Kind of a hard wired human trait. Born of selfishness. Not a wholly unnecessary one either IMO. A bit of it used on an instinctive level goes along way in ensuring survival. Not tempered it becomes megalomania. I guess the question is fast becoming has Big Media become so enamored with itself that it fails to see that it's consumers no longer wish to "purchase" bias? Especially RED bias, no matter how much ink of any other color they dilute it with.
promote ourselves and our own interests.
Kind of a hard wired human trait.
My point exactly - if you assume that journalists are not the paragons of virtue which they present themselves as but rather are selfish and cowardly, you can understand their behavior far better than if you try to start with an ideological assumption that "they say that because they are liberals." No, they say that because they are self-centered and cowardly, and the result is what gets called "liberal."Because they are cowardly, they have no interest in fighting a fair fight with someone else who "buys ink by the carload." Far better to cooperate - "I'll call you objective if you call me objective" - than to take up the challenge of actually trying to be objective. Do that, and first thing you know you will find yourself in the uncomfortable position of having to point out that the emperor isn't even wearing BVDs.
Cowardice and self-centeredness explains why journalists criticize not only the "capitalists" who provide our food, clothing, shelter, and fuel but also the police and military without which the socialist's beloved government could not exist as an effective institution. The defining characteristic of the target of the journalist is that they are competitors with journalists for the respect of the public but
- targets are vulnerable to journalistic attack because they do not buy ink by the carload, and
- targets don't defer to journalists when journalists (inevitably) project their fantasies onto the reality in which the target functions under a bottom line discipline.