Editor’s Note: Explicit Content Below.
ABC, NBC and CBS are doing their best keep the public from seeing abortion for what it really is: the ripping apart of little baby bodies.
Since the release of the first Center for Medical Progress (CMP) video July 14 exposing Planned Parenthood’s harvesting of aborted baby parts, the three broadcast networks have spent only 1 minute and 13 seconds playing CMP video footage with audio. That’s 1 minute, 13 seconds out of 243 hours and 30 minutes of morning and evening news shows.
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In other words, ABC, NBC and CBS spent a mere 6% of their total Planned Parenthood coverage actually playing CMP’s videos during morning and evening news shows.
Of that 1 minute and 13 seconds:
Controversial video played: 0 seconds
Controversial imagery shown: 0 seconds
Controversial comments said: 1 minute, 5 seconds
The news shows not once played even blurred or pixilated footage of babies’ hands and legs picked apart in a dish – footage prominently shown in the fifth video.
For example, the networks censored camera-shots like these from the video:
Since release of the first CMP video, ABC, NBC and CBS have played 243 hours, 30 minutes total in morning and evening news shows. For perspective:
The networks spent 0.16% of that on total coverage of the CMP videos.
The networks spent 0.008% of that on total play of CMP videos.
Media Blasted Other Undercover Videos
It’s not like the networks have anything against undercover videos -- if they fit in the media’s liberal agenda.
In September 2012, the networks spent 88 minutes in 3 days covering the Mitt Romney "47 percent" undercover video. ABC found the story worth 21 minutes, 19 seconds, CBS covered it in 31 minutes, 24 seconds and NBC spent 35 minutes, 40 seconds.
That’s 1 political video against 6 showing the trafficking of baby parts by a taxpayer-funded organization.
The nets rushed to highlight NBA owner Donald Sterling’s racist remarks. In 3 ½ days, the networks devoted 146 minutes, or more than 2 hours, to the story of secret audiotapes capturing his racism.
In general, the networks are big fans of playing video. On January 7, ABC’s World News Tonight spent 114 seconds on zookeepers trying to get any mother gorilla to accept baby gorilla.
During the Jeff Rossen reports, elaborate set-ups where Rossen stages situations to see how people react, Today spent 306 seconds on an unruly child August 10th and 299 seconds on a person confessing to use a fake resume on August 12.
Breakdown of Coverage
MRC Culture searched Nexis and watched news shows to count the time spent on Planned Parenthood. We included stories that the media connected to Planned Parenthood videos (for example, the Senate’s vote on Planned Parenthood). We did not include teasers.
NBC total coverage of CMP videos: 6 minutes, 52 seconds
13 seconds playing actual CMP footage with audio
ABC total coverage of CMP videos: 1 minute, 41 seconds
0 seconds playing actual CMP footage with audio
CBS total coverage of CMP videos: 14 minutes, 59 seconds
1 minute playing actual CMP footage with audio
GRAND TOTAL of network coverage of CMP videos: 23 minutes, 32 seconds
GRAND TOTAL of CMP video content played with audio: 1 minute, 13 seconds
Media History
Since the release of CMP’s first video, the networks have proved hesitant to publicize the story – and when they do, they refuse to even utter the word “baby.”
From the beginning, the liberal media raced to defend Planned Parenthood. In the first 9 hours and 30 minutes of news shows broadcast after the story broke, ABC, NBC and CBS, spent only 39 seconds on the first video. It took more than 24 hours before all three covered the story. In the week after the first video, the networks gave a mere 9 minutes and 11 seconds to the story (in contrast, the networks devoted more than three times that to the Susan G. Komen controversy, when the charity temporarily decided to defund the abortion giant).
Also during their news shows, ABC, NBC and CBS covered the shooting of Cecil the lion more in one day than they did these videos in two weeks. That discrepancy continued even after three weeks since the release of the first CMP video.
Even in the wake of the sixth video, the three networks haven’t mentioned the content of CMP’s fifth video once.
The media similarly stayed silent on the case of Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell. Gosnell's trial, in which witnesses described baby abortion survivors “swimming" in toilets “to get out,” attracted a scant 12 – 15 reporters. Only after 56 days, multiple letters from members of the House of Representatives and a public outcry, did all three broadcast networks report on Gosnell.
Editor’s Note: NewsBusters analysts Rich Noyes and Mike Ciandella contributed to this report.
Demand the media tell the truth about Planned Parenthood! Sign the Media Research Center’s petition here.
