The Sociology of Media Bias

The OmbudsGod links to Media Minded who takes E.J. Dionne's recent column on media bias to task. Dionne acknowledges the existence of media bias by writing:

To the extent that there has been a bias in the establishment media, it has been less a liberal tilt than a preference for the values of the educated, professional class -- which, surprise, surprise, is roughly the class position of most journalists.

Now this is exactly the point that media critics have been making for twenty years. The media represents a distinct "class," to recycle Marxist terminology. Although they like to think of themselves as better educated and more objective, this class like all classes promotes its interest, which explains both the dramatic expansion of First Amendment rights with repsect to defemation law and the restriction of those rights in speech codes. Because of its position, this class materially sets the public agenda. As Media Minded notes about Dionnes' concession:

What an arrogant and evasive passage. The "values of the educated, professional class" reflect the sort of elitist liberalism that conservatives have bemoaned for decades. Calling it something that sounds prettier doesn't change that. And if you've got a group of so-called "objective" journalists who vote Democratic at something like an 80-percent clip, isn't that a problem? As for Dionne's bit on social issues, well, what he leaves out is as important as what he puts in. Dionne is right about abortion and religion not getting covered properly. But how about affirmative action (especially the horrendous coverage of Proposition 209 in California) or virtually any story that touches on race? How about immigration? Or homosexuality? Or AIDS? Apparently, those controversial and divisive issues don't count in Dionne's reckoning.

Media tilt is only a minor matter compared to a similar endemic bias in the Law. Do the current legal standards on abortion reflect a public concensus. Notwithstanding the constant media drumbeat, a dramatically high percentage of Americans would favor restrictions on abortion which are not permitted by the present legal regime. Likewise recent decisions on the public expression of religiosity are entirely out of contact with the broad consensus of Americans. In both cases, the current legal positions may be enlightened and right, but the problem is that it is a particular class that views these positions as enlightened and cannot understand that the rest of the population might legitimately dissent from the preferences of that class.