4w ago

what unbiased media sources do you use?

I don't know if I should change the title to 'does unbiased media exist?'

I just found out a Washington Post cartoonist quit after a Bezos satire she draw was rejected.

I was until today a reader of said newspaper, but after this kind of censorship I don't know if I should keep reading it.

Note that I'm not looking for media sources that fabricate outrage either for the left or for the right or news sources whose business model is to editorialize titles to work people up. I'm just looking for unbiased media sources.

Maybe this was a stupid question: everyone is biased, or am I wrong?

50 comments

Bias exists in all media, we must simply consume media critically with the relevant biases in mind
- If i may ask - what does "consume media critically" mean?
  How is the process description for that? I'm genuinely interested. I see the word "critical thinking" thrown around a lot but it was never explained to me even in the slightest bit. What does it entail?
  
  When you read with an awareness of the source and the larger context in which it was written, and you're trying to actively decide what to believe based on what can be substantiated, that is at least a part of reading critically.
  It's not taught well in schools, and most people nowadays are simply reading headlines and reacting based on their gut feeling. Such people are easily swayed for the worse, but difficult to help.

Everyone's biased imo. I like propublica's biases.

Associated Press and Reuters.
- note that in addition to staff reporting, the ap is also reliant on member publications--which means that those biases end up on 'the wire', too.
- Genuine question, what about Politico?

Every source has a bias, sometimes what is NOT reported is a stronger signal then what is reported.
I pull news from multiple biased sources and stitch together my own view.
The Economist (USA), BBC (UK), Reuters(UK), Al Jazerra (QAT) , CGTN (china), CNA (SGP) - Gives quite the picture of events, from multiple perspectives!
Remember the Left-Right spectrum is only a very shallow view of the world, its multidimensional politics out there with many different incentives!
- Have a check of !news_summary@lemmy.dbzer0.com ive got generated ai summaries of some of those sources. If u got an rss feed u would reccommend i add lmk.
  
  Yeah, I'm subscribed. I like the summaries! It's a good idea.
  I'm not sure if its possible, but can you torture your model to try to generate a one sentence summary as well, kinda like - make a factual headline for this article that is short and succinct!
  https://www.economist.com/rss - They do enjoy their paywalls, might need to link to one of the ladders as well, like archive.is

NPR isn't too bad.

Looking at stuff from out of country can help.
CBC in Canada and the BBC in the UK both cover significant US news and aren't going to be as overtly biased as for-profit US news sources.
- I hadn't heard of CBC. I consume a lot of BBC content. Also maybe check out ABC (Australia). These public broadcasters produce some great journalism IMO.
  
  The Conservative Party of Canada wants to shutdown the CBC, so it's gotta be good.

I don't think unbiased media exist. But some are at least less biased. And you want some bias towards scientific reasoning, honesty and meritocracy. Otherwise you introduce too much noise (which is one reason why being absolute about free speech leads to less free speech, and also the reason electronic warfare is something prioritized by politically weak and/or military weak state actors). Less noise usually correlate with what people perceive as left leaning or liberal bias (in the western political landscape of 2025). Might be very related to this. Also, I think it's OK with biased media as long as one is open and explicit about it.
In Sweden I use Omni which is a commercial news aggregator, which I find relatively unbiased or balanced. Public service is pretty good as well.
For American news, I usually go for NPR first. Don't know if they are super unbiased, but at least they are not full on crazy.
I've tried Ground News, but I feel it's a bit too focused on politics of the English speaking sphere.

None. All are biased. The best way is to read multiple news sources being aware of what their biases are.
- I wouldn't just say "all are biased".
  Some just outright make things up. (looking at you, Fox News entertainment)

Bias is less concerning to me than accuracy. Left/right? I don't really care as long as the reporting is accurate.

All corporate news has been moved to the right, even NPR. For all practical purposes, local news has been eliminated. Local news formed the basis for trust and truth. Getting you news at a local ground level creates trust - you may know the reporter or you kids go to school with his kids. There is nothing wrong with news bias if you have sources that you can trust to report the truth and not omit critical information. That said, seek out and listen to people like Timothy Snyder, who have important messages. Here's a clip of him talking about how the internet has changed and corrupted our news and views.
I like listening to Belle of the Ranch, because she succinctly explains important topics that the MSM does not - note she does present views from a more leftist angle.
Steve Shives is a Youtuber does not report the news but offers opinion that might inspire you to do further research. Finding good reliable news sources takes work, while junk news is cheap, readily available and detrimental to you.

None, there is no unbiased news source in existance.
That being said, I mainly use the government's TV station's (SVT) news feed and one of our major daily news papers (DN) feed to get a general idea of what is going on, they tend to be decently accurate.

All are biased.
If there's an event occurring within the last few days I'll check AP and a couple other moderate/right sources to check/compare spin.
After a few days there's usually a pod out on it from the left view. I like It Could Happen Here, Some More News, and Even More News. They're incredibly well sourced, and are out in the open about their biases.
Even when there's no editorializing there's selection bias. That selection is due to capacity or the political viewpoint of the reporting. You won't see stories that are less relevant to reporter/editor interest.

AP, Reuters, BBC, the Guardian, the Financial Times, the Economist, also Ground News (at risk of sounding like a YT content producer)

I usually prefer AP, Reuters, and PBS. I’m sure there is still some bias somewhere, but at least they strive to report just news straight up without injecting opinion.

AP, Routers, BBC, Al Jazeera.
Whenever I want to know the facts without any editorializing, I go for AP.

Everyone is biased, some less so. Use something like media bias checker or Ground News and read what they say the bias is and why.

I like the way the Behind the Bastards podcaster explains it. Each journalistic outlet had strengths to certain things and part of learning to consume journalism is knowing what each sources’ strengths or weaknesses are. Or learning to follow specific journalists across platforms.
And some just play to the echo chambering of political parties saying exactly what their reader base wants to hear. It’s good to learn what those are as well.

Wapo has been justifying a genocide for a year but a Bezos cartoon is what made you reconsider?

'the chart' is a good starting point.
note: linking to harvard because they have a static snapshot that is viewable without scripting enabled. just click it to go to the source at ad fontes.
i tend to stick with local public radio. it's always on when i'm in the car. when i see a post or headline that i want to read more about, i feed it to the duck and look for relevant content at places like reuters, ap, npr, or the nearest major papers (milwaukee, madison) that aren't in chicago (too much 'chicagoland' in them, and i avoid the city).

I prefer sources with obvious bias since it makes it easier to account for. Sources that pretend to be unbias are far more insidious.

In Canada, the CBC has the least amount of bias of any domestic news source.
Going International, I would say AP, PBS, NPR, Reuters, BBC.

My local newspaper.

You're right, everyone is biased. It's part of human nature. The bezt you can do about it is to be aware of biases, how they work, how to recognize them, and how to avoid them. Then practice those avoidance techniques.
It is not perfect, but a heck of a lot better than not helping the situation

WaPo has been quite biased for quite some time. Rather than giving you a fish, another flawed source that'll also likely fall victim to profit motive, I'd rather encourage you to glean what's meritable from whatever sources you may encounter.
The tools that best help me do that are the book Manufacturing Consent and a course on logic. I found both online for free and completed them by myself. But, there's been more value in subsequent group discussion. If you've an opportunity to learn as a group then favor it.

Ground news so theres a healthy mix of sources which are all inherently biased individually.

Most news organizations either are paid by the government or by some corporate stockholders (usually the rich).
It's difficult to find unbiased news sources. There are some smaller ones, which are paid by private donations, but they often have inferior quality due to ... appealing mostly to 18-y/o women who want "to make a change" and stuff (my opinion)
long story short, finding factual news sources is extremely difficult and i've basically given up on it. i can study physics to understand what is plausible and what is not, but i have no way to decide whether reporting on far-away events is biased or how much.

I've had a consistently unbiased experience with Tangle: https://www.readtangle.com/about/
- I liked reading their stuff then they came out pissing and moaning about Luigi and it kinda turned me off

I usually check Al Jazeera mainly for the war in Ukraine, Palestine, and Middle East in general.
No media is unbiased but they put effort in being objective.

Don't rely on one source, mix it up. For me, the Guardian for international news, the Economist for more economic topics and analysis, Süddeutsche Zeitung for a German view and BR24 for local news and to get enraged over idiot comments.

It's all biased but since I haven't seen it mentioned I like tangle. It comes as an email

My brain. I read everything, sometimes I also go on r/Republican if the news are particularly biased to the left, I often leave more stupid than before but it's a good test.
Always challenge what you are reading, add your research if the matter is important to you, use different websites, search engines and even AI.
More perspective is better than "always 1 news site"
I've seen many good online newspaper fall into oblivion and new good one to born.

I'm uninformed, feel free to feed me propaganda
- CEO was a good father and a husband too

i use bbc and routers
- I get all my news through my router. (Also Reuters is pretty good.)

I like Verity (formerly Improve The News) which collates the facts of a news story from multiple sources, then gives you multiple spins on it.

Firsthand experience is beyond words and super deep.
Convert to words. Consume words. Map words to your own experience.
It's basically anime at that point.

Ground News and NYT here

50 comments