Balance as bias: global warming and the US prestige press
Here is an article from the scientific press which reinforces my views of the
misreporting of the global warming "debate" by the BBC. It is not only in hte
US that the balance is biased!
Cheers, Alastair.
Balance as bias: global warming and the US prestige press
Maxwell T. Boykoff and Jules M. Boykoff
Global Environmental Change Part A
Volume 14, Issue 2 , July 2004, Pages 125-136
Abstract
This paper demonstrates that US prestige-press coverage of global warming from
1988 to 2002 has contributed to a significant divergence of popular discourse
from scientific discourse. This failed discursive translation results from an
accumulation of tactical media responses and practices guided by widely
accepted journalistic norms. Through content analysis of US prestige
press-meaning the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times,
and the Wall Street Journal-this paper focuses on the norm of balanced
reporting, and shows that the prestige press's adherence to balance actually
leads to biased coverage of both anthropogenic contributions to global warming
and resultant action.
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