Is There Political Bias in the Mainstream Media?

The mainsteam media (sometimes referred to as “MSM”) has been a target of republicans for some time now as being somehow biased and unfair toward the GOP and conservative views in general. For their part, Democrats have targeted networks such as Fox as being unbalanced and unfair, even during times when pundits who openly share their political
leans are not being featured. The intensity of these feelings about the media seems to be increasing as time passes and as social media outlets play a stronger role in politics.

The problem with these assertions of political media bias for both sides of the political aisle is that they are hard to prove. Republicans and conservative bloggers point out correctly that many mainstream media members do fit demographics more typical of democratic voters – given the colleges they went to, the attitudes of the professors at those colleges, and the demographics of the states where they live. But then again, it would be unfair to assume that even if more mainstream media members vote for democrats or hold personal liberal opinions that they would necessarily be biased in their reporting.

On the other hand, while many pundits employed by Fox news may have a conservative or right-wing lean, that does not mean that the regular news broadcasts on the network are equally biased. That also would be unfair, and may merely be the result of a hyper-sensitivity to that possibility by people who are charged up by the opinions of the political pundits on the station.

Several scientific studies have tried to explore whether there is any mainstream media political bias. One study out of UCLA found no evidence of a left-leaning bias in the mainsteam media, and in fact found that political media reporting overall leaned to the conservative side. This study simply counted the number of times various media outlets mentioned liberal and conservative advocacy groups and political organizations, but these methods were faulted as not accurately measuring bias. Other studies have tried to measure potential political boas in the media by comparing the types of stories written during election campaigns and putting stories about different candidates and parties in “positive” and “negative” categories to see which party seems to get more of the latter. Still other studies have taken a retrospective view of political media bias by looking historically at whether
more positive media reports tend to follow certain leaders, depending on their political lean. There has been no meta-conclusion reached as yet about media bias based on these studies.

The fact that in this age where statistical science is well advanced we have not been able to prove any “liberal bias” in the mainsteam media or conservative bias in the non-pundit driven news broadcasts on conservative stations like Fox might suggest that perhaps there is none overall. A recent possibility that has gained steam is that the mainstream media stays so adamantly central and middle-of-the-road politically that those who have views on the far right or left do not feel they are completely covered or heard. That leads to claims of bias because the media reports seem to always disagree with their own off center political opinions and beliefs.

For more information about potential bias in the mainstream media and related coverage of politics from an independent view, please see our blogs at:

Foxes in the Henhouse: Coverage of politicians and political groups who do have hidden agendas and secret loyalties

Campaign Report Cards: Your chance to grade the mainstream media and other aspects of each political campaign.