Journalists at EWTN/Franciscan Conference Discuss Media Bias in the Internet Age

As the news industry shifted toward the internet, Cannon noted, advertisements became more targeted and a lot of newspapers began to sell online subscriptions. If a news outlet failed to toe an ideological line, he said subscribers would “rant and rave and cancel their subscriptions. People wanted the culture war stuff: the slogans, instead of information.” 

“If you give people what they think they want, that might work economically,” Cannon added, “but that isn’t journalism.”

Lisi echoed many of Cannon’s concerns, saying “if you tell your audience [something] they don’t want to hear, they’re going to go somewhere else.” Along with the incentive structure, he said students are being taught activism and “they go into journalism because they want to be activists.” For these reasons, he said the “fly on the wall mindset [is] going away.” 

“They think this is the right way and the wrong way,” Lisi said. “It’s hard to put people in your story if you think they’re evil.”

Olohan noted that the bias in “mainstream outlets” all shifts one way because “the media is very ideologically bent.” She said mainstream outlets have taken sides on disputed topics, such as transgenderism, the right to worship, and abortion.

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When speaking about the reporting on pro-life bills that ban abortion once a heartbeat can be detected, Olohan said, “you won’t see the word heart, you won’t see the word baby, [and] you won’t even see the word mother” even though “abortion ends the life of a human child.” She added: “That is activist reporting right there.”

On transgender issues, Olohan said media outlets will frame legislation as “an anti-trans bill” or as a “bill targeting transgender youth” while “not giving us all the information.” 

“You can literally get your outlet kicked off of a platform [if you do not use] the language of the regime,” Olohan added in reference to preferred gender pronouns.

All three panelists argued that journalists need to put more effort into presenting the news more objectively and ensuring more diversity of thought in their newsrooms and in their articles. 

“A journalist should be someone who sheds light on the truth ... in the most dignified and objective way possible,” Olohan said.

Lisi suggested a lot of people still want objective reporting and noted that the standard might change with the growth of nonprofit reporting. 

“It may boomerang back,” he said. 

Cannon argued that a diversity of opinion within the newsroom “would solve a lot of these problems” and suggested that nonprofit news outlets “have to get sponsors from both sides.” He said sponsors “should support journalism even that they don’t agree with.”

Although Cannon acknowledged that objectivity can be difficult, he reminded attendees of some of the difficult things Christ called on his followers to do, such as loving one’s enemies. 

“If we can aspire to that, we can aspire to objectivity,” Cannon said.

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