Blog X (Unqualified Defense)

Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism is a documentary made by Robert Greenwald about Fox news network. The whole documentary was basically claiming that Fox News is not as "fair and balanced" as it tries to come across as. Greenwald uses first person testimonies from former employees to push his point farther across the line. He claims that Fox distorts the facts, picks guests, and spins stories all to its own advantage. This claim may seem biased and untrue to most of the people who watch fox news, but there is more to this claim than meets the eye.

A study done by FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting) in 2003 has backed up claims maid by Greenwald in Outfoxed. FAIR did a study in which they studied 25 weeks of Fox's Special Report. In this crucial segment, Brit Hume has one-on-one chats with guests selected by the network. FAIR found that over 71% of guests on Special Report were conservative. They also noticed that the few liberals that were on the show were closer to the middle of the political spectrum. (Still Failing the "Fair & Balanced" Test, FAIR.com) This shows Fox's extremely tilted viewpoint. Fox doesn't accurately present the "other side" in many of its arguments. Another study was done in which the guests were divided into three groups: Conservatives, Centrists, and Progressives. These guests did not automatically fall into the category they claimed as their "political party", but were categorized by voting records and interviews. In this study, 57% of guests were conservatives, 12% were centrists, and 12% were liberals. 20% of the guests of the show were non-ideological. This means that viewers were five times more likely to see a conservative rather than a liberal on Fox's Special Report with Brit Hume.

Greenwald also claims that Fox doesn't report news, they report more of a watered down version. A study done at the Program of International Policy (PIPA) in the University of Maryland showed that people who primarily watch Fox news are more likely to have misconceptions about the war in Iraq than people who watch PBS or listen to NPR. So, what does this mean? Fox News distorts the facts to fit its own agenda. The people who watched Fox believed that the US did find nuclear weapons in Iraq, when in fact, we didn't. people who listened to NPR were more likely to know that there were no weapons of mass destruction found. (Misconceptions, The Media and the Iraq War, WPO.org) This, once again, shows how Fox twists its "facts" to fit it's tilted viewpoint.

Works Cited

"Misconceptions, the Media, and the Iraq War." World Public Opinion.Org. 2 Oct. 2003. 5 May 2008 http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/international_security_bt/102.php?nid=&id=&pnt=102&lb=brusc.

Rendall, Steve, and Julie Hollar. "Still Failing the "Fair and Balanced" Test." FAIR.Com. Aug. 2004. 5 May 2008 .