The essence of being “FAIR and BALANCED”

Review Documentary Outfoxed.

By AbhiManyu Dixit. (March 2006)

“Media is the nervous system of democracy” (Jeff Cohen- former MSNBC fox
news contributor). What we hear or learn of our leaders will depend entirely on what the
media will choose to show or won’t choose to show. The lives of people will be in the
hands of the people in media. How the media people choose to disgrace or dignify a
person will have definite result on the person’s image on the society. Outfoxed discusses
the same idea. How dangerous it would be to have large companies own media houses
and manipulate the public to go their way. Fox news Corp. is owned by Rupert Murdoch
who also owns several other companies including newspapers, magazines and a movie
studio.

What Fox is selling is not real news. It is not even close. But, if we accept the
notion that all news is relatively biased, where do we turn to? Every person has his/her
political identity. It is not justifiable to show that everyone must have the same ideas.
So it is easier to follow the people with power than to go on being fair and balanced. The
fox news network favors the republicans (the right wing). George Bush arguably the most
powerful man in the world is a republican. Former fox news workers and video clips of
high rated fox news shows like “The O’rilley factor” prove that those shows have always
been one sided- right winged. Favoring presidents like Regan, Clinton and Bush are
much better examples. Regan’s birthday was covered by a reporter and the reporter was
in huge trouble because he didn’t make the event “interesting”. The survival or Bush’s
administration is mainly because of the efforts of the Fox News Channel. Fox News was
the main media to back up every move of George Bush during the Predential campaign
while they humiliated and doubted John Kerry’s abilities to act as the president. Fox
news is also discredited in the documentary for inflicting unwanted fear in the American
public to support the war against Iraq and Al-Qaeda or to support George Bush. The word
fox itself means “to deceive”. Many of the nation’s voices are silenced and only the
voices favoring the American president or the republicans are given more importance.

One sidedness or opinion based news has always prevailed in the media.
Edward .R. Murrow brought down Senator Joseph McCarthy by being one sided.
Murrow was a hero because he had proof and was fighting for something that was
ethically acceptable. Americas and British news broadcasters favoring the allied force
and discrediting the Nazis during the Second World War can also be taken as an example.
Opinion based news with proof would be the most effective kind of news. This is
followed by the documentary “Outfoxed”. The documentary uses Fox Network’s own
former staff members and their own visuals, their own content of the news to prove their
opinion. Unlike Fox which has a slightly different way of opinionating. Fox News is
popular mainly because of the fact that it is entertaining, it is fast paced, combative and is
a very different approach than those of the old styled news programs which has not been
discussed in the documentary. Only the con of Fox News has been talked about in the
documentary. “Outfoxed” itself is a one sided documentary.

After watching this documentary, we might tend to believe all news networks are
like Fox. Maybe not exactly like fox in presentation, but similar to fox in being a bit one
sided. ”Outfoxed” itself will be discredited for being one sided. What should we watch?
There is no news we can trust. The news outlet would tell us only the news what we want
to hear. News coverage is for sale. They go to the people in power and the ones trying to
earn money. There will always be a big story but the coverage might be small and
opinions might flare out from different people who would only make the people more
inclined to adapt to the views of the opinion makers. If “Fair and Balanced news” is now
broadcasted, people might not watch it as it might be a bit boring and uninteresting. To
correct this flaw, people must be seriously inclined to their jobs as journalists. And think
about the people not just themselves. Everyone should be morally or ethically guided by
a rule or a law which would not be in any rulebook but themselves know the true
meaning of being “Fair and Balanced”.