Proof of Censorship on Faux News

Parent Cafe
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<p>FOX News is editing out certain points that they (evidently) don’t like from Associated Press stories:</p>

<p>AP Story from iht.com: [Wyo</a>. Republicans hold caucuses after Iowa, before New Hampshire - International Herald Tribune](<a href=“http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/01/03/america/Wyoming-Republicans.php]Wyo”>http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/01/03/america/Wyoming-Republicans.php)</p>

<p>The same story from Fox: [You</a> Decide 08! » Wyoming to Hold Overlooked GOP Caucus Before New Hampshire](<a href=“http://youdecide08.foxnews.com/2008/01/03/wyoming-to-hold-fogotten-caucus-between-iowa-new-hampshire-primaries/]You”>http://youdecide08.foxnews.com/2008/01/03/wyoming-to-hold-fogotten-caucus-between-iowa-new-hampshire-primaries/)</p>

<p>From the AP directly: [The</a> Associated Press: Will Anyone Notice Wyoming Caucuses?](<a href=“http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h5OOlm1KiB8Xqt3JqGsF2uBwQL9gD8TUHQQO0]The”>http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h5OOlm1KiB8Xqt3JqGsF2uBwQL9gD8TUHQQO0)</p>

<p>Compare the stories, especially the first few paragraphs.</p>

<p><edit: relinked=“”></edit:></p>

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<p>Leal, I’m sorry but I couldn’t open any. Would it be possible for you to re-link?</p>

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<p>One 404 error looks pretty much like any other 404 error in my book.</p>

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<p>It’s not censorship for a private company to decide what it wants to publish and what it doesn’t want to publish.</p>

<p>It may be a crummy excuse for journalism, but it isn’t censorship.</p>

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<p>Omitting certain details they don’t want to cover would not be censorship. Actually changing the statement, making it an untrue statement, is entirely different and could justifiably be considered censorship.</p>

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<p>Fox news IS fair and balanced. Can anyone link me to journalism more credible that Fox News?? CNN and the liberal media distort reality on a daily basis.</p>

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<p>Anyone see the Today Show this morning? Note Matt with Romney and Hillary.</p>

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<p>How do you reconcile your statement with the difference in the articles posted above?</p>

<p>(PS I think all the mainstream media distort the news to some degree. But this is blatant!)</p>

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<p>I had to cut and paste the different articles into a word processor and then use the “compare and merge” function to spot the differences. Aside from minor style changes – something that any copy editor might do to wire copy – the only substantial difference I can see is that the words “and Ron Paul” were deleted in the Fox version. I guess they don’t think Paul isn’t newsworthy.</p>

<p>This certainly shows they aren’t interested in reporting on Paul’s activities, but that is a far cry from “censorship.” It’s pretty weird, actually. It’s not like they had to cut words to fit into a news hole. It is the kind of “news filtering” that represents the bias of most news organizations. They don’t print lies, they just print what they like and leave out the rest. Leaving out one name from what is supposed to be a complete list of candidates visiting Wyoming in the past few months (perhaps the least newsworthy thing in the article) was a journalistic error, if the AP report is correct.</p>

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<p>LOL you Ron Paul ■■■■■■ entertain me to no end. All three of the articles were by the liberal media whose agenda is to degrade Fox News. Just because Fox News is the most watched channel in the United States, doesnt mean that it deserves cheap shots by its competitors.</p>

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<p>I don’t see a big difference, though I didn’t read closely. I only see that Ron Paul’s name was dropped in the Fox version.</p>

<p>News agencies pay for AP copy and can edit and trim as they want – though, obviously, they should maintain a level of integrity in doing so.</p>

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<p>Key word here being ‘only.’ That makes it a false statement, not a journalistic oversight. That, in conjunction with other similar actions on their part, add up to some pretty intentional ‘filtering.’</p>

<p>Whether you agree with a certain candidate or not is irrelevant. Democracy is supposed to be about the people deciding for themselves which candidates to support. The news media should not be deciding for the people; they should let the people decide.</p>

<p>Any excuses about ‘1st tier’ vs ‘2nd tier’ candidates are neutralized, as the criteria was met by all the candidates in question, yet some were selectively excluded from news articles, debates, etc., not to mention coverage whereas others with the same criteria were included.</p>

<p>Fair and balanced? Not by a long shot. They can choose which news stories they want to cover, but if they choose to cover a particular story, then they should be accurate in their coverage of that story. THAT is the issue.</p>

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<p>Just for the record, this thread is about Faux News, not any particular candidate. The point is the same, regardless of which candidate was omitted.</p>

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<p>I certainly agree it’s intentional filtering. What do you expect from Fox?</p>

<p>I was thrown by “Actually changing the statement, making it an untrue statement, is entirely different and could justifiably be considered censorship.” I thought you were saying they had changed a person’s direct quote.</p>

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<p>As soon as I saw the “and Ron Paul” in the original article, I knew what leal would be referring to. ;)</p>

<p>Don’t know what you’d expect though, leal… it’s Fox. That’s just par for the course.</p>

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<p>“Actually changing the statement, making it an untrue statement, is entirely different and could justifiably be considered censorship.”</p>

<p>No, it could justifiably be considered lying. Censorship is when some source of authority prevents the publication of information. When that happens, it’s censorship whether or not the final product is misleading. Are you saying that some individual reporter at Fox was trying to tell the whole truth and the powers that be prevented him? Technically, that would be censorship, but I bet that pretty much everyone who works for Fox is already on board with their policies.</p>

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<p>Their exclusion of Ron Paul from the debates was inexcusable considering that Paul is outpolling Thompson by a ton in New hampshire.</p>

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<p>“Technically, that would be censorship, but I bet that pretty much everyone who works for Fox is already on board with their policies.”</p>

<p>That is a misconception. The COO of NewsCorp was a huge Kerry supporter.</p>

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<p>Ok then, if you think lying is a better word, I’ll go along with that.</p>

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<p>It’s hard to find the exact right word. The statement is untrue, in substance as well as literally. And they had to know it was untrue; they edited the material from its source to delete the “unperson” from the AP report. I’m thinking that censorship might be the right term after all - corporate censorship, in this case. After all, if Fox could convince its sucke…er, customers that WMDs had been found in Iraq in 2003, it’s not much of a stretch to make one politician into an “unperson” is it?</p>