NEWS

Why America’s News Outlets Are Worthless

The media doesn’t cover inequality, poverty, or hardly anything in the public interest

According to the news outlet, EXTRA (the media watch group newsletter of FAIR), America’s corporate media outlets — newspapers and cable news — barely cover “income inequality” or “inequality” in their news coverage.

On the other hand, these outlets (especially the text based outlets) do report on the “debt ceiling,” “recession,” and “inflation.” EXTRA also reports that most Americans remain uninformed how egregious the issue of income inequality is today. This is, according to FAIR and EXTRA, due to slanted news outlets owned by corporate cash who hammer home fake problems at the expense of most people.

Inequality is not the #1 issue on the minds of Americans, due to this slanted coverage. The federal budget deficit is considered a huge problem (53 percent) according to FAIR while income inequality is not as big of an issue. This is despite the fact that CEOs earn 354 dollars for each dollar their workers earn, on average.

One would think that if these numbers do exist (and they do) more Americans would be concerned about income inequality. But with our 24–7 news cycle and half of it covering Trump like he is a movie star, the state of mass media is trash. The corporate outlets don’t give two cents about any of you. If they did, your favorite announcer would quit. Most of what they report is nonsense. They don’t hold the state accountable or corporations accountable. They help them maintain the status quo.

Here is what Conor Smyth, of EXTRA, wrote about this:

“News media don’t just structure conversations about inequality; inequality structures the media. The dominant news outlets are major corporations owned by the wealthy.”

Smyth also points out that all of your favorite news personalities on those alphabet soup outlets are millionaires who have no motivation to call it straight. If income inequality and wealth inequality were the #1 issue covered, we would have a different discourse. Instead, we get distraction news, distorted news, and Donald Trump.

The lesson here is obvious: don’t watch CNN, MSNBC, NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX, and a handful of other outlets. These media outlets are not news outlets. They are corporations trying to make profit. They will do it at your expense and my expense. The anchors on those shows are part of the problem.

How do you get your news then, you ask? Work harder for answers. Go the direct sources. Democracy Now and Pro Publica are pretty good. PBS is good sometimes, especially FRONTLINE. Yet, you are going to have to look harder for answers. You will need to read multiple sources. The corporate outlets are not necessarily lying to you but they are distracting you with topics that are not really as important as your topics like income inequality.

Those corporate parasites don’t have your interests in mind when they organize their news presentations. Their first goal is to make money for their shareholders.