Outfoxed - Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism

Robert Greenwald's Documentary Challenges Fair and Balanced FNC

Nov 10, 2009

When a news organization becomes a partisan political agent, journalism goes out the window. According to this documentary, Fox is anything but fair or balanced.

Robert Greenwald's documentary, Outfoxed, is "an obsessively researched expose," according to the New York Times writer Robert Boynton. The film looks at a supposed news organization with an avowed political partisanship that uses its audience to portray lies, deceptions, and rhetoric from the Far Right 24/7. Interviews with former employees, footage from FNC, and interviews with people who were invited on Fox News as guests are all seen during the documentary. Walter Cronkite, a highly respected news journalistic icon, states that he has never heard of any other news organization participating in the type of partisanship that FNC participates in.

Fox News Partisan Political Tactics are a Study in Testing Free Speech

One interviewee stated that he had no problem with what Fox does, with one exception - they are participating in "consumer fraud." Our democracy is supposed to be based on giving the public true information and allowing them to decide who and what they choose to support. But FNC reportedly uses several tactics designed to distort the truth. When polled, FNC viewers have consistently shown less understanding of issues than those who get their news from other sources. This is consistent with the charges of bias.

The tactics used by FNC include character assassination, distorting the argument, capitalizing and mongering fear, and repeating lies so often that they will be picked up by the viewing audience as truth. According to Jon Du Pro, a former Fox News anchor, he was once told to portray Reagan's birthday celebration at the Reagan Library as a mammoth event, when in truth there was no celebration, just a pitifully small group of 4th graders and a few straggling visitors. Clara Frank, a former Fox News producer, validates the distortions promoted by FNC.

FNC Tactics are Validated by Research, Film Footage, and Interviews

Another tactic that is frequently used by FNC is to voice the phrase, "some people say" over and over, to inject lies and distortion, as if the "some people" was a credible source of information. Another distortion is the use of faux liberals for "balance" and the use of Republic viewpoints over Democrat viewpoints at a ratio fo 83% Republican to 17% Democrats - and those Democrats that are shown are usually centrist to pro-Republican. The scare campaigns they mount become dangerously close to open rebellion of the government, despite declaring anyone who did not support the last president as being unpatriotic. What other news organization would dare to try to organize political rallies on the air?

One of the former FNC employees admitted there is a culture of fear at FNC and anyone who does not toe the party line will soon be shown the door. Even guests are intimidated, despite having been sought after at length. One such guest, Jeremy Glick, is a young man whose father was killed in the 9/11 attacks. Bill O'Reilly was unhappy with Mr. Glick's interjections that 9/11 and the War in Iraq were not related. At one point, Mr. O'Reilly told the guest to "shut up" and told him his father would be ashamed of him. When Mr. Glick returned to the green room, he was told to hurry up and leave because the staff did not want Mr. O'Reilly to end up in jail. Such blatant bullying tactics do not speak well of the agenda at FNC - it does not appear to be truth-telling, but rather control of information.

Is Fox News Really a News Agency?

Whether FNC represents a threat to democracy or if there is an absurdity in giving them credence as a news organization, they continue to maintain an audience of loyal followers. The question in this film does not seem to be that they do not have a right to exist, but that they are not truly a news agency. They are rather a propaganda machine with a tremendous amount of influence over the American people. These types of propaganda machines have long histories in other non-democratic countries; yet they are representative of a movement in this nation that has a substantial following. The criterion for maintaining their status as a news agency is less fully explored and would seem to be the crux of the problem.

The copyright of the article Outfoxed - Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism in Socio-Political Documentaries is owned by Barbara DeGrande. Permission to republish Outfoxed - Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.