Talk:Media blackout

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Socially-unpopular media blackout

In some cases, media fails to cover a topic because its a socially unpopular subject (e.g. extreme left/right wing) such as in the case of the Kermit Gosnell abortion trial, where it was clearly unpopular in the pro-choice movement:

"Writing for The Washington Post, Melinda Henneberger responded that "we didn’t write more because the only abortion story most outlets ever cover in the news pages is every single threat or perceived threat to abortion rights. In fact, that is so fixed a view of what constitutes coverage of that issue that it’s genuinely hard, I think, for many journalists to see a story outside that paradigm as news. That’s not so much a conscious decision as a reflex, but the effect is one-sided coverage". Explaining why some of her colleagues did not report on the story, Henneberger wrote, "One colleague viewed Gosnell’s alleged atrocities as a local crime story, though I can’t think of another mass murder, with hundreds of victims, that we ever saw that way. Another said it was just too lurid, though that didn’t keep us from covering Jeffrey Dahmer, or that aspiring cannibal at the NYPD."[140] Writing for Bloomberg View, Jeffrey Goldberg said that this story "upsets a particular narrative about the reality of certain types of abortion, and that reality isn’t something some pro-choice absolutists want to discuss".

I just realized that "blackouts" can be due to forces other than mandates, etc... but realize there's no existing terminology to describe this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hippypink (talk • contribs) 18:14, 11 January 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"Blackout" is racist

Removed link about The Christian and Newsom murders. There's no evidence that any "blackout" (which is a racist term) is in effect, maybe the news is just not interesting, and posting such a link here seems very racist to me.

"Blackout" is a racist term??? New one on me. I thought its etymology was from covering a printed page with black ink to literally make the page black. Or are you suggesting that any term which has "black" in it must somehow be racist? No opinion about the murders having a news blackout. LaughingVulcan ^{Laugh With Me /} ^{Logical Entries} 00:05, 25 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Added Fact Tags

Added several fact tags for unreferenced allegations of media blackouts throughout history. LaughingVulcan ^{Laugh With Me /} ^{Logical Entries} 01:09, 26 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom murder

Removed link again, not because of the Truth of it, but because no reference was cited for including it as a "See Also" example per WP:V:

"Be careful not to go too far on the side of not upsetting editors by leaving unsourced information in articles for too long, or at all in the case of information about living people. Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, has said of this: 'I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons.'"

I don't want to get involved in the edit war. If someone wants to restore it, fine and great and be my guest. But I'd request that it be restored and not reverted (to avoid removing the other Fact requests,) and if it is restored, please add a citation demonstrating how the murder connects to a media blackout. Thanks! LaughingVulcan ^{Laugh With Me /} ^{Logical Entries} 01:09, 26 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sigh... So much for hoping that the Talk page would be used for discussion... it was just added again, with no citation. Rather than plain reverting it, I'm going to add the word "alleged," and let the link stand, along with a note to the contributing editor this time around. LaughingVulcan ^{Laugh w/ Me} ^{or Logical Entries} 17:07, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Citations?

How can one expect a citation of a media blackout? It is little more than asking for proof that something (in this case, a particular news organization's coverage of an event) does not exist. If it does not exist, you cannot find evidence of it's non-existance.

167.104.7.4 (talk) 23:07, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Good point. I've taken the trouble to find sources and simply removed two citation requests that I believe were unnecessary. Freikorp (talk) 14:19, 21 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Law template

I think there should be a law template on this article, since it involve actions of government officials or civil servants being the only persons capable of issuing a blackout on the media.

88.105.20.89 (talk) 10:55, 24 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Separate "Black on White Atrocities section

This falls under "examples." There's no need for a separate section and the title "Black on White Atrocities" is dramatic and ridiculous. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.37.172.226 (talk) 15:37, 18 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why not include the climate gate in this section?

There was a blatant three week media blackout due to the Copenhagen summit of 2009. Of course, I think we should include it because, we don't want people to think that wikipedia blacksout sourced and cited material, do we? 75.34.16.67 (talk) 06:53, 2 February 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.34.16.67 (talk) 06:48, 2 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Get some reliable sources to cite it, then it might be considered. Tony Fox (arf!) 16:57, 2 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

File:Day 12 Occupy Wall Street September 28 2011 Shankbone 31.JPG Nominated for Deletion

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Media black out of DC Motorcycle Ride on Sept 11th.

The most recent media blackout was the September 11th motorcycle ride into DC that was not covered on national t.v. or in newspapers. 108.43.192.230 (talk) 16:46, 16 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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Biden

Let's discuss this here. A media blackout is censorship of a news story. If a story is reported on in the media, it is not a blackout. Speculation about why so-termed "large" outlets will not report on a story is not a blackout. Not to mention large outlets - Salon, Vox, Huffington Post - did report on the story. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AvatarQX (talk • contribs) 02:26, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Also, there have been no sources calling it a media blackout. Sources have noted that right-wing publications have been publishing the allegations - "Reade's story has garnered some coverage elsewhere, most noticeably from The Hill and The Intercept. Some left-leaning news sites—The Huffington Post, Vox—have written about it, and of course conservative media are all over the story." — Preceding unsigned comment added by AvatarQX (talk • contribs) 02:41, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Your opinion about what is and is not a media blackout is irrelevant. All we care about is whether reliable sources describe it as one. Which they have.

"The most striking thing about Ms Reade’s story may be the silence with which it has been greeted—particularly from some of those who argued that a sexual-assault allegation should disqualify Brett Kavanaugh from the Supreme Court." Source: The Economist
"Why is the paper of record now declining to publicize a very troubling allegation against former Vice President Joe Biden? The Times is hardly alone in this regard. The mainstream media have remained bafflingly silent about Tara Reade, a former member of then-Senator Biden's staff who claims that he sexually assaulted her in 1993." Source: Reasom magazine
"Rightwing news outlets have gleefully seized upon the accusations against Biden; the story has also been discussed by leftwing commentators. However, the mainstream media has largely ignored the allegations." Source: The Gaurdian

--Guy Macon (talk) 02:46, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

A media blackout doesn't mean a certain source will not report on the story. It means the story AS A WHOLE is not getting reported on. Considering it has been published in The Hill, Salon, Vox, Huffington Post, and others, it is clearly getting reported on.

None of the quotes you just gave me define "censorship by the media" which is what a media blackout is. None of your sources use the word blackout. They are upset certain sites are not publicizing the allegations, but that is not a blackout. Considering this page needs to be factual, you need to find a reliable source directly calling this a media blackout, which you have not done. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AvatarQX (talk • contribs) 02:53, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I am asking for a dispute resolution, as this is going nowhere. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AvatarQX (talk • contribs) 02:59, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Comment – AvatarQX, you may want to revisit the way you're defining and using the term "blackout". It's an act of suppression, not necessarily elimination. Some news coverage can exist in a media blackout situation (see it defined). Whether or not a subject's media coverage is sufficient can be a subjective position, which brings me to my next point. While the term exists and has been used in reliable sources to describe suppressed coverage, I'm not sure the article's topic merits having a dedicated article, or at the very least, is written from the right perspective. It approaches soapbox territory, with the appearance of advancing fringe minority viewpoints with very few scholarly sources cited (in fact, maybe only this one counts). This isn't a list article, yet nearly 80% of the article is focused on compiling examples. The debate in this thread won't solve the larger problem here, and in fact, may just add to it. --GoneIn60 (talk) 05:25, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that this article seems politically motivated. Thank you for the source. I suppose I was referring to the "keep from public knowledge" part of the "suppressing" definition - also from Merriam-Webster, as clearly this has not been kept from public knowledge. I agree that suppression has a subjective definition, so I'm not sure including a highly contentious "example" is the best thing to do. --AvatarQX (talk) 06:49, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

This seems nuts to me, we're using sources that don't use the term media blackout to call something a media blackout

So I've raised this at WP:RSN#Media blackout - what sources do we need to include something in this article? with a mention at BLPN. To me this looks like a BLP issue fueled more by politics than anything else. Doug Weller talk 06:01, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. I am completely confused as to how that is allowed to stay up. Not a single one of the sources refers to a media blackout, either by name or by definition. All of them mention places where the story has been reported. --AvatarQX (talk) 06:55, 10 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]