Why People of Color Don’t Trust the News Media
When Cole Campbell and I launched our year long Journalism and the Public: Restoring the Trust project, people of color said: What do you mean restoring? They felt the trust was never there in the first place. So at our conference A Wake Up Call: Can Quality and Trust Save Journalism? we put that issues front and center.
Below are excerpts from what our panelists said — or go directly to the Final Report page to read the complete transcripts:
Can You Have Trust if You Practice Censorship by Omission? Why People of Color Don’t Read the Mainstream Media — Dori Maynard
we don’t always learn the mores and the nuances of what’s going on in the communities we cover. We’re almost like occupying forces. We come in for a little while, we tell people what’s going on, and then we move off. And then we wonder why people in our communities say, “You don’t get us.” And we say, “Well, we gave you the facts.” But we didn’t put them in the context of your particular community.
Thirteen Percent of Americans Prefer Ethnic to Mainstream Media –Alice Tait
Forty-five percent of all African American, Hispanic, Asian American, Native Americans and Arab Americans adults prefer ethnic television, radio, or newspapers to their mainstream counterparts. These primary consumers also indicated that they access ethnic media frequently. This means that a staggering 29 million adult–45 percent of the 64 million ethnic adults studied, or a full 13 percent of the entire adult population of the United State–prefer ethnic media. Eighty percent of the ethnic media population studied is, in fact, reached by ethnic media.
Immigrants Have a Different Definition of What’s News–Alejandro Manrique
…It is very difficult to address how to restore trust in ethnic media when your readers have never had trust in media. The immigrants who come from Mexico or Central America or Latin America, they don’t even trust the media. They don’t trust the government there. So the question must be addressed in the following way: How do we gain the trust of readers who face many challenges here in this country?
Is There A Need For Mainstream Media? George White
(Ethnic groups) … have not been served by the mainstream media. They are finding what they need elsewhere.
What we do see is mainstream media trying to get into the game. With the New York Times trying to start what is, effectively, a black newspaper in Gainesville, Florida. We’ve seen it with the Chicago Tribune company with Ho–there are lots and lots of examples. This is the trend when we look at the changing demographics of this country. We’re going to see a continuation of this niche-news approach.
