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Andrew Duffy
English 1111
2/28/2017
U2 - Media Bias

You wont BELIEVE what this Northeastern Freshman wrote about

Branding, the world runs on branding. A social order has been built on headlines and

glued together by yellow journalism. The Cronkites of yesterday have been replaced by anchors

that put ratings over progress by adjusting the truth just a little, every broadcast another inch, so

that issues once discussed turn into issues debated on which turn into issues fought over. Yes,

these things happen. Lies are uncommon, but they arent necessary for the truth to become

untrue. Look at how a man famous for straying from truth, Donny himself, will say, I don't want

to hit Crazy Bernie Sanders too hard yet because I love watching what he is doing to Crooked

Hillary. His time will come! subtlety putting himself above the competition whilst smearing

both candidates involved in the race with derogatory adjectives. Of course, this is merely a tweet,

an offhand comment. There couldnt possibly be examples of crafty word play that push

narratives beyond what the facts back up, right? Bluntly, there are, especially in the reporting of

Bernie Sanders 2016 bid for the Democratic Partys presidential nomination. Heres how it

happened.

The DNCs primary started out as a slog. Both Hillary and Bernie won important states

following their roadmaps to 2382 delegates. However, despite victories being grappled by both

players, the ways in which news outlets reported their victories were very different. On February

10th, the New York Times published an article covering Bernies double digit victory in New

Hampshire written by their author Amy Chozick. Given the topic of the article, it wouldnt be

outlandish to assume that the article would focus on, well, Bernies victory. Unfortunately, that

was not the case. It was not his victory that they cared about, it was her loss. In fact, the article
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didnt even mention Bernies name in the introduction paragraph. No, instead the author stated

time and time again that Hillary just hadnt found her voice yet and that she was struggling to

find her footing. Are these points flattering to Hillary? Not directly. But isnt it convenient that

instead of talking about how Bernie coalesced support in the state, how his rally numbers

skyrocketed in the state, or any other factor that went towards his victory margin the writer only

talked about Hillary. Instead of telling their readers why Bernie won and what resonated with his

voters, the New York Times thought it was more suited to their reader base to discuss Hillarys

shortcomings. In other words, Bernie couldnt possibly win against Hillary, but Hillary could

fall short of her nameless opponents numbers.

Now, if this was in fact media bias, one would expect there to be distinctly opposite

results in the coverage of Hillarys victories. Well, good job New York Times, there are plenty of

articles that meet this requirement. On February 27th, under the title Hillary Clinton Wins South

Carolina Primary, the NYT makes it very clear that when Hillary wins, it is her victory, not the

shortcomings of her opponent. In the last article, there was a distinct lack of discussion on

Bernies support and why he won. The very first line in the second article starkly contrasts this

trend by saying, Drawing overwhelming support from the African-American voters... Hillary

Clinton won her first resounding victory of the 2016 campaign in South Carolina The very

first line associates her with minority groups that the Democratic Party claims to represent. The

article goes on to say, The rout was both politically and psychologically meaningful for Mrs.

Clinton and her allies. Notice how they described her double-digit victory as a rout, compared

to Bernies double digit victory in New Hampshire being framed as Hillary not having her voice

yet. Here is the kicker. This article was written by the exact same writer, Amy Chozick. If there

were different writers for both articles, the argument could be made that maybe they just had
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different writing styles. Unfortunately, that was not the case. Chozick knew what she was writing

when she covered both victories. When Hillary won, it was because of her overwhelming

African American support and despite her winning by similar margins her victory was a rout,

whereas Bernie won because of Hillarys lack of footing.

What about other liberal leaning news organizations? Well, in a CNN published article on

July 27th, titled The last gasp of Bernie Sanders 2016, it is made clear that CNN came to the

same conclusion about who to talk up to their audience as the New York Times did. The title says

a lot to begin with. The title references Californias Democratic primary vote, and the way they

worded it made it seem like Bernie was dying, which in all fairness his campaign was at this

point. Even so, the bias here is clear, before the election was conceded CNN was acting like his

campaign was over. The article then went on to say the delegation's Sanders contingent was

loud and rowdy and hanging to a small glimmer of hope. Theres a ton of bias in this statement

from the opening paragraph of the article. Referring to Sanders supporters as loud and rowdy,

playing off the stereotype that all supporters of Bernie are young and feeble minded showing up

to events to shout about their fundamentalist beliefs, subtly contrasting Hillarys supporters as

very collected individuals saying that the Clinton supporters in the delegation were more

prepared. They made sure that they arrived early to the Wells Fargo Center, filling up the first ten

rows. It is also important to notice how the writer of this article, Gabe Ramirez, talked about

how Bernies supporters held on to a small glimmer of hope. He was diminishing Bernies

chances, and in all fairness at this point Bernie had very low chances but either way the bias here

is clear, CNN was pushing a narrative that Bernie was a bust before the votes were in and

framing his supporters in a very negative light compared to Hillarys supporters. This is probably

due to CNN knowing that the majority of their audience were Centrist Democrats.
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Why would these left leaning news companies cover two liberal campaigns differently?

For the liberal media, it isnt about getting their candidate to win. They arent writing these

stories and creating negative narratives to affect the political climate. When an outlet writes a left

leaning story, it is because their audience is left leaning. They want to tell their audience what

their audience wants to hear to have that audience keep coming back. Site traffic is money, and

the more people that like what is written about and how it is written the more people will visit

the site. In psychology, this is called confirmation bias. This is why you see liberals trashing on

Fox News all the time and conservatives trashing on MSNBC, if a news organization says things

that contradict what someone believes that person is more likely to not visit that site. In Bernie

and Hillarys case, one can only guess why these outlets chose to favor Hillary instead of Bernie.

What is 100% clear however, is that these news outlets spend a ton of time and money trying to

understand their audience to report on what their audience wants to hear about, and if they

thought that the majority of their audience wanted to have a pro-Hillary narrative presented on

their sites and in their broadcasts, that is what the outlets would present to their listeners.

The evidence here is clear, although these examples make up only a small percentage of

the reporting done on both campaigns, they represent a trend favoring Hillary both with word

choice and with topic choice. Was it Bernies win or Hillarys loss? Was Bernies crowd very

energetic and excited or loud and rowdy? The claim here isnt that Bernie was cheated out of an

election with Fake News articles and lies festering amongst the mainstream media. A harsher

reality exists. The system at play doesnt present facts that may or may not be true, it presents

facts that may be subjectively true to some, and false to others. It presents a narrative that plays

out in the readers mind as they read article after article on various events. The reader base of

these media outlets isnt looking to shape or edit their political beliefs, they are looking to
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confirm what they already believe. This is why media outlets get away with representing

situations and people with adjectives that some might apply to those things whilst others disagree

with those tags. It is clear, at the very least, that bias was found in the articles presented here,

published by the companies that claim to present facts. Under the guise of news, stories get

written and enacted by the masses in a symbiotic relationship with the companies that profit off

bias within their reporting.

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Works Cited

Chozick, Amy. "After New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton Struggles to Find Her Footing." The New

York Times. The New York Times, 10 Feb. 2016. Web. 01 Mar. 2017.

Gabe Ramirez. "The Last Gasp of Bernie Sanders 2016." CNN. Cable News Network, 27 July

2016. Web. 01 Mar. 2017.

Healy, Amy Chozick and Patrick. "Hillary Clinton Wins South Carolina Primary." The New York

Times. The New York Times, 27 Feb. 2016. Web. 01 Mar. 2017.

Trump, Donald J. "I Don't Want to Hit Crazy Bernie Sanders Too Hard Yet Because I Love

Watching What He Is Doing to Crooked Hillary. His Time Will Come!" Twitter. Twitter, 11

May 2016. Web. 01 Mar. 2017.