By RORY MOORE
Tiger Media Network
A recent Gallup poll showed that 31% of Americans have a “great deal” or “fair amount” of confidence in the mass media to report the news “fully, accurately and fairly,” a record low since the analytics organization began asking the question in 1972. This comes as many view an increased polarization in political news while others perceive what they see as biased commentary.
In that same poll, 54% of Democrats expressed trust in the media, while 27% of independents and 12% of Republicans expressed the same. The percentage among independents is tied with the record low in 2022. Younger people aged 18-29 were also shown to have low trust, with 26% compared to 43% among people 65 and older.
Fort Hays students shared their perspectives on how they perceive the media and what contributes to the historically low trust among Americans.
Sophomore Cade Becker believes most people distrust the media based on what they see as dishonest or misleading to fit an agenda.
“It’s just a big mix-up of politics and media,” he said. “Politics and media have become too intertwined. There’s this over sensationalization that has made media less trustworthy since they’re more for the bait, clicks, and likes.”
Becker singled out sites on both political spectrums of engaging in sensationalism.
“There are left-leaning sites that you see antagonizing politicians like [President Donald] Trump. They scrutinize and put him under a microscope, and then there are Republican ones that do the same thing,” he said. “People who watch Fox News or CNN see these extremists, and they think that’s what most people in that other party think. They try to create this hasty generalization out of one person. That’s something I’ve noticed a lot of them do.”
Senior Andrew Scott thinks people are fed up with receiving misleading headlines.
“A large portion of it is we’re told one thing, and it turns out to be a completely other thing,” he said. “It’s like we’ve been lied to, and it happens over and over.”
Scott attributes the little trust people have to their continual following of certain outlets over the years.
“Back in the day, the news used to be a lot easier to trust,” he said. “Something changed along historical lines, and it was no longer trustworthy.”
As a result of that distrust, many Americans have turned their attention away from mainstream media and given it to alternative forms of media like podcasts and independent outlets.
“I, for one, am fully behind podcasts,” Scott said. “I think it’s great that they’re not being financially compensated for, nor are they bought out by corporations trying to push their agenda. From my experience listening to podcasts, I think they’re genuine people having a conversation and getting to the bottom of whatever they have their opinions on. Some of them are wrong, but that should be left to the listener to make their own decision.”
Scott cited the Joe Rogan Experience as his favorite podcast while mentioning X, formerly known as Twitter, as trustworthy for its pro-free speech policy. He does, however, try to fact-check his sources.
“I usually look up multiple sources on the internet,” he said. “If most of them say something that is true, I go with it.”
Other students like Junior Shealynn Rasmussen choose to avoid media altogether.
“I don’t follow a lot of media,” she said. “I want to stay out of the whole political realm of it. I follow it every now and then since I have a lot of classes that relate to the whole political side of things. So, I’ve gotten into it more in the last year just to get by.”
Sophomore Ainsley Green sees people turned off by abundant media bias and polarization.
“You’re not getting all the facts,” she said. “With all the craziness happening in our country, there’s a lack of trust in authority figures and other people in general.”
She holds mixed feelings about the rising reliance on alternative media.
“It depends on the situation,” Green said. “You should try to educate yourself, and podcasts are a good way to start, but you should be fact-checking information and making sure you’re getting it from multiple sources and not just one source. You should be using multiple different platforms.”
Green seeks out information directly from government sites after being informed by others.
“I get most of my news from TikTok,” she said. “Then, I go online, do my own research and see what’s true. With a lot of the executive orders, there were people on TikTok explaining it, and I read the executive orders myself to see what they actually said.”