A survey has revealed a glaring disconnect between mainstream media (MSM) journalists and the American public. The nonpartisan Pew Research Center polled almost 12,000 journalists and the general public about how they perceive the media.
The survey, which ran from February to March, showed that 65 percent of journalists believe the media accurately reports the news, while only 35 percent of the American public believe so. Only 41 percent of American adults believe that members of the media cover the most important stories of the day, compared to 67 percent of journalists.
Meanwhile, 25 percent of American adults are of the opinion that the media people perform well in managing or correcting misinformation. More than half of adults, however, perceive the media to be terrible when it comes to managing misinformation.
The survey also found that more than half of journalists – 52 percent – believe the media does a good job of serving as a watchdog over elected leaders, compared to 29 percent of the general public. Forty-six percent of journalists believe that the media does well in giving a voice to the underrepresented sectors of society, but 45 percent of American adults believe otherwise.
On one hand, nearly half of the journalists surveyed – 46 percent – say they feel extremely or very connected with their audiences. On the other hand, only 26 percent of American respondents feel they are connected to MSM news outlets.
According to the Pew poll, 67 percent of journalists believe social media has had a negative impact on the state of journalism as a whole. Only 18 percent say social media has a positive impact, while 14 percent have a neutral opinion.
The poll also found that almost three-quarters of journalists describe their industry with negative words. They mentioned "chaos," "struggling," "biased," "partisan" and "stressful" as some of the words to describe the state of journalism.
Concha: HQs of MSM outlets located in liberal areas
In a June 22 op-ed for the Hill, media and politics columnist John Concha expounded on the disconnect between journalists and the American public. "It's like the old saying about the key to good real estate – location, location, location. Most of the national media [outlets] are located in two places, New York City and Washington, D.C.," he wrote.
According to Concha, just nine percent of Manhattan voters voted for former President Donald Trump. Support for the former Republican president in the federal capital was lower at 5.4 percent.
"It's only human nature that a journalist's perception of issues will generally conform to the places and people with whom he works and lives," the columnist wrote, pointing to the fact that people living in or near the two cities "exist in overwhelmingly liberal silos."
Concha referenced the 2017 book "Overload: Finding the Truth in Today's Deluge of News," penned by longtime CBS newsman Bob Schieffer, for two explanations as to why journalists have been insulated from the American public at large.
"In 2004, one reporter in eight lived in New York [City], Washington, [D.C.] or Los Angeles. That number is now down to one in five who live in those three places," noted the retired journalist.
Scheiffer also pointed to the massive decrease of local reporters due to shrinking budgets as another reason for the insulation.
"While no solutions seem obvious, there is general agreement throughout the industry that if local newspapers go away and some entity does not rise to do what we have come to expect of them – that is, keep an eye on local government – we will experience corruption at levels we have never seen," he warned. (Related: "Journalism is dying" in the U.S.: It's now government-controlled propaganda.)
Concha concluded: "Fewer reporters and editors has resulted in less trust as news gathering becomes more and more confined to two or three cities. More and more, local newspapers are cutting staff [members] as profits dwindle in the digital age. The result is that online news organizations almost exclusively headquartered in deep-blue New York or D.C. keep expanding."
"Such is the state of media in 2022, where the bubbles in the Big Apple and the nation’s capital are increasingly soundproof, shutting out the rest of the world."
Watch this video explaining why most journalists lean liberal below.
This video is from the Hal Graves channel on Brighteon.com.
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