Media Agenda

Everyone knows that all media outlets have their own agendas. They decide what they feel is most important to the people that receive their messages, even if what they deem important is believed to be otherwise by their viewers. They cherry-pick what ideas and events they feel are most important and relevant to the interests of the people, but they also have their own bias that aids in filtering the important events.

This bias is very heavily seen in political situations. What one person does may be looked over completely by the media simply because of their political affiliation, whereas something simpler is criticized endlessly for the same reason. Additionally, in elections, they may decide to “peg” someone as the victor even before all the votes are counted. This was most evident in the Bush/Gore election, where different media outlets predicted Gore to win, but Bush won the Electoral College. In short, the media always picks what they want the public to see, whether or not it is truly important, and their bias also causes their perceived importance of events to differ depending on the situation and those involved.