Well Duh: Study Finds Fox News Makes Ya Stupid

[AFK]

Of course this is really more commentary on the end users than those disseminating the information.  A long time ago Americans, en masse, decided they wanted their news reporting to be more entertaining than informative.  So they're getting exactly what they wanted.  There seems to be endless demand for this stuff, advertisers are locked into that big time.  Weeeeee!

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Here is the link to the poll the article is based upon: http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/brunitedstatescanadara/671.php?nid=&id=&pnt=671&lb=

If you read the report of the findings you'll see that it is actually more focused on the influence of money on elections.  The Fox News/Media portion is just one of the narratives in the summary. 

Which is, of course, also interesting but not terribly newsworthy. And by that I mean that what is newsworthy and what is deemed newsworthy don't always overlap. Speaking of which, did you hear that the football dude and his wife made a foot fetish home movie? Apparently the TV box tells me this is vital information even though I don't care for football.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Of course this is really more commentary on the end users than those disseminating the information.  A long time ago Americans, en masse, decided they wanted their news reporting to be more entertaining than informative.  So they're getting exactly what they wanted.  There seems to be endless demand for this stuff, advertisers are locked into that big time.  Weeeeee!

Same page. We're on it.

[Bruno]

I remember when I was a kid wondering why they talked about sports on the news.

Sports isn't news.

[Fujikoma]

Phack SLIGHTLY MISINFORMED, I go whole hog with INFOWARS, so I can have an excuse to hide in my cave and craft mindbombs with the intent to topple the NWO... Not much success yet, but it's the little results keep me going.

And yes, I must agree that this article is biased. %67 of statistics are made up on the spot, and polls are by no means a reliable gauge of human intention and/or understanding... Just like the guy in the stained wifebeater is more likely to come out of the front door of his decrepit mobile home and tell the reporter all about the tornado that is surely God's revenge against the gays, so too, I imagine, are many of the people who are like "Yeah, I've got time to answer a few questions.". I imagine a lot of people with a brain in their head are like "#$*% you, I'm $*%&in BUSY.".

I only answer survey questions when I'm severely intoxicated.

[Jenne]

...actually, my husband and I answer survey polls all the time on the phone.  And truthfully.

[Fujikoma]

There's room for this, too. I guess I used some indefinite wording when I said "many", I didn't say majority or minority, I didn't cite any studies. In truth, I knew that attempting to define the exact proportion would be stupid, given that I haven't read any studies to cite, and this is why I chose the word "many". So I'm not saying YOU, I'm saying that there exists a significant proportion.

On the other side, I said "a lot of", which again does not specify an exact amount. I know a lot of people, who happen to be of above average intelligence, who do not take the time to answer surveys, simply hanging up. My mom is fairly smart, in some ways, and she answers political surveys, but when I'm around to eavesdrop it sometimes makes me cringe. She's one of those self-styled republican "wiccans", and I can't stand talking to her about religion, as far as politics, I have to pull out my soap box and use those long monologues she hates so much in order to discourage any kind of conversation on the matter. She usually just agrees with me to get me to shut up, I think. Just because she answers surveys, or has notions I do not agree with, does not make her wrong, it's just, I can hear the same stuff from Glenn Beck, and I don't trust that guy.

Still, the purpose of the poll is to gauge opinion, which is neither validated nor invalidated by the intelligence of those surveyed, but rather by particular groups of people who may be over or under represented in the poll, whether due to opting out or strange wording of the question. My point is, polls are tainted, and IMO, not a reliable opinion gauge... You can't just snag a random group of people off the street and expect to have a firm understanding of the view out there in the larger portion of the population, just like you can't call random numbers and reliably predict opinion, but I suppose it's a step in the right direction, which looks a lot like a dead end to me. Easy to criticize, but hard to solve. Yes, I know that's why they use statistics, and I know statistical information is useful in a number of areas... Determinism with such a large problem is impossible (or, as I've suspected and possibly read somewhere else, extremely difficult with just about anything, as determinism is ideal for simpler problems, involving two body interactions, but these interactions never truly exist, always being interacted with by countless factors and forces, and I apologize if my understanding of the issue is completely ignorant), and I'm not saying a poll should be %100 accurate.

I am not saying your post is ill thought out, I am saying that I used weasely wording to provide a seemingly coherent idea, but you likely already knew that... In my mind, using these terms is slightly justified by the ends, which is hopefully someone much more invested in such an idea will happen along and expand on it. Perhaps this is foolishness, I don't know. While I admit, it's not very considerate to just cop out on the work related to making a point, I'm really not that concerned with making a point (in which case, perhaps I should think my posts out a little more before considering posting them), though I will admit that my take on poll results is not my own, so there must exist some basis for the idea in the first place... Whether that basis comes from a sound source or not, I can't say.

The statistic on statistics I made up on the spot, although I can't take credit for that idea, either.

Should someone discover that this idea is wrong, and prove their point, they will be doing me, and in the long run, potentially many others, a service... Same goes if it should happen to be right. I apologize if this crap has come up before, but I noticed the notion in my head and figured I could use some input on the subject. I'm sorry if this bothers anyone. Perhaps I'm retroactively attempting to justify the post, but I don't think so, as the reason I post here, or anywhere, is usually to see who agrees and disagrees with me and why... This here is a poll in itself, but I'll try not to go about touting it like it's the truth... And I recognize the hypocrisy with posting some half-baked opinion on polls as truth and then posting what I have just posted.

I find that a lot of the news articles I've read have been biased. True neutrality is hard to achieve, and likely not sensationalist enough to capture the public's attention the way biased articles and stories are, which serve to validate what they already "know", or guide them along a path parallel with the agenda of the powerful people behind the news itself.

[Jenne]

Well, at the end of all that TL; DR, do you have a solution to your supposed problem, or do you just like taking the long-winded approach to shitting in pools?

[Fujikoma]

The latter.

I suppose the solution is to educate as many people as possible that the news makes ya stupid, just like the article attempts to do.