Pacific Standard July-August 2013 Cover

News Outlets Show Significant Bias in Favor of Same-Sex Marriage

June 17, 2013 • By • Leave a Comment
lgbt-flat

The media is off balance with the public on the issue of same-sex marriage, according to a new study from the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. Stories with statements mostly in support of same-sex marriage outweighed those with statements mostly opposing by a five to one margin, from March 18 through May 12, while only a slim 51 percent majority of the general public favor legalizing same-sex marriage. The Pew study looked at stories from a mix of new media outlets such as Politico and BuzzFeed; 11 national, regional, and local newspapers; major broadcast news ... Read More

More like this: Culture
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Violent Crime Is Dropping: Why Are We So Scared?

June 12, 2013 • By • Leave a Comment
the-wire

Blame it on the media? A Pew Research Center poll released last month found that most Americans think that gun crime has increased in the past two decades—but they’re dead wrong. In the survey of 900 adults, 56 percent thought gun crime had increased, 26 percent thought it had stayed about the same, and only 12 percent thought it had gone down. Those 12 percent were right. A separate report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that the number of gun homicides decreased by 39 percent from 1993 to 2011, and that non-fatal shootings fell by 69 percent. According to the FBI’s ... Read More

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The Melting-Pot Gazette

May 13, 2013 • By • Leave a Comment
alhambra

Seventeen people squeeze around a dark wood table in a low, redbrick office building on the outskirts of Los Angeles, picking at a potluck dinner of fried chicken, pad thai, and Cherry Coke. The group is as oddly matched as the menu. There’s Eric Sunada, an engineer who also runs a small environmental non-profit. Kerrie Gutierrez, an instructional aide and mother of five. Joe Soong, an analyst for the Los Angeles Police Department. But they do have one thing in common: They are all newly minted journalists, contributors to a novel kind of local news outlet in the ethnically fractured, ... Read More

More like this: Culture, May-June 2013
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P.S.

January 14, 2013 • By • Leave a Comment

The Best Stuff You May Have Missed Last Week: A Coldplay-obsessed, Bieber-bodyguard-befriending, Vin Diesel-quoting, jet-setting American businessman is one of the only people that North Korea follows on Twitter. But why, asked Mother Jones? Vulture popped a quiz to see if you can tell the difference between Jay-Z lyrics and Great Gatsby prose. Zocalo Public Square recalled how support from a single big-city daily newspaper was once enough to send a gawky no-name with too-large feet on his way to the American presidency. The Atlantic revised history: President Kennedy’s ... Read More

More like this: Culture & Society, Environment, The 101
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Smokin’ Election Campaign Quote of the Week

October 19, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment

No doubt assuming Americans are more concerned about high gasoline prices than long-term threats to the environment, neither of the major-party presidential campaigns--nor, for that matter, the reporters covering them--have paid much attention to climate change. A few of our thoughtful commentators are starting to take note, including Eugene Robinson in today's Washington Post. But the most succinct and pithy quote on the subject was offered on MSNBC by articulate and erudite Chris Hayes. His metaphor: "Having an energy conversation without talking about climate is like talking about ... Read More

More like this: Environment, The 101
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Journalists: Why Do We Even Bother?

September 24, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment

Why am I even writing this? Odds are that you, dear reader, don't believe a word journalists like myself have to say. A new Gallup poll finds that "Americans' distrust in the media hit a new high this year, with 60% saying they have little or no trust in the mass media to report the news fully, accurately, and fairly." Republicans are the most skeptical, with only 26 per cent expressing some degree of trust in the media. Independents aren't far behind. A slim majority of Democrats do generally trust the media, but even their numbers are falling. Not a good sign for the health of our ... Read More

More like this: The 101, Uncategorized
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Female Olympians Sidetracked from Prime Time TV

July 26, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
Summer Olympics Beijing 2008

When it comes to gender-neutral coverage, NBC’s prime-time Olympics telecast is no medalist. That’s the conclusion of two newly published studies looking at the American television network’s prime-time coverage of the most recent summer and winter Olympics. One reported female athletes were marginalized during the 2010 winter Olympics, receiving only 37.8 percent of prime-time coverage. The other found they did significantly better during the 2008 summer Olympics, receiving 46.3 percent of air time during the broadcast network’s evening programming. However, that figure was ... Read More

More like this: Culture & Society, Findings
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Photos Implant ‘Memories’ of Fictional News Events

November 19, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment

Remember that botched mission to rescue captured British soldiers in Baghdad during the Iraq War? And how Prime Minister Tony Blair subsequently rebuffed calls for his resignation? If you answered no, it’s for a good reason: The event never happened. But if you answered yes, the photograph of a pensive Blair that accompanies this blog post may be partially to blame. That’s the conclusion of a troubling new study about false memories, which was recently published in the journal Acta Psychologica. It reports a fake news headline is more likely to be accepted as factual if it is ... Read More

More like this: Media, Mediator
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In Disney Films, Beauty Is Far From Beastly

November 5, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment

Highly attractive people are smarter, more socially adept and generally superior to the rest of us, and they tend to live happier lives. At least, that’s a widely shared stereotype that psychologists first identified in the early 1970s and recent research suggests is somewhat self-perpetuating. (Having been fawned over from an early age, good-looking people tend to have higher levels of self-esteem, which is an important ingredient in positive life outcomes.) But how exactly does the good-is-beautiful belief get passed down from one generation to the next? Newly published research ... Read More

More like this: Culture, Culture & Society, Mediator
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Golden Age of Newscasts is Now — on NPR

September 30, 2010 • By • Leave a Comment

Edward R. Murrow is, deservedly, a revered figure in broadcast news. His on-the-scene coverage of the Nazi bombing of London brought the terrifying realities of World War II to American listeners in a uniquely palpable way. Murrow not only personified the idea of a foreign broadcast correspondent: He essentially invented the role. But how do his reports, and those of his CBS colleagues, hold up today? Iowa State University researcher Raluca Cozma addressed that question by comparing two sets of morning newscasts: One produced by CBS radio in the early 1940s, the other produced by NPR in ... Read More

More like this: Media, Mediator
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