"No people can be both ignorant and free."
― Thomas Jefferson
By Chas Danner
Over the last week or so, local television news anchors
across the the country have joined together to paradoxically warn viewers about
the “troubling trend of irresponsible, one-sided news stories plaguing our country.”
The identical, seemingly earnest editorial messages paid lip service to the
importance of fact-checking and unbiased reporting, but they also complained
about “false news” and “fake stories.” If that seems to echo the rhetoric of
President Trump, it’s probably because the statement was written by one of his
allies.
The anchors were forced to read the so-called journalistic
responsibility messages word for word by their employer, the
conservative-leaning Sinclair Broadcast Group, the largest owner of television
stations in the country. The features were one of Sinclair’s now infamous “must-run”
segments, consisting of conservative commentary that every Sinclair-owned
station is required to air.
Think Progress rounded up many of the “fake stories”
segments for a chilling
video on Friday, but Deadspin’s Timothy Burke published a
much more terrifying version on Saturday, which at one point shows 30 of the
segments synced up in unison:
How America's largest local TV owner turned its news
anchors into soldiers in Trump's war on the media: https://t.co/iLVtKRQycL pic.twitter.com/dMdSGellH3
—
Deadspin (@Deadspin) March
31, 2018
If you want to read along, the script that Seattle’s
KOMO-TV used on the air, which was obtained and published by the
Seattle Post Intelligencer on Thursday, is as
follows:
“Hi, I’m(A) ____________, and I’m (B) _________________…
(B) Our greatest responsibility is to serve our Northwest
communities. We are extremely proud of the quality, balanced journalism that
KOMO News produces.
(A) But we’re concerned about the troubling trend of
irresponsible, one sided news stories plaguing our country. The sharing of
biased and false news has become all too common on social media.
(B) More alarming, some media outlets publish these same
fake stories… stories that just aren’t true, without checking facts first.
(A) Unfortunately, some members of the media use their
platforms to push their own personal bias and agenda to control ‘exactly what
people think’…This is extremely dangerous to a democracy.
(B) At KOMO it’s our responsibility to pursue and report
the truth. We understand Truth is neither politically ‘left nor right.’ Our
commitment to factual reporting is the foundation of our credibility, now more
than ever.
(A) But we are human and sometimes our reporting might
fall short. If you believe our coverage is unfair please reach out to us by
going to KOMOnews.com and clicking on CONTENT CONCERNS.
We value your comments. We will respond back to you.
(B) We work very hard to seek the truth and strive to be
fair, balanced and factual… We consider it our honor, our privilege to
responsibly deliver the news every day.
(A) Thank you for watching and we appreciate your
feedback”
The Post Intelligencer adds that,
according to a source at KOMO-TV, the anchors were “certainly not happy about
it,” since the statements were “a forced thing.” One KOMO anchor also
tweeted a columncriticizing
Sinclair on Sunday. They aren’t alone in their discontent. CNN’s Brian
Stelter has reported that
other channels’ staff members resent the move, too. He has also reported that
Sinclair instructed its channels to repeat the promos as often as possible “to
create maximum reach and frequency.”
Please continue this article, and to view video footage, please go here: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/04/anchors-reciting-sinclair-propaganda-is-terrifying-in-unison.html
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