The Mainstream Media Accountability "Survey"
Today I am going to be taking a good hard look at an advertisement campaign put out by the GOP known as the Mainstream Media Accountability Survey. It has been around since early 2017, but recently I have been seeing a version of it advertised during YouTube videos, and so it was brought back to my attention.. Despite how it might sound, this is most certainly an advertisement campaign, not a legitimate attempt at a survey. It is a poll consisting of twenty-five questions, many of which rank in the most biased, poorly worded, and leading questions I have ever read. I have seen a few different versions of it, which I will link to at the bottom, but all of them, as you might have guessed, mostly relate to mainstream media. Some of my favorite questions include "On which issues does the mainstream media do the worst job of representing Republicans? (Select as many that apply)", "Do you believe that thee media unfairly reported on Trump's executive order temporarily restricting people entering our country from nations compromised by radical Islamic terrorism?", "Do you believe that the media uses slurs rather than facts to attack conservative stances on issues like border control, religious liberties, and ObamaCare?" Most of the polls have a giant self-righteous and imposing picture of Trump on the right half of the screen. It all lends itself towards looking very tidy and official.
Let me lay out why this is by no means meant to be a legitimate survey, with an intent to gather useful. scientifically minded data on social opinion, and is rather a barely disguised advertisement mean to bolster Trump supporters, and deface the established media. Firstly, for a considerable time it asked for no personal information from the person filling out the survey, later adding simply a section asking your zip code. That kind of demographic information is needed to make any data collected from such a poll useful. Secondly, and I feel most importantly, it asks incredibly biased and leading questions, often questions that would not provide useful social data. It uses these techniques to attempt to shape the dialogue on the subject in the users mind, appeal to a false authority on subjects, and prey on any hidden fear they might have about the subject. For example, in the question, "Do you believe the media is biased when it covers President Trump's restriction on immigration from countries compromised by radical Islamic terrorism?", they associate the media directly with bias, devalue other countries by calling them "compromised", and prey on peoples fears of terrorism, even going so far as to specify "radical Islamic terrorism."A better phrasing for this question would look something like "Do you believe that the media accurately covered the executive order issued by President Trump to ban travel from specific countries?" They do not even seem to be trying to hide the fact that this is incredibly biased.
This type of advertising is not new. Biased surveys have most likely been around as long as surveys themselves, I simply have not personally seem one quite so blatant or widespread. I can see a number of things that this advertising campaign is trying to accomplish. Firstly, it is trying to persuade opinion by itself, targeting conservative leaning, but not wholly convinced individuals that the media is against them. It preys on people with latent fears of conspiracies, and those likely to blindly accept the word of authority. Secondly, considering it is most often beeing filled out by those that agree with them, it is a way for them to spew "statistics" gathered from this poll to say something along the linees of "See? Look! 84% of the population agrees with Trump!" even when the reality may be very different. Those more knowledgeable on the subject, or those with a more open mind could easily find many of the questions offensive (i.e. the "compromised by radical Islamic terrorism" thing again).
I think that if you do not know much about survey bias, or are inclined towards these beliefs anyways, this is probably a depressingly effective advertisement. It has a very strong message that is almost impossible to ignore, and if that is a message you were looking to hear, that can be very powerful. On the opposite side of the coin though, I believe this to be exactly the type of thing that could very much inflame relations with the opposition. Doing that could easily rally counteroffensives. It is definitely very memorable to all sides, as a strong rallying force for or against it. It being advertised as it is on YouTube, it is far reaching, and has probably connected very well with its target audience, as well as non-targeted audiences.
I found an article on NPR that largely agrees with me. They also mention an idea I had not considered, and that is probing for what Trump supporters agree with. Danielle Kiurtzleben states, "If respondents don't think the media have been unfair to people of faith, but they do think (as another question proposes) that "the media uses slurs rather than facts to attack conservative stances on issues like border control, religious liberties, and ObamaCare," that idea might reasonably be more likely to show up in a future ad or a Trump speech."
Wired magazine also published an article about this survey. Anna Vlasits titled the article "Trump made a media survey that's more rant than science", which is a sentiment I completely agree with.
Huffington Post's Cody Lyon had some strong words about this survey: "The questions are not only stilted, they have the faint scent of a threat. The survey is the stuff of an autocrat wannabe, when the reporting of facts make the leader look less than savory, it gets spun as unpatriotic."
I personally find this entire survey repulsive. It is sleazy, misleading, and manipulative. I am livid that we live in the kind of society today where something such as this is considered acceptable practice. It is hard to believe that such rancid misrepresentation can be seen as anything less than con-artistry.
The "survey":
https://gop.com/msm-media-accountability-survey-new
https://gop.com/mainstream-media-accountability-survey/
https://action.donaldjtrump.com/msm-media-accountability-survey
Sources:
Let me lay out why this is by no means meant to be a legitimate survey, with an intent to gather useful. scientifically minded data on social opinion, and is rather a barely disguised advertisement mean to bolster Trump supporters, and deface the established media. Firstly, for a considerable time it asked for no personal information from the person filling out the survey, later adding simply a section asking your zip code. That kind of demographic information is needed to make any data collected from such a poll useful. Secondly, and I feel most importantly, it asks incredibly biased and leading questions, often questions that would not provide useful social data. It uses these techniques to attempt to shape the dialogue on the subject in the users mind, appeal to a false authority on subjects, and prey on any hidden fear they might have about the subject. For example, in the question, "Do you believe the media is biased when it covers President Trump's restriction on immigration from countries compromised by radical Islamic terrorism?", they associate the media directly with bias, devalue other countries by calling them "compromised", and prey on peoples fears of terrorism, even going so far as to specify "radical Islamic terrorism."A better phrasing for this question would look something like "Do you believe that the media accurately covered the executive order issued by President Trump to ban travel from specific countries?" They do not even seem to be trying to hide the fact that this is incredibly biased.
This type of advertising is not new. Biased surveys have most likely been around as long as surveys themselves, I simply have not personally seem one quite so blatant or widespread. I can see a number of things that this advertising campaign is trying to accomplish. Firstly, it is trying to persuade opinion by itself, targeting conservative leaning, but not wholly convinced individuals that the media is against them. It preys on people with latent fears of conspiracies, and those likely to blindly accept the word of authority. Secondly, considering it is most often beeing filled out by those that agree with them, it is a way for them to spew "statistics" gathered from this poll to say something along the linees of "See? Look! 84% of the population agrees with Trump!" even when the reality may be very different. Those more knowledgeable on the subject, or those with a more open mind could easily find many of the questions offensive (i.e. the "compromised by radical Islamic terrorism" thing again).
I think that if you do not know much about survey bias, or are inclined towards these beliefs anyways, this is probably a depressingly effective advertisement. It has a very strong message that is almost impossible to ignore, and if that is a message you were looking to hear, that can be very powerful. On the opposite side of the coin though, I believe this to be exactly the type of thing that could very much inflame relations with the opposition. Doing that could easily rally counteroffensives. It is definitely very memorable to all sides, as a strong rallying force for or against it. It being advertised as it is on YouTube, it is far reaching, and has probably connected very well with its target audience, as well as non-targeted audiences.
I found an article on NPR that largely agrees with me. They also mention an idea I had not considered, and that is probing for what Trump supporters agree with. Danielle Kiurtzleben states, "If respondents don't think the media have been unfair to people of faith, but they do think (as another question proposes) that "the media uses slurs rather than facts to attack conservative stances on issues like border control, religious liberties, and ObamaCare," that idea might reasonably be more likely to show up in a future ad or a Trump speech."
Wired magazine also published an article about this survey. Anna Vlasits titled the article "Trump made a media survey that's more rant than science", which is a sentiment I completely agree with.
Huffington Post's Cody Lyon had some strong words about this survey: "The questions are not only stilted, they have the faint scent of a threat. The survey is the stuff of an autocrat wannabe, when the reporting of facts make the leader look less than savory, it gets spun as unpatriotic."
I personally find this entire survey repulsive. It is sleazy, misleading, and manipulative. I am livid that we live in the kind of society today where something such as this is considered acceptable practice. It is hard to believe that such rancid misrepresentation can be seen as anything less than con-artistry.
The "survey":
https://gop.com/msm-media-accountability-survey-new
https://gop.com/mainstream-media-accountability-survey/
https://action.donaldjtrump.com/msm-media-accountability-survey
Sources:
Kurtzleben, Danielle. “The Trump Media Survey Is Phenomenally Biased. It's Also Useful.” NPR, NPR, 17 Feb. 2017, www.npr.org/2017/02/17/515791540/the-trump-media-survey-is-phenomenally-biased-it-also-does-its-job-well.
Vlasits, Anna. “Trump Made a Media Survey That's More Rant Than Science.” Wired, Conde Nast, 3 June 2017, www.wired.com/2017/02/trump-made-media-survey-thats-rant-science/.
Lyon, Cody. “GOP Media Accountability Survey Is Dangerous Propaganda.” The Huffington Post, TheHuffingtonPost.com, 6 Nov. 2017, www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gop-media-accountability-survey-is-dangerous-propaganda_us_59ff880ae4b05e3e1f0a0240.
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