It was the first day of a college journalism class, and I was practically dizzy with idealistic anticipation.
Then it happened.
As the professor was introducing the syllabus, he came to the subject of “straight news reporting,” the meat of journalism. The phrase describes those news stories that pepper the front page and evokes images of gutsy journalists chasing Pulitzers. It supposedly distinguishes the reporting of news events from features or comics or, more importantly, opinions and editorials.
Or at least, that’s what I thought. Boy, was I wrong.
When he came to that section of the syllabus he commented, as if it was common knowledge, “Of course, there is really no such thing as unbiased news reporting. Every reporter and every article are biased.” And he kept talking like nothing had just happened.
But it had. Sure, I was young and naïve (it was 1982), but I had lived happily for 18 years with the unchallenged notion that those frontpage articles were unbiased and unprejudiced, that the news was just the unvarnished facts, and that newspapers protected a clear distinction between straight news reporting and editorial opinion.
From his off-hand explanation I had not only just learned something unexpected about the lack of objectivity in reporting. I had just learned something unsettling about human nature: People are biased. And more importantly, people, left to themselves, are incapable of being unbiased.
In this installment and the last, I am considering “fake news” and its parent, media bias, and applying a biblical perspective to both. To answer both biblically, we need to understand the difference. I think we confuse the two, which ignites more conflict in our cultural discourse.
All fake news results from bias, but not all bias is fake news. And yet, for both, the same thing is at stake: Truth.
I am unofficially defining media bias as the inherent lack of neutrality that motivates sinners to see things their way and, if journalists, report the news as they see it. Because we are sinners, we are never entirely and absolutely objective. The question is not whether we are biased. The question is, what bias do we choose?
Journalists have a stage to broadcast their bias. They are reporting the news but doing so from their own perspective. And this bias motivates us to listen to media that support our own bias. CNN or FOX, World Magazine or the Washington Post. These outlets exist because consumers are biased as well.
But bias in the media generates two results. The first is that media outlets will provide facts otherwise unreported by media of a different bias. That’s a good thing. This is like listening to different sides of an issue to get a bigger, more complete picture.
But the second result is media slanting the news in favor of their own bias and opinions. It happens when journalists tweak the news, insert fake facts, omit key facts, install opinion as if it were facts, or seek to manipulate the news to support their preconceived notions. That’s a bad thing. And it is a result of our sin.
So let me offer a few takeaways:
- Admit you are biased. Everyone is. True neutrality is not possible. And apart from Christ, our bias is always motivated by our sinful inclinations, our selfish desire to be right, and our sin-biased mindset. Always. (Prov. 14:12; Rom. 8:5-8).
- But, bias can change, and you can choose your bias. You can cultivate a bias for a biblical worldview. The better you know the Bible, the more likely you are to interpret correctly what is happening in our culture (Col. 2:8) and in your own life (Deut. 30:19-20). The inclination to be biased is in our nature. Which way we lean is our choice. But to explicitly choose a biblical worldview requires God’s intervention (John 3:3; 2 Cor. 5:17).
- Seek the truth. Of course, to do that, you need a biblical worldview. (John 17:17).
- Promote the truth. Avoid pandering in every opinion that flashes on your Facebook page. Value the truth as if it were precious—because it is (Eph. 6:14; 1 John 3:18).
- Consume the truth. Seek a balanced and fair reporting of the news, but also cultivate a bias for a biblical worldview of culture and world events (James 1:5), on that honors God and His creation. Acknowledge the bias of the media you currently consume. Do you need to change it?
- Seek to reflect God’s impartial nature. To be changed in Christ means we see people the way He does—lost and in need of Christ (Acts 10:34). It means that we neither show preference to certain sin because we like the sinner, nor that we judge any person or group as unworthy of our compassion, attention, or message of hope. And it means that we teach, without partiality or reservation, that Christ and Christ alone is the hope of salvation (Rom. 2:11, 1 Tim. 5:21, James 2:1).
- And remember, God is partial toward you. On the one hand, God is impartial. Others might sniff at your imperfections, skin color, political persuasion, or economic status. But God loves you without partiality. He just loves you. But on the other hand, God is partial toward you. He wants you to have a relationship with Him, wants you to know Him, and wants you to turn to Him (Rom. 5:8).
He just loves you.