CNN and FOX were simultaneously broadcasting John McCain's foreign affairs speech, in full, sans commentary. Except for the overlay text, they looked like pretty much identical broadcasts. But, there was a certain dissimilarity in the video feed. See if you can spot the difference (sorry, it's hard to take pictures of a television):
CNN's broadcast is much, much sharper. You can clearly see the details of McCain's face and combover. It's not flattering-- He looks, well, worse. FOX's broadcast is zoomed out, and slightly blurry. The audio feed was also much different-- CNN sounded very tinny and shrill compared to FOX which sounded warm and resonant.
Granted, considering the other (more flagrant) examples of bias between these two networks, this isn't anything too groundbreaking. It does remind us, though, to be aware of the many subtle ways televised news can attempt to effect certain judgements without even saying a word.
No comments:
Post a Comment