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Chapter 6: Newspapers and the News: Reflection of a Democratic Society
Summary and Learning Objectives
The first newspapers were published in Europe in the 17th century. Numerous papers were
published in the American colonies, but they faced extensive censorship from the British
government. Newspapers printed before the 19th century tended to be partisan publications that
were supported through high subscription fees and political subsidies. This changed with the rise
of the penny press in the 1830s. The penny papers were mass produced on steam-powered
printing presses and contained news of interest to ordinary people. The papers cost one or two
cents and were supported by advertisers who wanted to reach the papers’ large numbers of
readers.
The late 19th and early 20th centuries were characterized by the yellow journalism of the New
York newspapers published by Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst. The two
publishers tried to attract circulation and attention by running comic strips, advice columns, and
sensational stories about sex, crime, and scandal. This was also the time when newspapers
started running extensive headlines and illustrations.
The major classes of newspapers today include the following:
• Newspapers with a national reach that may cover a particular urban area but also try to
print material of interest to the entire country, such as USA Today, the Wall Street Journal,
the New York Times, and the Washington Post. Newspapers of this size may just try to reach
their own urban area.
with the issue of objectivity, especially when the story is close to home and when they are risking
their lives to report the news.
Many people claim that the media are biased toward one political view or another. Conservative
critics argue that there is a liberal bias arising from the tendency of reporters to be more liberal
than the public at large. The liberals’ counterargument is that the press has a conservative bias
After studying this chapter, you will be able to:
1. Discuss the development of the colonial and early American press.
2. Explain how tabloid newspapers differ from broadsheet newspapers.
3. Describe the three major types of newspapers today, with examples. (Note: The book incorrectly
has this listed as four types. For this edition, I’ve combined national and major metro papers into
a single category because of the national reach of the online presence of these papers.)
4. Name six basic news values used by journalists.
5. Discuss the risks that reporters take to cover the news.
6. Explain how the Internet and mobile technology have changed the news and newspaper business.
Review Questions
1. Why does MSNBC television commentator Rachel Maddow argue that it is essential for her
viewers to support their local news media?
2. How was the penny press responsible for creating our modern version of the newspaper?
3. What makes journalists calling out sources for lying so difficult?
4. How does the news media experience differ between people who are politically liberal and
politically conservative?
5. What did Washington Post executive editor Marty Barron mean when he said, “It’s wrong to say
we’re becoming a digital society. We already are a digital society. And even that statement is
behind the times. We’re a mobile society.”
Media Literacy Exercises
Gans’s Basic Journalistic Values
Pick up a copy of a major newspaper (USA Today, New York Times, Wall Street Journal) or the
nearest urban newspaper (Omaha World Herald or Denver Post) and look at the front page. Mark
each example of Gans’s basic journalistic values that you can identify. Then, in your journal:
• Give the name and date of your paper.
• List every story by headline on the front page.
• List the basic journalistic values from Gans for each story, and provide examples of how you
see them. Not all stories will fit perfectly, but review them and give your best argument for
why you think its fits into one category versus another. Be specific. HINT: You should have
something to say about each story on your front page.
Then, in a brief essay (400–500 words), explain which values you found and the evidence for
them. Did you see any other values that you would want to add to the list? What were they?
Notes: This is one of my favorite exercises for several reasons:
• It forces students to look at the nature of bias rather than parrot back what they have heard
media commentators saying.
• It forces them to get at the “how” of bias. That is, what forms does bias take? What do
journalists actually emphasize?
• It will result in similar findings by both liberal and conservative students. Gans’s scheme
gets away from the notion that everything you see is evidence of bias against your point of
view.
• It works reliably. I have never had any problem with students being unable to find examples
of these values within news stories.
Is the Newspaper Industry Declining?
Is the newspaper business really in a decline? Identify and discuss two reasons in support of this
argument and two reasons opposing it.
Notes: This assignment builds directly out of the textbook. The central issues are
• Urban afternoon papers having been closing at a steady pace over the last several decades;
much trouble as the urban papers.
Nellie Bly and the Tabloids Today
How would 19th century reporter Nellie Bly fit into the world of tabloid journalism today?
Explain.
Notes: For a more complete look at journalist Nellie Bly, take a look at
www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/world
This link takes you to the Around the World in 72 Days website that accompanies the PBS
documentary of the same name. From what was written in the book and is apparent from the
website, Nellie Bly would have neatly fit within any of the current tabloid newspapers. Look at the
sort of lively and sensational stories that Bly used to write and compare them in style to what
papers like the New York Daily News or the Chicago Sun-Times print.
Suggested Readings
• Pearl, D. (2002). At Home in the World: Collected Writings from the Wall Street Journal. New
York: Wall Street Journal. A collection of the best of murdered reporter Danny Pearl’s work.
• Bradlee, B. (1995). A Good Life: Newspapering and other Adventures. New York: Simon &
Schuster. This autobiography of the former editor of the Washington Post gives insight into
Watergate, the Janet Cooke scandal, and the growth of one of the country’s great
newspapers.
• Schudson, M. (1978). Discovering the News. New York: Basic Books. Schudson clearly
explains the varied roles that newspapers have played in the United States from the colonial
period through the 20th century.
• Kroeger, B. (1994) Nellie Bly: Daredevil, Reporter, Feminist. New York: Times Books. Kroger
provides a fascinating look at the lives and times of stunt reporter Nellie Bly.
• All of the Chapter 6 links posted to my RalphEHanson.com blog
http://www.ralphehanson.com/category/chapter-6/
Media Activities
Who Are the Press?
• http://www.ralphehanson.com/2014/04/16/who-is-the-press/
One question that’s pretty hard to answer these days is “Who is a reporter?”
Is this someone who works for a newspaper? A television station? A radio network? Most folks
would say, yes, these people are reporters.
But as I have mentioned before, among my Seven Truths They Don’t Want You To Know About the
Media is Truth #2--There are no mainstream media (MSM). Of course we have big and small media;
however, we use all kinds of media and our old legacy media hold no special status.
SCOTUSblog was the authoritative news site that everyone turned to for immediate and accurate
news about the decision. And on a day that several bigger websites had trouble staying online
because of heavy demand, SCOTUSblog had server capacity to spare despite drawing hundreds of
times more traffic than normal.
So you would think that when the reporter from SCOTUSblog applied for a U.S. Senate press pass
(something that is required to get a Supreme Court press pass), he was turned down. Why? It’s hard
to tell, beyond a “We’ve never done it that way before” kind of argument.
Here’s a great update from SCOTUSblog on their quest for one of the best organizations covering the
U.S. Supreme Court trying to get official recognition of their status as journalists.
Because credentialing the folks we all turn to for accurate information just seems like a good idea . .
Why Media Bias Is Complicated
If you want to ever get involved in a no-win scenario argument about the media, start talking
And you know what? They’re both (to a degree) correct.
And we could see this playing out during the 2014 election.
As reported on the ever excellent media criticism site JimRomenesko.com:
The owner of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Daily News, and Philly.com tells readers that his media
• http://www.ralphehanson.com/2014/10/28/why-media-bias-is-complicated/
Questions: How do you see multiple points of view/biases emerging from your local newspaper or
broadcaster? What do you think is the source of that point of view? Were you surprised to find that?
More on Media Bias and Importance of Telling the Truth
In January 2012, then New York Times public editor Arthur Brisbane set off a disturbance on the
Brisbane’s online column drew a huge range of comments, many of which could be paraphrased as,
“Well, duh!”
A commenter from Pennsylvania gave a typical response: “If you genuinely do not know whether or
not the paper of record should act as a stenographer for liars, then count me among the rest of the
commenters who is incredulous that you had to ask.”3
Another commenter, this one from Seattle, posted sarcastically, “I’m a pharmacist. Do you think it is
absolutely imperative that the next time you come to me for medication I actually give you what
your doctor ordered or will just any old medication be just fine? . . . This whole article is about the
dumbest thing I have ever read in ANY newspaper.”4
Among the hundreds of comments were accusations that the paper was printing lies from President
Obama, the government of Israel, or the Bush administration during the lead-up to the war in Iraq.
But the answer to Brisbane’s question is not necessarily so simple. Greg Sargent, writer of the
Washington Post’s political blog Plum Line, says that trying to fact-check everything before it gets
printed would be difficult. On the other hand, Sargent points out that the Times prints misleading
statements from candidates repeatedly, to the point that a reasonable person reading the paper
would think those claims were true.5
One of the strongest reactions to Brisbane’s column came from New York University journalism
professor Jay Rosen. Rosen, who has been an outspoken critic of the approach mainstream
journalists take to objectivity, says that the need to ask Brisbane’s question comes out of an
increasing desire for journalists to seem “unbiased.” He wrote on his blog PressThink,
Something happened in our press over the last 40 years or so that never got acknowledged and to
this day would be denied by a majority of newsroom professionals. Somewhere along the way, truth
telling was surpassed by other priorities the mainstream press felt a stronger duty to. These include
such things as “maintaining objectivity,” “not imposing a judgment,” or “refusing to take sides” . . .
Journalists felt better, safer, on firmer professional ground--more like pros--when they stopped
short of reporting substantially untrue statements as false.9
Classroom Debate on Opinion in the News
Do you prefer news presented with an explicit point of view (as on Fox News or MSNBC) or in
a detached manner (as on C-SPAN)? Do you think that it is possible for most news outlets to
keep their views out of the news?
Notes: You will certainly get a response from your students on this one. There are a couple of
issues you might want to raise with students here. First, students will perceive anything they
disagree with as biased and anything they like as balanced and reasonable. The more difficult
issue is to get students to see that there are multiple forms that bias can take. This discussion can
be a good launching ground for the Gans’s Basic Journalistic Values media literacy exercise.
New York University professor and blogger Jay Rosen posted an excellent essay on the ideology of
the American press in June 2010 that you might find helpful as well:
• http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2010/06/14/ideology_press.htm
l
In 2009, I participated in an extended debate via Facebook on media bias with my friend and
conservative journalist Danny Glover. You can read a transcript of that debate here:
• http://ralphehanson.com/blog/archive_09_04.html#042309_bias
Classroom Debate on Living in Different Media Worlds
Maybe we’re asking the wrong question when we ask about media bias. Of course journalists and
news organizations have a basic worldview that shapes how they report the news. And it is clearly a
mistake to presume that every news organization starts from the same perspective.
But research by the Pew Research Center suggests a better question to ask: What bias do news
consumers have, and how does that affect how they consume news?
(What is the Pew Research Center? It is a nonpartisan think tank that informs the public “about the
issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world.” Pew is one of the best sources of
information about media habits of people in the United States, and its reports are used consistently
throughout this book.)
The study “Political Polarization & Media Habits” divided news consumers into five political groups
ranging from consistently conservative to consistently liberal. The study found that there was little
overlap in where liberals and conservatives turned when they wanted news:
• Consistent conservatives count on Fox News with 47% of them using Fox News as their
primary source of political and government news.
•
• Consistent liberals are more likely to block or “defriend” someone on a social network
because of political opinions.
•
• While Fox News was the preferred news source on the right, and NPR and the New York
Times were the preferred sources on the left, where did the people in the center of the
political spectrum turn? The preference from the ideological center was for the Wall Street
Journal, USA Today, ABC News, CBS News, and NBC News.
WHO are the sources?
Who conducted the study of media use by political orientation discussed here? What do they do?
WHAT are they saying?
How do liberals and conservatives differ in where they go for news? How do they differ in terms of
how many news sources they use? Who is more likely to communicate with people who have
political opinions different from their own? Who is most likely to unfriend or block someone for
expressing a disagreeable political point of view? How would you categorize this research in terms
of being message, medium, ownership, or audience based? Can you categorize the type of theory
base the researchers were using?
WHAT evidence exists?
Read the complete report at www.journalism.org/2014/10/21/political-polarization-media-habits.
How did the researchers reach their conclusions? How did they conduct their research?
WHAT do you and your classmates think about ideology and media choices?
What is your political point of view? Where do you turn to for news? What news sources do you
trust? Which ones don’t you trust? Do you think your media choices reflect your political point of
view? Do you and your friends talk about politics and government on social media? Have you ever
blocked or unfriended someone over something political he or she posted on social media? Has
anyone ever done that to you? Do you worry that you don’t get a diverse enough media diet? Why
or why not?
Here’s some more on how people respond to the news:
• https://www.ralphehanson.com/2018/09/28/talking-about-the-news-and-how-
we-respond-to-it/
How Can Journalists Better Build The Public’s Trust?
• https://www.ralphehanson.com/2018/02/24/transperancy/
Classroom Debate on Journalists and Social Media
Everyone needs to be careful about revealing too much personal information through social media
such as Twitter or Facebook, but journalists see this as a particularly difficult issue because of fears
of alienating sources and readers.
Wall Street Journal reporters are not supposed to post about how a story was reported. The paper’s
code of conduct says: “Let our coverage speak for itself, and don’t detail how an article was
reported, written, or edited.” Reporters are also required to get their editor’s permission before
friending a confidential source.1
The BBC has fairly elaborate guidelines on using social media, especially in cases when its workers
identify themselves as BBC employees. One rule suggests that BBC employees should not include a
political identification online, even if they don’t indicate that they work for the BBC.2
Mathew Ingram, writing for the blog Gigaom, says that this policy, which keeps reporters from
engaging with the public, completely misses the point of social media. He writes,
[The] main point being missed is that social media is powerful precisely because it is
personal . . . The best way to make social media work is to allow reporters and editors to be
themselves, to be human, and to engage with readers through Twitter and Facebook and
comments and blogs.3
CNN global affairs correspondent Elise Labott landed in hot water with a two-week suspension
when she made an opinionated tweet about a U.S. House vote to restrict Syrian and Iraqi refugees
from entering the United States. She tweeted:
House passes bill that could limit Syrian refugees. Statue of Liberty bows head in anguish.
In general, only commentators are allowed to tweet opinions that are not “predictably partisan”;
reporters are supposed to stick to the facts.4 Labott did not delete the tweet that got her in trouble,
but she did apologize for it in another tweet that said, “Everyone, It was wrong of me to editorialize.
My tweet was inappropriate and disrespectful. I sincerely apologize.”5
According to Zosha Millman, writing for LXBN, CNN has not made its social media policies for
reporters public for several years, but an older version of its policy stated:
If you publicly declare your preference for issues or candidates or one side or the other of
the public policy issues CNN reports on, then your ability to be viewed as objective is
compromised. We appreciate that everyone has a life outside work and we encourage all of
our employees to get involved with the issues that are important within their communities.
That said, you need to avoid any appearance of bias or partiality. It’s just one of the
responsibilities associated with working for a news organization.6
WHO are the sources?
You have looked at codes of conduct for journalists using social media at several major news
organizations from around the world. What are these news organizations? How do they differ from
each other?
WHAT are they saying?
These codes of conduct tell reporters under what circumstances they can make posts on social
media such as Twitter and Facebook. What kinds of rules do they expect reporters to follow? What
happens to journalists who violate these standards?
WHAT kind of evidence indicates that journalists misuse social media?
What examples do the news organizations give to illustrate the problem of journalists misusing
social media? What harm do they say this will bring to the news organization?
HOW do you and your classmates react to journalists using social media?
Do you or your classmates follow the social media feeds of any journalists? What do you discover
about them from their tweets or Facebook posts? Do you think that journalists risk appearing
biased by what they post to their social media feeds? Do you think it is right for news organizations
to restrict how journalists use their social media accounts?
1. Diane Brady, “What’s the Right Corporate Policy for Twitter, Facebook and Blogs?” Businessweek,
May 14, 2009.
2. BBC, “Editorial Guidelines,” http://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines/
3. Ibid.
4. Erik Wemple, “Updated: CNN Correspondent Suspended Over Tweet About House Vote,” The
Washington Post, November 19, 2015, https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-
wemple/wp/2015/11/19/dear-cnn-are-you-biased/?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories_wemple-cnn-
suspension-950pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
5. Elise Labott, “House Passes Bill That Could Limit Syrian Refugees. Statue of Liberty Bows Head in
Anguish,” Twitter, November 19, 2015,
https://twitter.com/eliselabottcnn/status/667425269347704832
6. Zosha Millman, “Don’t Let CNN Fool You--Uniform Employment Policy is Key,” LXBN, November
23, 2015, http://www.lxbn.com/2015/11/23/dont-let-cnn-fool-you-uniform-employment-policy-
is-key/
