Just as everyone has a political bias, every media site has a bias. The only way to be completely neutral is to forego all participation altogether. After all, the moment you make any sort of political decision is the moment you establish your bias.
Now, let's be clear: just because a media site is biased does not mean it's disreputable! For example, The Wall Street Journal may skew right while The Atlantic may skew left, but both sites do their due diligence and produce high-quality articles that are worth reading. Having a slight political bias is perfectly normal.
The problem arises when a site is so driven by its bias that it begins to misrepresent reality, such as by distorting the opposition's viewpoint or producing fake news and conspiracy theories. This is what you want to avoid, and that's where Media Bias Fact Check comes in.
Image Credit: Imgur / Unrelated to Media Bias Fact Check
As of this writing, Media Bias Fact Check tracks and analyzes 1,000+ media sites to determine each one's particular bent, then categorizes them as one of the following:
- Left Bias
- Left-Center Bias
- Least Biased
- Right-Center Bias
- Right Bias
Other fringe categories include:
- Pro-Science
- Conspiracy-Pseudoscience
- Questionable Sources
- Satire
You can read about their methodology if you're skeptical. If you don't see a particular site being tracked, you can submit a source. If there's a particular claim or article that doesn't seem credible or true, you can submit a fact check request.
So the next time you come across an outlandish claim on Facebook or Twitter (which happens way more often than you'd think), double-check it with Media Bias Fact Check. It's also one of the first sites you should run to when you want to avoid fake news during an unfolding crisis.
Website -- Media Bias Fact Check
Are there any other tools you use to check political biases? Which media sites do you trust the most? Share with us in the comments!
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