CNN chief media correspondent Brian Stelter said the quiet part out loud in October when he proclaimed it was the media’s job to “protect the public” from certain things politicians, candidates for higher office, and the like say.
In media-speak terms, that was code for “it’s our job to control the message and to prevent audiences from hearing things we don’t like.”
So knowing that, I wasn’t super surprised to read his latest Oliver Darcy-inspired rant about how media coverage of stories that are damaging to Democrats – like the Eric Swalwell and Hunter Biden stories – must be kept “in proportion” to alleged scandals involving President Trump because Orange Man Bad and related left-wing narratives.
This was another on a long list of “why is Fox spending so much time on this story?!” rants by various CNN figures, but what set it apart was Stelter’s rank hypocrisy and poor choice of words.
He literally said Fox News “has a big problem with portion control”:
Fox News *led* this hour with "more fallout from Hunter Biden investigation." This is further proof of what I said on Sunday: Journalism is all about proportionality, and Fox has a big problem with portion control. Here's the essay pic.twitter.com/55X08o6ebo
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) December 14, 2020
Fox's Hunter obsession is an example of a much larger problem in media: The internet has blown up proportionality. On Facebook and Twitter, everything appears to be the same size, equally important, equally legit. I think this has a lot to do with why our info-verse feels broken.
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) December 14, 2020
This set off a well-deserved firestorm of criticism about his network’s actual portion control problems, especially as it relates to their four-year-campaign of peddling the Russia collusion scandal nonsense:
This is precious-
Just a reminder that @BrianStelter wants you to ignore that he works at the network that pimped the Russian Collusion story FOR FOUR YEARS as he barks about Fox being ''obsessed'' over Hunter for a couple of weeks. https://t.co/U7RvUjv3VO— Brad Slager Mail-splaining and Voter Resignation (@MartiniShark) December 15, 2020
You spent hundreds of hours over 4 years on the RUSSIA HOAX.
You called the Hunter story a smear, suppressed actual news, censored journalists and engaged in election interference.
Best to limit talk of portion control to your eating habits, Potato. https://t.co/QleyNOtj6k
— Jewhadi™ (@JewhadiTM) December 15, 2020
Brian Stelter lecturing on portion control is such low hanging fruit that I’m tripping on it. https://t.co/14wAnH0mvC
— Adrian F Malagon (@agemalagon) December 14, 2020
As I’ve noted before, to say Stelter’s position on “protecting the public” and “portion control on stories” are dangerously stupid ones for him to take would be quite an understatement. Reporters are not supposed to be in the business of “protecting the public” from what politicians, candidates for higher office, and the like say and do. Nor or they supposed to suppress stories that might interfere with the political aspirations of their preferred political candidates. Period.
If they want to do fact checks, fine. If they want to include a note about putting something in context, fine. Let readers and viewers see the original comments and read/watch the fact checks and contextual links if necessary in order to decide for themselves.
But to keep it from them altogether or “in proportion” simply because they don’t like what they’re reporting on? No. That is not – I repeat – not the media’s job. Not at all.
The irony here is that in advocating that the MSM shield readers and viewers from stories they find uncomfortable to report, it’s Brian Stelter himself who is contributing to “why our info-verse feels broken.” A better title for him would be something like “chief media propagandist” or “chief minister of disinformation” because that’s exactly what he’s turned into over the years.
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