In a rather bizarre exchange on CNN’s Reliable Sources, moderator Brian Stelter admitted that there is a liberal bias when covering shootings, but it’s not about pushing gun control. “We heard this at the investigative reporter and editor's conference this weekend that’s going on,” Stelter chatted with NPR’s Michael Oreskes, “The panel of gun reporting experts agreed that sometimes there's too much coverage of mass shootings…and not enough coverage of the daily grim death toll from gun violence.”
Oreskes agreed explaining that mass shootings were rarer than the average shootings, but and they receive greater coverage because of it, “things that happen all the time and change us over time and those things that happen suddenly.”
Stelter pointed to media coverage of Chicago’s mass violence as evidence of his twisted definition of liberal media bias. “"It's much harder to write about the gun violence in inner cities like Chicago but ignoring the wider violence creates the impression that the media cares only about rifles and mass shootings,"” he stated, quoting an article from the left leaning Slate.
But Stelter seems to have missed the point on two fronts. First, the real liberal media bias is the constant exploitation of tragedy to push the gun-control agenda, such as NBC for example. Also, the bias in regards to Chicago is that the liberal media refuses to report about how the killing is out of control under liberal leadership and liberal gun policies.
Transcript below:
CNN
Reliable Sources
June 19, 2016
11:06:49 PM EasternJON AVLON: Yes, I think one of the things that maybe does color us as journalists in our perception and coverage of these attacks— You know, when Tammy Baldwin was part of that Democratic filibuster she listed mass— major mass shootings over the last ten years, and it took ten minutes.
And I kept thinking as I heard all the times at The Daily Beast had covered those attacks. The initial adrenalin, the coverage, how it absorbed the oxygen in the country and then predicted faded away and then the sense of impedance surrounded us in the wake of Newtown, where 90 percent support for some of these bills and it couldn't get it past.
And so that’s part of the outrage that does, I think, drive some of our coverage. We have lived through these and, look, people don't kill people, guns kill people but guns help. And the idea we can't talk about that, the idea this legislation that even members of congress feel totally defeated and impotent in the face of these shootings we deal with. Whether it’s mass shootings or the shooting that occur every day that's an appropriate filter to place, at least when it comes to opinion or editorial in terms of our prospective on these attacks.
BRIAN STELTER: There has also been a lot comments about liberal media bias in the wake of the coverage, particularly around guns. Let me read something from Slate that tried to point this out, arguing that whenever guns are covered, there's a media bias.
It says there's a lot of coverage of mass shooting but quote, "It's much harder to write about the gun violence in inner cities like Chicago but ignoring the wider violence creates the impression that the media cares only about rifles and mass shootings."
Michael we heard this at the investigative reporter and editor's conference this weekend that’s going on. The panel of gun reporting experts agreed that sometimes there's too much coverage of mass shootings, which are relatively rare but horrible, and not enough coverage of the daily grim death toll from gun violence. How do you, as a leader of the NPR newsroom, try to address that?
MICHAEL ORESKES: Well, it's an important subject and it goes to the large issue of the difference between what you can call a glacial event, things that happen all the time and change us over time and those things that happen suddenly. We're a lot better at covering things that happen suddenly that stand out rather than the steady accretion of gun violence. Although, I will say there are a number of news organizations, and I include NPR in this, who have done a really good job of, for example, covering the gun violence in Chicago, or in other cities in this country, but it doesn't stick with people nearly the way the sudden events do.
