I am listening today to the election results, commentary and explanations on my local NPR station. To be fair, they are not NPR although they brand themselves as such. They are an entity provided by the local state university and they purchase programming from NPR amongst other public radio providers. Both the local station and the NPR feed are claiming seemingly every five minutes or so that they do not offer opinions, they bring the facts, they are objective. None of this is true.
Let me bold and state that there are no facts. There are things on which a large group agree or for which there is substantial evidence, however both can and do change. For example, a meter and a second have recently been re-defined. New York - Washington DC is not 226 miles. (First, define New York and Washington DC, so any measurement is from two specific points. Secondly, define the route. Thirdly, define the measure and to how many decimal places.) The earth is flat.
When I was a G11/12 literature teacher, one of my most important initial lessons was to disabuse students of the notion that there are hard and fast absolutes. One exercise was to ask students to write down one word to describe an apple. Most would say red, some green, some juicy etc. Inevitably, one would come up with hair (shampoo scents!) or temptation (Snow White, Eve). The point is that each person brings her/her views and experiences to something as seemingly universal as an apple.
Another exercise was to ask them to define "hot". Quite quickly they would realize that "hot" is relative and that one needs two measures. After all, 80 degrees in the north-east US is cold in the desert southwest, and would not boil an egg!
The claim to objectivity and a lack of opinions is demonstrably untrue. Any writing, reporting or journalistic endeavor starts with selection, decisions on what to include and what to leave out. Simply reporting on a cat in a tree says that this is important, and every single such story I have seen has the cat as cute, worthy or rescue and deserving our sympathy. Places with feral cat problems may well disapprove of such characterizations. The rescuing firefighter is a hero, unless you live in a place with a reduced fire service because taxpayers do not want to pay salaries or overtime or vehicle expenses.
My specific example concerns with the coverage, and specifically lack of coverage, of education and specifically non-public education. Betsy de Vos has some very unpleasant views and a questionable history and yet I have not heard an NPR story which dissects a position or policy announcement. That she is bad and that a position is bad are stated as given and she is then criticized. Why is "school choice" bad? Why should public funds not go to private providers? Abuses and failures are breathlessly announced, but the policies themselves are not broken down. This is of course known as preaching to the choir, ie reinforcing already-held opinions.
My personal experience comes from an overt refusal to cover non-public education. My local NPR station barely covers education, perhaps one mention a week. When it does, it is always public education, the largest local district and/or the state teacher union and local affiliate. For several years, I sent in weekly press releases of state or national success or recognitions of our school : winning national awards, international accreditations, visiting ambassadors and foreign politicians. When we won a local poetry competition, the PBS station (same organization, same leadership, same policies) reviewed the competition and interviewed the second place-getter, who came from a public school. When we took 80% of first places in a state academic competition, they covered the competition and did not mention that a school in their city had done so well. Whn we won two state chess titles, they featured the three public schools which had won one title each and did not mention us. The radio station did not even cover these events.
I offered for three or four years to be on-air "talent" during a pledge-drive and did not even receive an acknowledgment. A friend who was on the station community advisory board nominated me for three or four years; the nomination was never followed up. We spent about $10.000 on sponsoring the station so I put it to the advertising executive that they were happy to take our money but would not even name us. She came back to say that the policy was not to cover non-public education.
The kicker came after I was interviewed by a journalist who had her own local magazine show and at that time, had a free hand. We had met somewhere and she was intrigued by our approach to teaching and learning and asked me onto her show to discuss this and why we were able to be so unusual in the state. At the end of the piece, she asked me on air if I would come back for other education discussions, and to debate on air with public providers which I accepted.
A week later she called me to tell me she had been called to a meeting with the station management and told not to invite me back and not to cover non-public education. I don't recall is he gave me any justification, but I do remember the decisions and the pattern of behaviors noted above.
By selecting out topics, subjects and speakers, the journalist or editor or station are acting subjectively and from an opinion. I have no problem with this, but what is wrong is to assert the opposite. NPR may be more objective than another provider, however (a) that depends on who does the measuring and what is measured and (b) is not the same is being objective. The claim that they "they do not offer opinions, they bring the facts, they are objective" is simply not true.
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