Page 276 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

Med a Watch Groups |

bias on the program by pointing out that white males constituted a grossly dis-
proportionate majority of guest experts, even on stories focused on minority
concerns. By extending its focus from facts to sources, FAIR, which since 1986
has emphasized “media practices that slight public interest, peace and minor-
ity viewpoints,” has demonstrated recognition that opinion and analysis require
every bit as much attention as news reporting. Like Project Censored, FAIR ad-
vocates for more diversity of coverage rather than the curtailing of expression
contrary to its aims. From supporting more coverage of the popular nuclear
freeze movement during the Reagan administration to its advocacy on behalf
of small publishers threatened by proposed postal rules favoring large entities,
FAIR has sought to encourage greater attention to populist causes affected by
disproportionately scant coverage.
Less inclined to point to lacunae in the news landscape and more focused
upon negating ideological enemies is the Media Research Center (MRC),
founded in 1985. The MRC claims the mantle of “America’s Media Watchdog,”
calling itself at the top of its home page “The Leader in Documenting, Expos-
ing, and Neutralizing Liberal Media Bias.” Its emphasis on the liberal political
leanings of what it claims is a substantial majority of journalists, and the notion
that such beliefs regularly affect coverage, is a leitmotif of media criticism from
the right. Claiming the support of public opinion, which also registers a higher
degree of belief in liberal bias than conservative bias (among those detecting
any bias), MRC further personalizes its approach through the prominent fea-
turing of the opinions of its founder and president, L. Brent Bozell III. The
organization boasts a $6 million annual budget, which supports both news-
and entertainment-oriented analysis, as well as its own news service and free-
market institute.

ThE JournaLism rEviEws
Established watchdogs such as the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) and
the American Journalism Review (AJR) retain a voice as media watch organiza-
tions even as their editorial energies are channeled more toward reporting on
media issues rather than systematically monitoring bias. CJR’s famed “Darts and
Laurels” feature approaches the criticism function in highly truncated form, but
the pithy summaries of good and bad journalistic practice likely receive more
attention than all of the more lengthily analyzed correctives of competitors
combined, at least among journalists.

diy Media watChdogs
Established leaders in the media watch field, already experiencing the flux created by the
growth of the Internet, may face new competition from not only new sources, but alternate
modes of discourse. Fresh on the heels of the success of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,
YouTube and other Web sites have arrived to offer a gigantic new community of users the
opportunity to practice their own forms of media vigilance. Social networking sites such
as MySpace and Facebook invite their users to rank and rate news according to their own