Second Post Assignment

Catholic Social Teaching and the Problem of Media Bias

The problem of media bias is where the reporters allow personal prejudices and political agendas to influence the accuracy of their reporting.

CST #1-Life and Dignity of the Human Person
In the Catholic Social Teaching about the Life and Dignity of the Human Person, the church proclaims that the human life is sacred. All societies are called upon to ensure the protection of human life and dignity because we are all created in the image of God. There are many threats to human dignity such as racism, ignorance and blind hatred towards many groups. The church calls on us to be mindful of these threats and to do our best to curb these threats. Our subject can be related to the Life and Dignity of the Human Person because in skewing the truth, reporters effectively misguide the public. This intentional misguiding of the public hurts human dignity because it uses the public as an instrument to achieve political, social or economic goals at the expense of the people.




CST #2-Call to Family, Community, and Participation
Catholic Social teaching #2, the Call to family, Community, and Participation is centered around the importance of relationships. It teaches that human dignity can only be recognized within the context of our relationships. As a community, how we shape our society directly effects human dignity. It also teaches that everyone has a responsibility to contribute to the common good of the society. This can be related to media bias through the idea that the world news audience is a community. This community involves the audience, and the members of the news and media. This means that the members of the media have a responsibility to provide the viewers with accurate stories, for the common good. If these stories are biased, it can be a detriment to the audience, and the community as a whole. In turn, this would damage the dignity of the audience by misleading them with biased reporting. The bias in the media can have a direct effect to the call to community because it can hurt the world community of news viewers.