the BBC of Rupert Murdoch, FOX News's proprietor. It is probable that some viewers have been wrong-footed into adopting the Murdoch line against the BBC. Of course, Murdoch's real reason for disliking the BBC is that, as a competitor to his B Sky B, it is an obstacle on his path to market domination, rather than any belief that the BBC is biased against his adopted nation. Tim Ivorson 07:05, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

PS. Having said that, I wouldn't mind if it was included under another heading, perhaps "other criticisms" or "international views." Tim Ivorson 08:38, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

PPS.

Have you read the pages that you linked?

My opinion is that the original piece was a fairytale. In it, Gibson says that the BBC "insisted its reporter had a right to lie," (CF FOX News BGH suit). However, the BBC never acknowledged that it lied (it appears that it actually was an honest mistake) and, therefore, never needed to assert its right to. He continues, "...the BBC knew the war was wrong and anything it could say to underscore that point had to be right." There was an academic study, like those by PIPA and and FAIR, that sought to show the BBC to be biased in favour of the war. (I agree with the study's conclusions, but I don't think that it showed anything more than just watching, or listening to, the coverage would have. I felt that the BBC had under-reported arguments against the war, though this has changed since the war "finished"). After accusing the BBC of "blatant anti-Americanism," (presumably meaning critical of US policy, though I have yet to notice the BBC straying from its neutrality towards US politics), he calls Gilligan "pro-Iraqi and anti-American." This hardly seems relevant, as Gilligan's opinion was not reported. Gibson uses the terms `anti-American' and `pro-Iraqi' without specifying whether he meant them with respect to xenophobia or criticism of government policy (the different usages might have been opposed). I suspect that Gibson intended to confuse the issue. Gibson claims that "Gilligan got a guy named David Kelly to tell him a few things about prewar assessments on Iraq's weapons' programs. ...Kelly committed suicide over the story" but doesn't take time to debunk the popular view that it was mishandling of the situation by the Ministry of Defence, Kelly's employer, that lead to the suicide.

The Hutton report, which prompted Gibson's first piece, was the conclusion of a government inquiry into controversial BBC reporting. The BBC claims in question were good investigative journalism and an exception to heavily pro-government reporting. The British government tried to paint a minor factual error as fundamentally flawed reporting. With the help of the government sponsored Hutton inquiry, the government turned investigation of its own behaviour into an investigation of the usually supportive BBC. Some have likened the BBC reporting what might be facts inconvenient to the government based on a single source to the government publishing intelligence based on a single source for propaganda purposes.

In his response, Gibson colours himself as standing up to the British government, but he took the line of Murdoch, the US government and the British government against the BBC. It would be closer to the truth to claim that the BBC had stood up to the British government.

Gibson may appear bewildered, but I believe that he understands that he is being dishonest. I disapprove of the Murdoch media all the more because it distracts me from criticising the BBC.

Tim Ivorson 12:14, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I have no idea whether Murdoch was involved in this debate at all. As for your opinion of the story, valid or otherwise, it could only be expressed in the article in the context of a quote, or in describing a controversy. Yes, I read the pages I linked, and I see no more than a man with an opinion (albeit a strong one). Anywho, neither opinion on the subject belongs in the Wikipedia article. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 04:10, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I didn't mean to suggest that Murdoch intervened, but rather that Gibson knew that he was expected to do his employer's proprietor's bidding. I didn't mean that my opinion should be covered in the article, but I thought that maybe it was something to bear in mind when covering the alleged bias of FOX News. Tim Ivorson 07:59, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I can't think of any more necessary changes to the proposed passages for re-inclusion, so I'm waiting for more feedback for the moment. I have had another look through the Talk archives and I found PIPA study and Neutralization on archive two. Are these the whole arguments on PIPA, FAIR et al? I also noticed comments by Zoney and Lee M. Alleged bias aside, I think that it would be interesting to add something about international difference in programming and broadcast methods. For example, here in Britain, as Lee M mentions, it has weather instead of adverts, which makes it unwatchable during hurricane season. Tim Ivorson 16:29, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Maybe we could start editing replacements for the deleted passages here on the talk page. I have included below, all with changes of my own, four passages that I think are worth putting back into the article. External links [6] (http://www.ofcom.org.uk/bulletins/prog_cb/pcb_11/upheld_cases?a=87101), [7] (http://www.fair.org/reports/fox.html), [8] (http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Iraq/Media_10_02_03_Report.pdf) and [9] (http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=13373) to be included in external links section? Tim Ivorson 14:07, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Excellent! I have made a few changes: I added your external links, and mine regarding John Gibson, into the text "in context." Also, I've mentioned the fact that FOX does not refer to "suicide bombers" but rather to "homicide bombers," for which it has drawn criticism from conservatives for being too Politically Correct, and I changed "alleged POV language" to "biased language" because readers may not know what POV means. I made a few other word choice/sentence structure changes as well. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 04:10, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Should these passages be put into the article now? If so, where should they be put and should the subheadings be preserved? Tim Ivorson 16:46, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Proposed passages

Biased language

Some critcise FOX News for calling Palestinian and other Arab militants "terrorists," while many other channels tend to use the generic word "militant," or descriptive words such as "gunman" and "suicide bomber." It is argued that, although "terrorist" may be accurate, the word carries a negative connontation and does not give enough detail. FOX has also drawn criticism for its use of the term "homicide bomber" in place of the more common "suicide bomber." Critics maintain that this substitution is an unnecessary instance of political correctness and is detrimental to the accuracy of the articles.

Ofcom

In early 2004, when the Hutton Inquiry had just closed, FOX News broadcast an opinion piece by presenter John Gibson which claimed that the BBC had "a frothing-at-the-mouth anti-Americanism that was obsessive, irrational and dishonest" and that the BBC reporter, Andrew Gilligan, in Baghdad during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, had "insisted on air that the Iraqi Army was heroically repulsing an incompetent American Military" [10] (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,109821,00.html). Viewers filed twenty-four complaints with Ofcom, the United Kingdom broadcasting regulator, regarding the incident. In its case, FOX News claimed that the "heroic repulsion" quote was mere paraphrasing and pointed to a Google search for "BBC anti-american" as proof of bias. Ofcom subsequently released a report censuring FOX News for not giving the BBC a chance to respond, failing to back up Gibson's claims with reliable evidence after complaints were made, and not making it clear that Gibson was paraphrasing Gilligan's words ([11] (http://www.ofcom.org.uk/bulletins/prog_cb/pcb_11/upheld_cases?a=87101)).

FAIR

In 2001, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), a left-leaning media "watchdog" group, released a report titled "Fox: The Most Biased Name in News" ([12] (http://www.fair.org/reports/fox.html)). The report claims that of the guests on the network's signature political show, Special Report with Brit Hume, 89 percent were Republicans, 65 percent were conservatives, 91 percent were male, and 93 percent were white, while, by comparison, on CNN's Wolf Blitzer Reports 57% of the guests were Republican and 32 percent were conservatives. FAIR also claimed that since 1998, one out of every 12 episodes of The O'Reilly Factor has featured a segment on Jesse Jackson, with themes such as "How personal are African-Americans taking the moral failures of Reverend Jesse Jackson?"

Many commentators, especially on the right, regard FAIR as biased in its coverage of media issues.

PIPA

A study by the Program on International Policy Attitudes, sponsored by the Ford, Carnegie, and Tides foundations, claims that viewers of FOX News were more likely to hold misconceptions than viewers of any other network ([13] (http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Iraq/Media_10_02_03_Report.pdf), link in PDF). The study lists three beliefs, which it labels "misperceptions," that are more common among FOX News viewers:

• That evidence of a link between al-Qaeda and Iraq had been found;
• That weapons of mass destruction had been discovered in Iraq; and
• That the U.S. had received wide international support in its decision to go to war.

Eighty percent of FOX News viewers polled held at least one of these three beliefs, more than any other radio or television news source. PIPA claims that this trend persists even after adjusting for viewership and political preference. The report also claims that the viewers who watched FOX News more often tended to have more of these beliefs.

Critics of this report such as columnist Ann Coulter condemned the choice of misconceptions as hand-picked "liberal talking points," "deceptive," and "designed to falsely portrary FOX News viewers as ignorant" ([14] (http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=13373)).

An arm of the tobacco industry?

BJAODN material, for sure. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 01:53, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)