HONESTREPORTING: NEW SERIES. HonestReporting is starting a series of media critiques studying long-term media bias.

This is the first in a new HonestReporting series that will analyze whether specific media outlets demonstrate a discernible bias over the long term. Bias in the mainstream media can sometimes be patently clear - deliberately manipulated or staged photographs, articles comparing Israel to apartheid South Africa, or sympathetic descriptions of terrorists, to name but a few. We try to respond to all of these cases, encouraging you, our readers, to contact the media directly and ask why the facts are not being reported accurately.

However, bias is often more subtle. There is nothing inherently suspect about a picture of a Palestinian civilian or a human interest story detailing the life of a Palestinian child. An account of a Palestinian shopkeeper's life can be useful in shedding light on how the conflict affects ordinary people. Articles and photographs can be 100% accurate and, taken at face value, are completely within the realms of professional journalism.

Yet, a closer examination of specific media outlets over a longer period of time can reveal troubling patterns which indicate a more subtle and potentially more harmful bias. When pictures and accounts detailing only one side of a conflict are given prominence on an almost daily basis, it is a classic example of a bias so deep that it colors a media organization's entire reporting.

The first article: 6 Month Analysis of the BBC: The Subtle Bias

Subtle?

Technorati Tag: Israel and BBC and HonestReporting and Media Bias.