News-Sentinel shows bias
A few days back, readers will recall that I called for the boycott of WBIR-TV because it persisted in showing The Book of Daniel despite multitudinous objections from local Christians, clergy and others.Now the News-Sentinel is showing where its biases are on the matter. On January 7th, the paper published a series of letters sent to WBIR General Manager Jeff Lee in support of the station's decision to run the show. By his own admission on television, Lee received numerous letters and phone calls demanding that the program not be run here in Knoxville, far more against Daniel than in its favor. Note that Lee chose not to submit those letters so that the people of East Tennessee might read them in the paper.
Indeed, I examined Letters to the Editor all the way back to January 1st, and could not find a single letter in the paper regarding the controversy about The Book of Daniel that was opposed to WBIR running the show. As emotional and as public as this issue has been locally, I have a hard time believing that the News-Sentinel got no letters from concerned readers denouncing WBIR's decision.
I did find one interesting letter, though, on January 7th. Danny Evans of Knoxville wrote a letter denouncing "liberal" Christians for their moral laxity. I agree with Mr. Evans' argument from a moral point of view, but his letter does not argue his case well from a logical point of view. However, the letters from the people in support of blasphemous television were logical and well-argued, even if wrong.
The well-informed reader is forced to ask: How much of that was by design?
posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 8:18 AM
2 Comments:
WBIR and the Knoxville News-Sentinel have a partnership agreement. I have had the experience of having a KNS reporter tell me that they alerted WBIR about a story because of the companies agreement.
I was (somewhat) aware of the partnership agreement, only because of the prominent WBIR link on the paper's website.
You'd think that would make the paper WANT to print letters from both sides on this issue to prove that the agreement does not bias the paper. However, it appears that the agreement is more important than responsible journalism.
Knoxville is in dire need of a second daily newspaper to compete with the NEWS-SENTINEL.
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