I chose to look at the events of
the Edward Snowden leaks that occurred over the summer. More specifically, I
found two articles both discussing the moment when the US charged Snowden with
espionage and theft of government property. The two news outlets I used were
the BBC and FOX News.
Structurally, both articles are
quite similar. Starting with the “new” information (that Snowden was charged),
there was a brief discussion on the reaction by other politicians/individuals,
and then both conclude with a bit more background information on either the
leaks, or the political structure of Beijing that is allowing for such a
complex political situation to occur. Word-wise, there once again doesn’t seem
much difference, as the “facts” are essentially the same.
Where there is a difference is the “reaction” section. Interestingly, both
articles quoted the same senator, Bill Nelson, as he called Snowden’s act
“treasonous”. The other quotes that followed, however indicates where the slant
in this writing may be. The BBC article proceeded to quote a left-wing Hong
Kong politician as well as Wikileaks’ Julian Assange, both of whom expressed
how they thought Snowden should be protected from extradition and any charges.
Fox News did not show these contrasting voices — the only other voiced
“opinion” is that of a New York Republican echoing the notion that Snowden
“betrayed his country”. Clearly here one can see that there isn’t a “balanced”
voice, as FOX News readers may be led to assume that there isn’t an opposition
to these charges (as opposed to the BBC article). While this is the sources who
are saying these opinions, it is the journalist’s own omission of the counter
arguments that reveals the bias.
As I mainly followed the Snowden
controversy through the BBC, seeing a more “slanted” article from FOX didn’t
really affect me. I’ve found that the BBC reporting usually does a decent job
of showing varying sides in a neutral voice, and so my opinions were usually
created through other means than just reading a single news article. I could
see, however, how the FOX News article could be working to influence
individuals to think a certain way. This is not much of a shock, given FOX’s
reputation.
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Very pertinent comment on the impact of the choice of sources on an article that otherwise appears to be objective in terms of attributing all its information, opinion and arguments to sources. Later reporting of the story became increasingly politically charged, but it is especially interesting to see the bias in early news reports.
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