The Effect of TV Journalism on Civic Discourse: Fox News

When thinking about the impact of television journalism and the effect it has on civic discourse, Fox News immediately comes to mind. It is a news station that over the course of my life has become very partisan to the Republican party, and I do not consider it to be credible as a news source.

Fox News was launched in 1996 by Robert Murdoch from 21st Century Fox. Murdoch was aggressive in getting Fox News started and paid cable providers to screen the channel. In its hay day, over 17 million people had the news network on in their homes. Murdoch appointed Roger Ailes to oversee the new network. Ailes was a television producer and former Republican consultant. Fox News’ slogan was “Fair and Balanced.” It was popular for its opinion programming, such as The O’Reilly Factor and Hannity and Colmes. The viewers of Fox News have the largest ideological skew than all the other news networks. Fox has 60% conservative viewers, 23% moderate and 10% liberal, while CNN has 32% conservative viewers, 30% moderate and 30% liberal. MSNBC has similar number to CNN- 32% conservative, 23% moderate and 36% liberal. So what is the effect on civic discourse does the television network have, exactly?

A generation ago, when it was time for the evening news, you still had your basic options of Fox, CNN and MSNBC. But across these channels, the news was for the most part the same as well as the format. Now, there are more explicitly partisan networks, where individuals can choose what messages they see to reinforce their beliefs. News is no longer the same across the board. It is skewed by ideology, and this degradation of credibility has resulted in polarization across the United States. Most people avoid news all together. There are more options, more channels, more distractions. People prefer to actually know less about politics because of the polarization between partisan news networks- and therefore less likely to participate in politics.

In the second quarter of 2017, Fox News had over one million more viewers than CNN and MSNBC. This statistic is concerning for a number of reasons. There are more people tuning in to a partisan news network where the viewership is skewed 60% to the conservative side. There is nothing wrong with opinion programming, but it is concerning that people no longer want to consume objective news.