Tag: assault on the media

Spicer Said Media Shouldn’t Be Banned — In December

Buck Banks

I think we have a respect for the press when it comes to the government. That is something you can’t ban an entity from. Conservative, liberal or otherwise, that’s what makes a democracy a democracy versus a dictatorship.

— White House press secretary Sean Spicer, quoted by the Washington Post, on Dec. 16, 2016. On Friday, Feb. 24, 2017, Spicer blocked several media outlets from a White House briefing.

Narrow Majority of Trump Voters See Press as Enemy

Buck Banks

51%

A new HuffPost/YouGov survey finds “most Trump voters, 51%, say the media is an enemy to people like them, according to the poll, with 36% considering the media unfriendly, and just 5% saying it’s friendly or an ally. Overall, 22% of Americans consider the media an enemy to people like them, with 19% saying it’s unfriendly, 21% that it’s friendly, and 14% that it’s an ally.”

It’s Not About Crowd Size, It’s About Delegitimizing the Media

Buck Banks

The Trump administration is creating a baseline expectation among its loyalists that they can’t trust anything said by the media. The spat over crowd size is a low-stakes, semi-comic dispute, but the groundwork is being laid for much more consequential debates over what is, and isn’t, true. Delegitimizing the institutions that might report inconvenient or damaging facts about the president is strategic for an administration that has made a slew of impossible promises and takes office amid a cloud of ethics concerns and potential scandals.

— Ezra Klein

Majority Find Mainstream News Sources to Be Credible

Buck Banks

two-thirds

Of respondents to a Morning Consult poll found ABC, CBS and NBC to be credible news sources, while less than 1 in 5 found Breitbart or Fox News to be credible. Interesting finding: Thirty-one percent said they see fake news stories in their social media feeds more than once a day, and 55 percent said they have started reading a story only to realize it was fake.

Kids Can’t Tell Real from Fake News

Buck Banks

82%

Of middle-schoolers failed to differentiate between news stories and “sponsored content,” according to a Stanford University study, reports Quartz. “According to the study, more than two-thirds of middle-school students failed to flag as biased a post written by a bank executive and arguing for young adults to pursue more financial-planning help. Likewise, some 40% of high-school students believed a photo and headline that suggested deformed daisies were evidence of toxic conditions near Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. The photo included no source or location tag.”

Trump Part of Larger Movement to Discredit the Press

Buck Banks

In the last few years, Trump has been joined by at least two billionaires who are determined to exploit cracks in the wall of defense around the press. The members of this club are innovators. They have sued or funded suits to defend reputations or protect privacy. But an underlying aim appears to be to punish critics… or even destroy entire media outlets. … This kind of manipulation of the law is unfolding at a keen moment of weakness for the press, which has already been buffeted by falling revenue and mounting public disaffection.

— New York Times