FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
FAIR’s Action Alert network is a powerful activism tool that encourages the public to become critically engaged with media. FAIR distributes timely, focused reports via email, critiquing a particular instance of media inaccuracy or bias, and encourages members to communicate directly to journalists to demand more responsible reporting. This activism get results! With the help of our readers and podcast listeners, FAIR has forced rewrites of stories, propelled important but under-reported stories from the sidelines to the mainstream and succeeded in getting different perspectives into the news. Get involved in the FAIR fight for better media coverage – sign up today.
A recent front-page story of the Wall Street Journal cheerily announced, “In Today’s Workplace, Women Feel Freer To Be, Well, Women” (2/7/00). The first of two subheadings explained what the Journal thinks being, well, women is all about: “Floppy Bow Ties Give Way To More-Alluring Attire; Sex Banter Has Its Place.” (When the story jumped […]
During the last week in January, NBC news viewers had two chances to learn that rape is not a crime of violence but a “natural, biological and evolved” male behavior–and that the clothing a woman wears can put her at risk of being attacked. On the Today show (1/24/00), evolutionary psychologist Randy Thornhill insisted that […]
To dozens of activists who asked why the New York Times had not reported allegations that the U.S. deliberately targeted the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade during the Kosovo War, Times foreign editor Andrew Rosenthal responded that his paper was still investigating the charges. Of late he has indicated that the investigation is complete: Unable to […]
On January 4th, the Washington Post broke a story that soon appeared in countless media outlets: The Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) had released a letter in mid-November outlining some guidelines for an employer concerned with providing a safe workplace for employees working at home. Labor Secretary Alexis Herman decided to withdraw the letter […]
Can we trust what we see on CBS news broadcasts, even when reports are filmed live? Not necessarily; certainly not on New Years Eve. Viewers who tuned into Dan Rather’s live-from-Times-Square New Years Eve broadcast saw the CBS logo prominently displayed on billboards over Times Square. A savvy advertising purchase? Not quite. As news reports […]
Please write to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and let them know that the public wants guaranteed open access to the Internet through broadband cable lines, and an investigation of the antitrust issues raised by the proposed AOL/Time Warner merger. For more information about […]
The last few media mergers have attracted an enormous amount of press attention, and this was certainly true when America Online (AOL) announced its plans to buy media giant Time Warner on January 10. Nonetheless, certain issues were obscured in the initial press treatment of the deal, which has been called the largest business merger […]
Without notice to producers or listeners, the Washington, D.C.–based Pacifica affiliate WPFW has cancelled FAIR’s radio show, CounterSpin. FAIR learned of the cancellation early this week when listeners called our offices to ask why the show was not on the air. CounterSpin—a media criticism show—has been censored by Pacifica stations five times this year […]
Without notice to producers or listeners, the Washington, D.C.-basedPacifica affiliate WPFW has cancelled FAIR’s radio show, CounterSpin. FAIR learned of the cancellation early this week when listeners called our offices to ask why the show was not on the air. CounterSpin–a media criticism show–has been censored by Pacifica stationsfive times this year for covering the […]
As an estimated 50,000 protesters rallied in Seattle to shut down the opening conference of the World Trade Organization meeting last week, mainstream media treated protesters’ concerns with indifference and often contempt. That hostility translated into slanted coverage of both the demonstrations and the police reaction. In mainstream reports, “anti-trade” became a common–though wildly inaccurate–label […]
Media from around the world have followed the World Trade Organization summit meeting in Seattle, as tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered to voice their concerns about corporate globalism, environmental abuse and labor rights. The ensuing arrests, police abuse and property damage dominated much of the mainstream media discussion. But one news outlet in particular […]
As trade ministers from over 130 countries meet in Seattle this week for the World Trade Organization summit, tens of thousands of activists from all over the world have converged on the city to protest both the undemocratic structure of the group and its record on labor and environmental issues. But the news coverage anticipating […]
In October, FAIR posted an alert on its website (10/22/99) noting that the mainstream U.S. media had overwhelmingly ignored an explosive report in the London Observer (10/17/99) that received substantial attention abroad. In conjunction with the Danish paper Politiken, the Observer ran an investigative article alleging that NATO’s attack on the Chinese embassy in Belgrade […]
On 20/20‘s November 12 broadcast, ABC News correspondent John Stossel devoted his “Give Me a Break” segment to taking on public schools and teaching standards. But a close examination of the report reveals so many mistakes and omissions that one can only wonder whether Stossel did his homework. The report is divided into two segments: […]
On November 9, 1999, representatives from a national coalition of over 30 feminist, progressive groups and individuals–including Barbara Ehrenreich, Gloria Steinem, the National Organization for Women, the Feminist Majority Foundation, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, and a variety of women and men from the labor, black, Latina and South Asian grassroots communities–met with […]
On September 28, FAIR released an alert about ABC News reporter John Stossel’s one-hour news special, titled “Is America # One?.” By comparing several countries, including the U.S., India and Hong Kong, Stossel’s September 19 broadcast sought to show that laissez-faire economic policy is “what makes a country work well for its people.” FAIR found […]
The media watchdog group FAIR says that the ABC News special Is America #One? contained many inaccuracies. We stand by our report: –FAIR claims that numerous countries (the UK, Canada, Australia, Denmark,Finland, Iceland, Ireland, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, and the U.S.itself) run government budget surpluses comparable to Hong Kong’s. In fact, Hong Kong is unique […]
Since FAIR released its October 22 action alert, “U.S. Media Overlook exposé on Chinese Embassy Bombing,” many readers have written to mainstream media outlets, asking them why they have devoted so little attention to the Chinese embassy story. A number of readers have received replies from Andrew Rosenthal, foreign editor of the New York Times, […]
ABC’s John Stossel‘s recent 20/20 report (10/11/99), “Lobbying for Lives,” presented a simplistic look at a very complicated matter– the allocation of medical research dollars by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The show’s basic premise is that Beltway politicking controls which diseases receive funding; Stossel states early on in the segment that “Congress makes […]
A detailed investigative article in the October 17 London Observer reported that NATO deliberately bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade last May. So far, the reaction in the mainstream U.S. media has been a deafening silence.
