Dinosaur Media’s Last Gasp: Public’s Trust in Media Reaches All Time Low

The way Americans perceive the mainstream media has drastically changed over the past two decades, largely due to the influence of the internet. The internet has not only given us countless perspectives on any given issue, it has also given us the ability to catch the media when they lie or make mistakes, which they have a habit of doing every day. They basically parrot everything the government says, even when it kills their ratings. Not only are their viewership and readership numbers sinking year after year, the amount of trust people place in the media is also falling.

A poll conducted by the American Press Institute found that only 6% of Americans place their full trust in the media. That’s on par with the support level that the American public has for Congress, which Americans typically have the least confidence in compared to other institutions in our society.

52% said they had some confidence in the media, while 41% said they had hardly any confidence. Bias in the media was widely cited as a reason why people are turning away from televised and print media, while 85% cited accuracy as their biggest concern.

According to the American Press Institute “The study reaffirms that consumers do value broad concepts of trust like fairness, balance, accuracy, and completeness. At least two-thirds of Americans cite each of these four general principles as very important to them.”

Gee, who would have thought that people want accuracy in their news?