This week, from Monday February 22 through Sunday February 28, 2010, NewsTrust is hosting a News Hunt for Bad Journalism, to highlight journalism with serious flaws: news reports and opinions that are inaccurate, biased, irresponsible or superficial. Please join our News Hunt, to help expose bad journalism — and fight the spin that is spreading in the news media and on the Internet.
For this special News Hunt, we will be joined by journalism students from Howard Rheingold’s class at Stanford University. Each day this week, we'll feature different examples of bad journalism from a variety of sources, across the political spectrum. We invite you to review these stories and rate them for journalistic quality, so we can identify the worst stories at the end of the week. Here's our schedule this week:
- Monday - News Reports
- Tuesday - Opinions
- Wednesday - Pundits from the Right
- Thursday - Pundits from the Left
- Friday - Media Watchdogs
- Saturday - Fact Checkers
(note that this blog post was updated throughout the week with new stories for review -- see below)
News Literacy Guides
To prepare for this News Hunt for Bad Journalism, we encourage you to read our Quick Review Guide, for helpful tips on how to review a story. Also, please read "Crap Detection 101" by Howard Rheingold (Stanford University), and "Think Like a Journalist" by Michael Bugeja (Iowa State University)
News Comparisons
How do you rate the stories below? Throughout this week, we'll compare questionable stories from these categories.
News Reports
- Obama tops Bush at ducking reporters - Washington Times
- Conservatives mock Al Gore on snowstorms - Politico
- The Internet Will Make You Smarter, Claims Study - Reuters
Opinions
- The EPA's climate con - New York Post
- N.Y. Times Laments Media Mistreatment of Voodoo, Including 'Voodoo Economics - NewsBusters
- Glenn Beck Dodges Incoming Plane at CPAC - The Nation
Pundits from the Right
- Obama's ability to dodge reporters' questions is now one for the record books - Fox News
- Obama Unveils Health Care Plan: A Defiant 'Screw You' to Nation - Rush Limbaugh Show
- Thunder on the right - Fox News
Pundits from the Left
- Chris Matthews: Throwback in South Carolina - MSNBC
- Uh-Oh...The Teabaggers Are Upset. - RandiRhodes.com
- Keith Olbermann: Not Worst Persons - MSNBC
Media Watchdogs
- WaPo's Ezra Klein Kisses Up to Keith, Agrees Limbaugh Is a 'Loathsome Racist' - NewsBusters
- 'Ram it through': Media adopt GOP characterization of majority vote - Media Matters
- ABC Pushes Obama's Insurance Demonization; Couric Asserts Summit 'Much-Anticipated' - Media Research Center
Fact-Checkers
- Health Care Summit Squabbles - FactCheck
- Fact-checking Obama's bipartisan health care reform meeting - PolitiFact
Join our News Hunt for Bad Journalism this week,to help us expose more stories that fail to uphold the journalistic standards that citizens rely on. To participate in this project, sign up (or login) and review any story our Bad Journalism page (featuring the Most Recent stories for review). To keep track of our scores throughout the week, check the Least Trusted tab on our Bad Journalism page (listing our lowest-rated stories so far).
And if you come across another example of bad journalism, please post it on our site (be sure to tag it "Bad Journalism" under Topics, so it will be listed in our News Hunt page).
Happy Hunting!
-- by Fabrice Florin, Kaizar Campwala and Derek Hawkins
Photo: Fox News
This is quite interesting, but the funny thing is it isn't that hard to find bad journalism ie. biased, irresponsible, inaccurate out here just turn to any foxnews channel or even read the new york times. So the bad journalism that we seek is really right in front of us.
Posted by: Vaughn Roland | February 28, 2010 at 02:01 PM