American media sucks?

Question

What is your opinion on the American media? Is it one-sided? Does it speak the truth or does it show people what they want to see? I can give an example.I am from India and I came to the U.S About 2 months ago.Maybe it's just me but I realized the media, especially cnn and fox news, is very one-sided whenever they show India on the news. It's all about poverty, the slums, under development, violence in the villages, etc etc. When was the last time cnn showed the other side of the country? When do they show the 420 million middle class or 100,000 millionaires? When do they mention anything positive about the country? 350 million English speakers, leading in pharmaceuticals and growing in the Information technology, information systems sector along with car manufacturing.I also realized that the media is really negative when portraying the Black society...When a black man commits a crime it becomes a big deal, but when a white man commits a crime not much is mentioned

Answer 1

The media here is very poor in many regards for two reasons - 1) most of the channels are owned by the same major corporations - so although we have the right to publish whatever we want, most of the channels are going to be influenced by whoever owns them  2) businesses run on who makes money, and people watch entertaining news slightly more than educational news, so the former wins.  

Many Americans feel that the news is a downright embarassment.  Whenever I see them report a story that I actually know something about, they always get many of the details wrong.  I hate watching the news for that reason - it's a business like everything else and they are a monopoly so they don't even bother doing a good job!  The only news that I watch and TRUST is the BBC World News on KPBS - I highly recommend it - it is from England.

Answer 2

I wouldn't say that American media "sucks", but yes, I get the point that you are trying to make here. Most of the media organizations these days have their own "vested" interests to pursue/propagate and the independent spirit of journalism and unbiased reporting has taken a beating. This is sad, and in many ways, dangerous. Also, on a similar note, there is a lot of focus on sensationalising reports/events that are, actually, of no use for the general public.

BBC, in my opinion, has still managed to maintain its independent reporting and I would say it's much better than most other international news channels.

Answer 3

Is called freedom of speech.

Answer 4

Jess is right.BBC News is gr8.See if you can get BBC News 24.

Answer 5

I believe any media not just U.S. media always puts some kind of spin on the news they report. I don't personally like most of the media CNN, Fox news, etc. I think like you are saying the media tends to show the negative side of most issues. I get a lot of my news from the radio and internet.

Answer 6

Yeah. Get your news from India.

Answer 7

without reading your entire blurb, let me say I do think the american media sucks... for the following reasons:

1) It is very one-sided. And with a political agenda.

2) It is laced with innuendo and editorial rather than pure facts.

3) The media is too cozy with the gov't and big business, hence is untrustworthy.

4) It is geared toward people with low attention spans, hence rarely covers any topic with sufficient depth.