Is the news being dumbed down?

humanji

Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that the news, in particular Sky News and Channel 4 news, are dumbing down their news reports?

I was watching Sky News this morning and the had an article about Blair calling for a general election. They then went on to symbolise the three main parties with three men on a race track. This was followed by some dodgy graphics overlaid on the track with the more important words that the reporter was saying appearing in large white letters that took up about a fifth of the screen.

I've noticed it before, but it was only today that I realised how bizare it really is! At first they were trying to emulate the American news channels, but now it's like they're making a tv version of the Sun newspaper.

Anyone else notice this?

bringitdown

"Hordes of panicky people seem to be evacuating the town for some unknown reason. Professor, without knowing precisely what the danger is, would you say it's time for our viewers to crack each other's heads open and feast on the goo inside?"

"Yes, I would, Kent."

Sleepy

It's the 21st Century, everything's being dumbed down. Our news. Our movies. Our food. People seem to like being stupid. How else can you explain religion, soap operas or Louis Walsh?

whiskeyman

Sky News is about as dumbed down as you can get.
C4 News is probably one of the most highly regarded News programmes among media circles. It's hour long show has more time to probe the big issues of the day.
The Beeb is still a rock, but too brief - thats where Newsnight, and Q&A come in.
RTE News still packs a punch, with TV3 being the dumber...

seamus

Moved from AH

Kingsize

Ignorance is bliss, TV is only dumbed down because people dont want to look any further.
People do indeed like being stupid,
e.g people seem to enjoy reading pages & pages of drivel about people theyve never met & probably never will yet they dont even talk to their neighbours.The human mind is like a complex super-computer system,most people seem content to just look at the screensaver.
one thing that i wonder though is were we always this dumb or have we evolved to this level of stupidity in recent times

Bri

Hell yeah.

It really bugs me when people say Sky News is great and not too tabloid-esque. I mean think about their red background with captial white writing...hardly broadsheet now is it . At least it's not as blatantly biased as his Fox News. BBC still good, CH.4 good but don't have it. Prime Time and RTE News is still pretty decent. TV3 obviously the LCD approach.

Then there's Naked News...

Ray777

RTÉ is far from perfect, but I think their news and current affairs output is second to none. They carry an aura of authority, explaining things clearly, but getting the balance between intelligent and 'dumbed-down' just perfect.

BBC News carries a similar 'authority', but in the face of populist competition from SKY and ITN, they're pandering more and more to the lowest common denominator. BBC Radio news is vastly superior to its televisual version.

ITV News is basically a carbon copy of SKY - based around the 'personality' of the newsreader, relying on Trevor McDonald's reputation far too much. It's all about aesthetics nowadays, rather than delivering quality news.

Channel Four News is about as good as it gets across the pond. Some say it delivers a slightly left-wing slant, but overall, in terms of being informative I don't think it can be touched.

TV3 'news' is laughable, just like TV3 itself. It looks cheap, and consists of nothing but anodyne smiles and people who aren't even good enough for AA-Roadwatch. They really shouldn't bother doing news at all. It's painfully embarrassing to watch. They'll never be able to live down, reporting the Pope's death prematurely, based around rumours from the Italian media (hardly the most reliable of sources). In fact, how that channel ever got a license to broadcast is beyond me... But that's an issue for another thread.

SKY News is basically pure thrash, without an ounce of substance behind the red banners and fancy graphics. Most of their newsreaders look as though they come from modelling backgrounds, rather than journalism. Fact me 'til I fart!

egan007

'Sky News' is a contradiction in itself
there seems to be very little to distinguish it from Dreamteam on Sky1

sceptre

Ray777 wrote:

people who aren't even good enough for AA-Roadwatch.

That's unfair. The rest of your paragraph is pretty fair though.

Ray777

sceptre wrote:

That's unfair. The rest of your paragraph is pretty fair though.

Well, I suppose they do have the accents for AA-Roadwatch. 'Red kye Rinde-abite' and all that...

Seriously though, apart from having reasonably pretty faces, I can't see an ounce of talent there - either journalistic or with regard to presentation style. It's just dire from start to finish.

mike65

Ray777 wrote:

BBC Radio news is vastly superior to its televisual version.

True, though TV not a complete dead loss with BBC World and News 24 being able to run background features and follow up stories which the main terrestrial news progs simply dont have time for.

Mike.

mike65

You'll be thrilled to know that SKY News have just invented the Smile-O-Metre...words fail me.

Mike.

flogen

mike65 wrote:

You'll be thrilled to know that SKY News have just invented the Smile-O-Metre...words fail me.

Mike.

oh lord help us.
Tv3 and Sky News are both tabloid TV, but there is a market there, it just scares me (as it does with any trashy tabloid) that people will watch this and swallow it whole. I wouldn't even do that with BBC or RTE news. Lazy journalism, bias and dumming down in some quarters is quite dangerous IMO, it leads people to believe they know what's going on when they don't really. It also leads to people ringing up Adrian Kennedy thinking they know what they're talking about!

I was laughing at Sky News on Tuesday, the way they were waiting for Blair's statement on the election and then BAM, tons of new graphics pop up with side bars and so on going nuts, public votes and comments everywhere, brilliant. It was like The episode of The Day Today where they manage to get two countries to go to war and the entire studio morphs into "war mode".

Dublin's Finest

24 hour news is a bad idea anyway. half the time they just talk to randomers while they wait for a statement. there's too much of a reliance on opinions.

you better off sticking with the beeb, rte2, ch4 and itv.

sky has two purposes: footy, simpsons.

thefuturehead

we're being a bit harsh here, aren't we?

first off, some genuinely talented journos work for some of the most derided news stations. take adam boulton on sky news. he's a good reporter, has great contacts and is as good, in my humble opinion, as most other political reporters.

it's unfair to compare bbc's tv news to their radio news service. there's no comparison between a five minute news bulletin on the radio with half an hour with three minute taped reports on the tv. unfortunately the audience isn't really there for more in-depth programs(more so than are out already obviously) on tv...but so what? shows that like that seem to suit radio more.


as for the use of graphics. they work. sorry, but it's true. and that's accepting the over-use of them as satirised by the genius that is The Day Today. generally though, people would rather look at a nice shiny graph than hear somebody tell them that information. and if said shiny graph gets the info across better, surely that's better public service journalism than some bloke in a suit outside downing street...in that it's a better way of sharing information with the public...

i do accept though that sometimes the graphics are just plain silly though.

i guess my essential point can be boiled down to the fact that what the viewers want, the viewers get.

flogen

thefuturehead wrote:

we're being a bit harsh here, aren't we?

first off, some genuinely talented journos work for some of the most derided news stations. take adam boulton on sky news. he's a good reporter, has great contacts and is as good, in my humble opinion, as most other political reporters.

There have been a few harsh comments in the thread, but mainly it's been pretty fair comment IMO.

I don't doubt that talented journos work for bad news stations, and that may be because they're waiting for a better job or they're getting paid enough. I'm not sure if I'd be happy to take a grand extra for my integrity, but saying that the likes of Boulton never really bothered me, it's more the story writers and general presenters on sky (if using that channel as an example)

it's unfair to compare bbc's tv news to their radio news service. there's no comparison between a five minute news bulletin on the radio with half an hour with three minute taped reports on the tv. unfortunately the audience isn't really there for more in-depth programs(more so than are out already obviously) on tv...but so what? shows that like that seem to suit radio more.

well, not really. BBC Radio has a vast array of channels, and places like radio 4 and BBC World Service are heavy on news and current affairs. In reality, BBC News 24 has the opportunity to evolve upon the shows on Radio 4, and it does to some degree. I think it's easily the best 24 hour news service going at the moment, but that doesn't mean it's as good as it could be (I don't watch it enough to say I think it's being dumbed down, but I have felt that the news bulletins on BBC 1 are becoming a bit, a little bit more tabloid).

as for the use of graphics. they work. sorry, but it's true. and that's accepting the over-use of them as satirised by the genius that is The Day Today. generally though, people would rather look at a nice shiny graph than hear somebody tell them that information. and if said shiny graph gets the info across better, surely that's better public service journalism than some bloke in a suit outside downing street...in that it's a better way of sharing information with the public...

Yes, but these graphs and polls don't give the full story, the often summarise it and leave people with half the information. While it may not be as fun or aestetically appealing, it's usually better to have a guy in a suit explaining the details of a new agreement, rather than a picture which uses bright colours to signify the new agreement.
also there's the idea that a picture may paint a thousand words, but not everybody can read, if that makes sense. In other words, a graph may give all the information but it just encourages the viewer to skim over the information and take the most stand-out point of it alone.

i do accept though that sometimes the graphics are just plain silly though.

i guess my essential point can be boiled down to the fact that what the viewers want, the viewers get.

I know that there will always be a market for tabloid journalism, and I have no problem with that. I've said it before that tabloid isn't meant to be the dirty word we all use it as, in countries like France their tabloids are usually the most reputable (tabloid traditionally refers more to the style of the paper rather than its content). In Ireland one of our broadsheets is often as bad for poor quality journalism as our tabloids.
I personally think that, in the context of tv tabloids, most people are happy to sit back and have the news spoonfed to them, but they would also be happy to actually be engaged by it where possible. Sky News takes an easy approach and it creates laziness on both sides, lazy journalism and lazy viewers who don't challenge it. Someone, and I don't know who, should teach the public on challenging the media more and become it's watchdog so that they can't mis-lead us or treat us like morons. The language they use doesn't really bother me, but their content does.

Eoghan-psych

Sleepy wrote:

It's the 21st Century, everything's being dumbed down. Our news. Our movies. Our food. People seem to like being stupid. How else can you explain religion, soap operas or Louis Walsh?

I think a distinction needs to be made between "dumbing down" and "making accessible" - C4 is definitely not 'dumbed down', but it is more accessible than some other outlets. I can't vouch for Sky News, as I don't have it.

All I can say to anyone accusing European media of dumbing down - look at US coverage. Most media outlets in the US make the News of the World look highbrow.

flogen

Eoghan-psych wrote:

I think a distinction needs to be made between "dumbing down" and "making accessible" - C4 is definitely not 'dumbed down', but it is more accessible than some other outlets. I can't vouch for Sky News, as I don't have it.

All I can say to anyone accusing European media of dumbing down - look at US coverage. Most media outlets in the US make the News of the World look highbrow.

I agree with you in relation to C4 and the distinction you have made, however I don't think we should sit back and appreciate the fact that we are better than the US, while their media is generally far more sensationalist, bias and generally dumber than ours, we must be on our guard to ensure that we don't go down the same path

thefuturehead

fair points all flogen. i guess i just have a problem with a snobbish attitude to news. to try to make my argument in a more succint way:

a lot of people attribute the dumbing down to issues like ownership and costcutting etc, saying journalistic standards suffer because of the pressures put on journos and editors by proprietors. fair point. but...these moguls want to give the public what they want. and if the majority of the public want stuff dumbed down, it's a bit preachy of us to say they shouldn't have it. if i can be clear though, i can't stand to read the trashy tabloids or watch the worst of the 24 hour news stations. just does nothing for me.

but there are people who buy the sun every day, or turn to sky news for their evening bulletin or whatever. and they make an active choice to do so. and they're surrounded by a choice of more in-depth and 'quality' news sources. so let them have their crap. to steal a genius quote from yes, minister:

Jim Hacker: "Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers:
The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country;
The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country;
The Times is read by people who actually do run the country;
The Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country;
The Financial Times is read by people who own the country;
The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country;
And the Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is."
Sir Humphrey: "Prime Minister, what about the people who read the Sun?"
Bernard Woolley: "Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits."


so if they want tits, let them have tits.

flogen

thefuturehead wrote:

fair points all flogen. i guess i just have a problem with a snobbish attitude to news. to try to make my argument in a more succint way:

a lot of people attribute the dumbing down to issues like ownership and costcutting etc, saying journalistic standards suffer because of the pressures put on journos and editors by proprietors. fair point. but...these moguls want to give the public what they want. and if the majority of the public want stuff dumbed down, it's a bit preachy of us to say they shouldn't have it. if i can be clear though, i can't stand to read the trashy tabloids or watch the worst of the 24 hour news stations. just does nothing for me.

but there are people who buy the sun every day, or turn to sky news for their evening bulletin or whatever. and they make an active choice to do so. and they're surrounded by a choice of more in-depth and 'quality' news sources. so let them have their crap. to steal a genius quote from yes, minister:

Jim Hacker: "Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers:
The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country;
The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country;
The Times is read by people who actually do run the country;
The Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country;
The Financial Times is read by people who own the country;
The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country;
And the Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is."
Sir Humphrey: "Prime Minister, what about the people who read the Sun?"
Bernard Woolley: "Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits."


so if they want tits, let them have tits.

Well, if the majority of the public made a consious decision to read a newspaper with less challenging language or a channel with less challenging insights into the issues, so be it. My problem is that tabloids in England (and thus Ireland) don't only dumb down the news, they try to sensationalise it and make it interesting. This may involve bias, ignorance of facts, tweaking facts or out right lying.
I would never look down on someone for reading The Sun, but I do have issue with them churning out what they've read as fact the day before, listen to Adrian Kennedy for an example of these types. Too many people read poor quality papers and think that they are accurate and fair journals. And why should the public have to expect anything but the news from a newspaper?
The problem with dumbing down the news is that, in Ireland at least, dumbing down also means the evasion of real analysis and a real and true presentation of the facts.

nice quote by the way!

Dublin's Finest

flogen wrote:

Well, if the majority of the public made a consious decision to read a newspaper with less challenging language or a channel with less challenging insights into the issues, so be it. My problem is that tabloids in England (and thus Ireland) don't only dumb down the news, they try to sensationalise it and make it interesting. This may involve bias, ignorance of facts, tweaking facts or out right lying.

I think we're being all being a little harsh on tabloid readers here. A large proportion of tabloid readers are very aware that what they are reading can be taken with a pinch of salt. I'd prefer that readership to be getting some news than no news. Fair enough, the tabloids can take a bit of a paint by numbers approach to the issues of the day but nonetheless.

I also think that we've been quite well-served by our media in the last couple of years - I think the overall standard is good.

flogen

Dublin's Finest wrote:

I think we're being all being a little harsh on tabloid readers here. A large proportion of tabloid readers are very aware that what they are reading can be taken with a pinch of salt. I'd prefer that readership to be getting some news than no news. Fair enough, the tabloids can take a bit of a paint by numbers approach to the issues of the day but nonetheless.

I also think that we've been quite well-served by our media in the last couple of years - I think the overall standard is good.

well, that's possible. The tabloid readers I know do take it all with a pinch of salt, but it's impossible to really quantify it either way, so I can't prove that they read it blindly or take it with a pinch of salt (that is unless someone has link to a survey which could help!).
I would still assume that a fair proportion of readers of tabloids do take it all as gospel, but more importantly I'd imagine a much larger proportion of Sky News/ITV/Tv3 news viewers take the pieces as 100% factual, 100% balanced etc. when it's not. Perhaps it's the air of authority these channels attempt to pass off (while The Sun has topless women and gossip pages etc, so it tends to lampoon itself to some degree). Perhaps its that in Ireland consistantly bad tv-journalism is a relatively new thing as we were always used to RTE, BBC, Channel 4 and ITV (which used to be much more reputable than it is now).

Thankfully we are not in a terrible situation, there are still many media outlets worth reading and worth relying on. As stated before, the US is in a much more dire state, from what I gather there are almost no papers or channels that can be trusted 100% and most are bias to some degree

thefuturehead

In defence of tabloids(generally, of course they cross ethical and journalistic boundaries sometimes):

'Sensationalism doesn't mean the distortion of truth. It means the vivid and dramatic presentation of events so as to give them a forceful impact on the mind of the reader'. - Sylvester Bolam

Flogen, you said: "from what I gather there are almost no papers or channels that can be trusted 100% and most are bias to some degree". They are, but so is every journalist/sub/editor in every country. No-one is completely free of bias. Choosing what makes a story is a story is, in itself, a form of bias IMHO.

Eoghan-psych

thefuturehead wrote:

Flogen, you said: "from what I gather there are almost no papers or channels that can be trusted 100% and most are bias to some degree". They are, but so is every journalist/sub/editor in every country. No-one is completely free of bias. Choosing what makes a story is a story is, in itself, a form of bias IMHO.

True, but at the end of the day if you pick up a shelf full of our newpapers or channel surf across the news bulletins you will see the same information - the words might be different, but the actual facts reported will be essentially the same [tabloids excepted - there just won't be any facts, or at least none relevant to the story]. That doesn't happen with proper 'dumb' media coverage - compare, for example, Fox News' coverage of Iraq to that of other US outlets.

flogen

thefuturehead wrote:

In defence of tabloids(generally, of course they cross ethical and journalistic boundaries sometimes):

'Sensationalism doesn't mean the distortion of truth. It means the vivid and dramatic presentation of events so as to give them a forceful impact on the mind of the reader'. - Sylvester Bolam

Flogen, you said: "from what I gather there are almost no papers or channels that can be trusted 100% and most are bias to some degree". They are, but so is every journalist/sub/editor in every country. No-one is completely free of bias. Choosing what makes a story is a story is, in itself, a form of bias IMHO.

Regarding a natural bias within individuals in the media, it's true that it's inescapable, but... well coincidently I read a piece yesterday which I would totally agree with, and I'm sure most here do too. According to a book "The electronic age" by Eamon G Hall, When the Broadcasting Act was being ammended in 1976 objections were raised by RTE to the inclusion of references to impartiality and objectivity. Conor Cruise O'Brien, the then Minister for Posts and Telegraphs appreciated that objectivity and impartiality were "probably philiosophically unattainable by human beings" but he considered it desirable that a medium should be obliged to "move in that direction". I know bias is always going to exist, even in the finest publications and broadcasts, it's just what degree that matters.
As far as the quote on sensationalism, while it may not mean to lie or distort, it does assume that the viewer hasn't the capability to grasp the gravity of a situation well enough. In my opinion, a big story that has an impact should stand on its own, and a minor story is just that and has no need to be over-blown. If it's the case that the viewer/reader can't understand the importance of a major world even through the basic facts then the problem lies with their perception of reality and not how the newspaper has written its piece.