Sources

MommyLiberty5013

Help a girl out here.

I seem to recall people, including myself, pointing out to others that Wikipedia isn't a great source. Personally, I do not think so and I prefer to do my own digging. Is it or is it not?

Also, if Fox and Washington Times are too biased conservatively and CNN, ABC, MSNBC, NPR and all the others are too biased liberally, then where the heck is anyone supposed to get any data or news?

I keep ready things sounding like, "Your point sucks and has no validity because of your source." And I'm guilty of that too re: not liking Wiki.

What sources should we use???

 

 

justAphase

I think Wikipedia has come a long way, actually. I could be wrong. But generally they have their sources linked so you can at least check on it. I probably wouldn't be quick to believe something that had no source. 

vlagrl29

i give up.  I think all news media is biased one way or the other

NastyAnnie

All news is biased. Look for reports by the AP, and/or acknowledge the obvious biases when making your point by looking for the same story in an opposition paper. 

 

For example, if we want to discuss Obama's approach to the "fiscal cliff", you could do this:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/09/obama-fiscal-cliff-speech_n_2102168.html

 http://nation.foxnews.com/fiscal-cliff/2012/11/09/click-here-watch-pres-obamas-address-fiscal-cliff-crisis-1-pm-et

 

After people see both sides, we might be able to have a legitimate discussion. 

missymo

What NastyAnnie said.  

Nechie122

I don't think the problem is with citing media sources per se. It's when you say, "Here's an unbiased source; we can all agree on this, right?" All sources have some degree of bias (some more than others). And as long as we recognize that, we can have good discussions. 

CinemaGoddess

I tend to trust outside news media (BBC, Al Jazeera) when it comes to US politics.  They are way less biased than US based news sources.  The only exemption is the Israel/Palestine situation if you're watching AJ.  AJ is definitely biased with stories about that subject. 

I trust some of the more conservative sources (WSJ, for example) because they're generally well-thought out and interesting discussions of issues.

I trust the sourced information in Wikipedia articles.

I trust The Daily Show and the Colbert Report.

I don't trust Fox News and MSNBC any further than I can throw them. 

YW. 

GeraldoRivera

Wikipedia is actually pretty good and has been shown to be more accurate than the Encyclopedia Britannica. I wouldn't rely on it solely, but for things that can be sourced within the wiki page (you can usually click on the citation and it takes you to the original source of that info), it's fairly accurate.

The key is to look at the source of any information that's reported. Washington Times is a biased source, but that doesn't mean that some or all of the information isn't accurate - it may just be the way it's presented that leads you to the wrong conclusion. Like the article that was posted the other day that said all these companies are planning layoffs because of Obamacare. Well, if you dig a little deeper and look at what the companies themselves said, the context of those layoffs, you see that it's true that they're planning layoffs, but it's not actually because of Obamacare.

It's just about looking critically at any report or article. 

CoffeeBeen

I also think it depends what you're trying to cite,  like, if you want to say that a politician gave a speech at a certain place on a certain day - then it's hard to botch that fact.  But, if you want to paraphrase what the politician said and what the implications are, the it's much more important to have the least biased source possible.

And just because all sources are biased doesn't mean that some aren't better than others.