The Crossed Pond

News headlines rather fascinate me in that the wording that is chosen to encapsulate the content of the story they cover can differ from a little to a lot from one outlet to another. Sometimes this difference is minor and relates to details such as death toll numbers, etc. But sometimes the wording of the headlines, if not the stories themselves reveal what the writer wants you to think as opposed to whet he/she wants you to know. Take the story of the 26 insurgents killed in Iraq that is being reported today. Here are the headlines and stories covering the event as reported by The Associated Press, Reuters, and AFP:

Associated Press: U.S. raids Baghdad slum; 26 Iraqis die

Reuters: U.S. kills 26 militants in Baghdad

AFP: 26 ‘Iran-linked terrorists’ killed in Baghdad raid: US

So, looking at these headlines, did 26 slum-dwelling Iraqis get butchered while kneeling on their prayer rugs? Did 26 courageous Iraqi minutemen die fighting for kin and country? Or, did a pack of blood-thirsty agents of Iran get turned into a pink mist?

While a certain amount of bias is inevitable given the fact that humans have opinions and journalists are human, at least some of them anyway, I find it striking that they all too often don’t make the effort to at least attempt to conceal it. The above story is but one example, and a very tame one at that. It is little wonder that so many people are turning to the new media of blogs and such. Such sources make few bones about their biases, but nor do they try to pretend those biases don’t exist. With this new form of media the packaging is well marked. With the mainstream media, that tin of Spam could contain the hideous mystery meat that the labeling indicates, or the stuff that came out of that ‘meat’ when it was still walking around. Of course in the case of Spam, the difference would be negligible. A bad example, sorry.