Ye of little faith – in the progressive media, that is. A new Gallup poll reveals the distrust most Americans have in major media outlets resulting in an all-time low. A paltry 32% of people have some trust in today’s media while nearly 40% say they have no trust at all in the media.
Gee, I wonder why? It was just three years ago that in another poll, a mere 9% of Americans said they have “a great deal of confidence” that journalists act in the best interests of the people.
Gallup has been tracking Americans’ trust in media since 1972 and stated they’ve never seen numbers this grim. Most informed Christians and conservatives saw signs of this slow erosion decades ago. The difference today is the media is proud to support and endorse godless and woke ideologies while they themselves are biased ministers of misinformation.
Vice president of Communications at Family Research Council (FRC), JP Duffy stated:
“In the Obama era, trust in the media began a precipitous drop and never recovered. President Obama sowed much of this division when he imposed policies that suppressed religious liberty as never before and used his bully pulpit to criticize those who ‘cling to guns or religion.’ The media cheered him on and even more so when he later endorsed redefining marriage.”
More than half of Democrats (58%) still trust the media but among Republicans, trust in the liberal media has plummeted to a historic low of 11%. This abysmal distrust is justified.
Back in June, another poll revealed only 18% of Americans still trust newspapers while just 14% trust television news. One reason may be the media’s open support of one political party and one side of most stories. Another reason is the growing hostility toward Christians and Jews, and of course, the biblical worldview, whether the subject is Israel, abortion, sexual morality, or gender ideology.
In addition to their progressive perspective and support of what the Bible considers sin and evil, the modern media have been known to be anti-Israel and even hire antisemites. Their reporting after the recent hateful attacks in Israel is another example of what the Media Research Council refers to as a “Decades-long, antisemitic Hamas PR campaign.” Hate has been cultivated.
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The mainstream media have a long history of denying the truth and dismissing Palestinian violence against the Jewish people, and it was on display again as many tried dismissing Hamas and their mass murder of over 1,400 Jewish people. Some in the media blamed Israel and insisted they deserved or provoked the brutal attacks.
At Newsbusters, Bill D’Agostino writes:
The left-wing media view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through a pseudo-Marxist framing, in which Israel is cast as the cruel and racist oppressor while the Palestinians are the oppressed minority subjugated by a hostile regime. As a result, journalists at these networks think of violence by Palestinians as the “voice of the unheard,” and therefore they endeavor to excuse it.
From CNN and MSNBC to the major networks, the reporting has become quite awful across the board. One anchor insisted, “Israel is an occupying power,” a contributor at CNN, Adele Raja said in 2021, “The world needs a new Hitler,” and an editor celebrated on Twitter when Hamas murdered four Jewish citizens in Jerusalem calling them “pigs.”
Following the October 7 attacks on Israel, the three main networks have protected Democrats in the House for their rabidly “anti-Israel posturing.” The “Squad,” informally known as seven radical members of the House of Representatives, called on Congress to stop sending military aid to Israel, and they called for a ceasefire when Israel retaliated after the attacks.
On ABC, CBS, and NBC, Newsbusters surveyed all nighttime newscasts from October 7 – October 22, watching for any mention of the Squad. In spite of dedicating almost 9 hours of airtime (a whopping 525 minutes) to the ongoing conflict in Gaza, not one of these networks gave even a second of air time to any one of the Democrats. Nothing negative.
It took the New York Times a week to admit they jumped the gun and made a mistake saying Israel bombed a hospital and murdered civilians. The lie was immediately repeated and sent out as media marching orders when no one had all the facts. In a separate article on how the networks shield pro-Hamas Democrats from the public, Bill D’Agostino writes:
“These three women (Representatives Omar, Bush, and Tlaib) were also the only Squad members to publicly repeat the now-disproven claim by Hamas that the al-Ahri Arab Hospital in Gaza had been destroyed by an Israeli airstrike. Even after evidence emerged showing that the blast was the result of a misfired Hamas rocket, and that the blast had occurred in a parking lot rather than the hospital itself, all three Congresswomen refused to delete tweets on their official accounts blaming Israel for the explosion.
It is sadly rare these days that a liberal Democrat or Marxist in power is held accountable because the media covers them like a warm, comfy blanket. It has become an almost accepted bias that has taken modern media far from the principles of journalism and standards of objectivity we used to assume existed. Five journalistic principles include:
- Journalism’s first obligation is to tell the truth
- Its first loyalty is to citizens
- Its essence is a discipline of verification
- Its practitioners must maintain an independence from those they cover
- It must serve as an independent monitor of power
Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult for a Christian or conservative to work in this industry today and report honestly. It is an unjust, unfair system when one side is practically above the law. You would never know the truth if it were not for alternative news outlets, independent reporting sources, and even social media.
You may be surprised that other recent polling indicates a majority of Americans, both Democrat and Republican voters still support Israel. It’s no wonder the biased broadcast networks have ignored or refused to report about the comments and actions of the anti-Christian, anti-Israel wing of the Democrat Party. The liberal media has a long history of bias and leftism.
We weren’t meant to keep up with everything but we should at least be avoiding the noise and the toxic ideological sites out there. This kind of story should remind us to be discerning and use caution about where to get the best news, information, and biblical commentary.
From creation and morality to world history, repeated lies have influenced public opinion. The danger we’re in as a nation and a church is that the godless left have practically won the propaganda war – a war many of us didn’t know existed – which has paved the way for much of the mayhem we see today.
