US just finished dead last among 46 countries in media trust

[DKW 86 7,424]

US just finished dead last among 46 countries in media trust

The U.S. media is the least trustworthy in the world, according to a comprehensive new Reuters Institute survey encompassing 46 countries. 

Yes, you read that right. The country with among the most resources in this arena – human, technical and otherwise – finished dead last. Finland ranked the highest, with a 65 percent trust rating. In Kenya, the trust rating clocked in at 61 percent. 

But here in the U.S.A., the home of global media giants including the New York Times, Washington Post and CNN, we’re trusted by a whopping 29 percent of those reading and watching. 

Is anyone really surprised? Because in looking at polls over the past few years (even pre-Donald Trump) we’ve been trending in this dubious direction for some time.  

For example, one Axios/Survey Monkey poll in 2019 found that nearly 8-in-10 independent voters said they believed that news organizations report news “they know to be fake, false or purposely misleading.” Ninety-two percent of Republicans felt the same way, as did even a majority of Democrats. 

Which means readers and viewers believe that the "mistakes" we so often see, particularly in the political media that dominates the national landscape, are not happening because of human error, which is a convenient excuse offered up from left-leaning "journalists" when "bombshell" reports end up being false, fake or purposely misleading. 

Russian collusion with the Trump campaign? The Mueller Report didn’t find proof of that despite all the "evidence" Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) claimed he had but never produced. That "story" dominated the first three years of the Trump era regardless, so that two-thirds of Democratic voters believe the Russians actually altered vote tallies to tip the election from Hillary Clinton to Trump. 

How about the bombshell Russian bounties of U.S. troops? Never happened. 

How about that COVID-19 came from a Wuhan lab that studies coronaviruses and engages in gain-of-function research? We've gone from reckless conspiracy theory to somebody like Jon Stewart appearing on The Late Show with Steven Colbert to make the argument that it's a very real possibility.  

I could go on and on but have finite space here. For dozens of more examples, check out Sharyl Attkisson's comprehensive list of media malfeasance over the past few years. She's currently up to 156 examples. 

But it wasn’t always this way. Back in 1976, in the days of anchors such as Walter Cronkite, John Chancellor, David Brinkley and Roger Mudd, nearly three-quarters of the country trusted the media, according to Gallup. 

Fast forward to 2021, and the likes of Chris Cuomo, Jim Acosta, Brian Williams and Yamiche Alcindor are given the same prestigious titles of anchor or correspondent. 

These aren’t anchors, of course, they’re patently partisan opinion hosts. All share their feelings, their opinions – which always support the blue team – and pass it off as objective news reporting. Which, of course, is an insult to those who have eyes and ears and brains. 

And trust is like toothpaste: Once it’s out of the tube, it’s impossible to regain. Example: The New York Times hasn't endorsed a Republican presidential candidate in 65 years, which means the so-called paper of record endorsed Walter Mondale in 1984 and Michael Dukakis in 1988, who lost a combined 89 states. 

Talk about being out of touch. The Washington Post has never endorsed a Republican presidential candidate in its history. CNN – once a beacon of solid, objective reporting in the Bernard Shaw/Gulf Wars era – has become a parody of itself in losing nearly 75 percent of its audience since the beginning of the year, an unprecedented drop. 

In other words, don’t expect the new Cronkites and Brinkleys of the world to swoop in and save journalism in the U.S. anytime soon. 

Fortunately, the news we get on the local level has remained largely unchanged. Viewers get the big stories regarding crime, human interest, sports and the weather. Trust in local news hasn’t changed much since 1976. The reason? Local news almost always keeps opinion out of its reporting, while national political media injects plenty of it, invariably in support of Democratic efforts, into stories outside of op-ed sections and in actual news stories. 

One of the best studies on the move to opinion came in a 2019 RAND Corporation report that analyzed content from 15 print and television outlets over nearly three decades (1989 to 2017).

The newspapers studied were The New York Times, Washington Post and St. Louis Post-Dispatch, while CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, Fox and MSNBC were analyzed on the TV front. Digital journalism was represented by Politico, The Blaze, Breitbart News, BuzzFeed Politics, The Daily Caller and The Huffington Post.

"The findings point to a gradual and subtle shift over time and between old and new media toward a more subjective form of journalism that is grounded in personal perspective," reads RAND's conclusion.

Edited June 29, 2021 by DKW 86

[DKW 86 7,424]

https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/digital-news-report/2021/dnr-executive-summary

This is the whole Reuters article and it is long. Lots to talk about. 

 

[CoffeeTiger 5,108]

The actual Reuters article was informing and interesting to read. The Hill article however, was just the same type of partisan hack material that it complains about. I was wondering why the writer seemed so laser focused on ONLY left leaning news media and personalities when talking about media mistrust as a whole, but then I got to the bottom where it says "Joe Concha is a media and politics columnist for The Hill and a Fox News contributor.

Ah,...of course. Fox News, the beacon of impartiality and media honesty.  

 

Overall US news trust is only so low because such a large majority of Right wing/Republican's don't trust the news and skew the results. News trust among Left leaning and Independent American's are more in line with the rest of the world, although aren't as high as you would prefer them to be. 

 

Edited June 29, 2021 by CoffeeTiger

[DKW 86 7,424]

So you are fine with Non-Aligned people at 50%+ not trusting MSM?

[CoffeeTiger 5,108]

7 minutes ago, DKW 86 said:

So you are fine with Non-Aligned people at 50%+ not trusting MSM?

No, I agree that America does have a media trust issue. I read Washington Post as one example, and I know that their stories and how they cover certain topics will be biased towards the liberal/progressive crowd. I also know they are owned by one of the wealthiest men the world and their primary purpose is as a business and to make money. 

I wish money and business has less to do with media and I wish media on both sides were much less focused on opinion and partisan commentary, (opinions have their place in news, but it shouldn't be the primary focus of the entire news operation or the most popular part of it ). 

I'm not saying Conservatives are completely wrong about the "mainstream media', and don't have some fair grievances, but I also believe their trust of media is so low because they are continually brainwashed by their own forms of partisan media that make it a part of their core, everyday program to label any media that isn't right of center as dangerous and untrustworthy. 

 

[DKW 86 7,424]

Other than MAYBE Gutfeld, in very small doses, I cant listen to anything Fox puts out. OAN, Breitbart, Q-Anon, I dont invest a brain cell.

MSNBC, CNN, WAPO, NYT, I pick and choose most of what they say. The vast majority of MSM I cant invest a moment of my time in.
EX: I saw thru trump in 1987. The fact that it took the media until 2015 to start telling the truth is just insane. 
EX: Do yall realize that Avenatti was a guest host on ABC and CNN on dozens of occasions? WTF? This guy was a slimy-sleazy con man, maybe worse than trump, even trump managed to employ some people. and we were treated to him being on the air 162 times in just a few months. 

As you said, $$$ is changing MSM in many ways from differing angles.
Profits sway WHAT is covered.
Owners sway HOW it is covered. 

Edited June 29, 2021 by DKW 86

[CoffeeTiger 5,108]

1 minute ago, DKW 86 said:

Other than MAYBE Gutfeld, in very small doses,

I loved Gutfeld back in the day when he was a host on Red Eye. A semi-political comedy show that FoxNews aired at like 1AM on weekdays. It was crass, stupid, and sometimes offensive, but I thought it was funny in my younger 20s. Which back then I was also much more Conservative and liked Bill O'Reilly too, so going back with my current views, I don't know if id like it the same way 

His new  primetime show has done away with all of that. Now it's primarily political, and is just the same old sanitized Fox News talking points that every other Fox News host talk about all day, except Gutfeld's show is apparently supposed to be presenting it in a funny or humorous way, but I don't have any interest in it any more.

[Mims44 1,869]

I have been reading major news outlets articles as opinion pieces for years....

 

 

It sucks more than trusting them for their objectivity...... but it makes them more money apparently.