{"id":28951,"date":"2022-10-05T08:04:49","date_gmt":"2022-10-05T15:04:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=28951"},"modified":"2022-10-07T10:08:54","modified_gmt":"2022-10-07T17:08:54","slug":"what-do-you-mean-limbaugh-was-biased","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/what-do-you-mean-limbaugh-was-biased\/","title":{"rendered":"What Do You Mean Limbaugh Was Biased?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Is it possible to be an unbiased news source in our era of relative truth? N.S. Lyons\u2019\u00a0The Upheaval<\/span><\/em>\u00a0seeks to rise above the noise of political and social ideologies to examine what is happening in our times and how it is changing our world.<\/span><\/p>\n

In his post, \u201cIntroducing the Revolutions Upending Our World,\u201d Lyons examines the radical shifts in Western (European and American) cultures. \u201cBut this ideology seemed to emerge so suddenly, and is in its stark irrationality so alien to the modern liberal mind, that surprised observers and hapless opponents so far struggle even to settle on a name for it,\u201d he noted.\u00a0[1]<\/span><\/p>\n

Humans have a fascinating relationship with change and the unknown. The unknown raises a gambit of emotions, from disappointment to frustration, egotism to timidity, grief to anxiety, doubt to fear, or depression to paralysis. What\u2019s fascinating about the human body is that these are natural psychological responses to the unknown.<\/span><\/p>\n

Physiologically, our bodies respond to the unknown in an equally myriad of ways, including and not limited to increased heart rate, unregulated breathing, a surge of adrenaline resulting in that famous flight, fight, or freeze, avoidance of the moment, and people associated with it, loss of sleep, intestinal discomfort, and chest tightness. [2]<\/span><\/p>\n

It is no wonder that people would rather settle into their explicit and confirmation biases, reinforcing what they want to believe about themselves, the world, their neighbor, and God. And since change is happening so rapidly now, along with the clashing of new and deeply held ideologies, do we really have to wonder why there is a clashing within our country, communities, churches, and families?<\/span><\/p>\n

Lyons argued that there is a revolution underway that he compares to the rapid changes brought about due to the creation of Gutenberg\u2019s printing press. \u201cThe evidence seems to be growing that this revolution \u2013 which is more accurately a revolution in how information is generated, collected, processed, analyzed, shared, consumed, and understood \u2013 may be fundamentally changing not only our relationship with each other but our individual and collective perception of, and relationship with, reality itself.\u201d[3]<\/span><\/p>\n

And yet, since information is processed differently and readily available on many new platforms, an individual\u2019s relationship with the truth has and will continue to change. Lyon calls this a paradox of \u201cpost-truth\u201d and \u201canti-privatization.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn\u2019s \u201cMen Have Forgotten God\u201d address, the Russian Anti-Soviet novelist argued, \u201cThe failings of human consciousness, deprived of its divine dimension, have been a determining factor in all the major crimes of this century.\u201d[4]\u00a0Of course, Solzhenitsyn\u2019s reflections were on the impact of the Communist Revolution in Russia and the pursuit of cohesion by a totalitarian government.<\/span><\/p>\n

So how do we deal with the global changes happening all around us? How do we process information differently, preventing us from entrenching ourselves into our unconscious and conscious ideologies?<\/span><\/p>\n

One way is to consider broadening our sources of news. If we know that partisan news outlets merely reinforce a prescribed worldview while making billions off of our fear, anger, and indignation, finding a diversity of sources is paramount for our development as leaders.<\/span><\/p>\n

In my recent research on explicit and implicit bias for a chapter of my doctoral book project, a cognitive psychologist asked readers to consider\u00a0AllSides.com<\/a>, a news source that claims to pursue \u201cmedia solutions company that strengthens our democratic society with balanced news, media bias ratings, diverse perspectives, and real conversation.\u201d Similarly, in the United States, sources like \u201cThe Associated Press\u201d starkly contrast the Fox News and MSNBC of the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Knight Foundation, in partnership with Gallup, conducts ongoing studies into how Americans rate predominant news sources on bias, finding that a majority of Americans currently see \u201ca great deal\u201d (46%) or \u201ca fair amount\u201d (37%) of political bias in news coverage. [5]\u00a0The same study produced the following results on the most biased media consumed in America:\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

As Christian leaders, we have our work cut out for us as we navigate workplaces and congregations filled with people navigating these rapid changes while engaging them with their implicit and explicit biases. It challenges us to consider how we choose to rethink how we process the world around us and how we help others rethink their approach.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/span>\u00a0Lyons, N.S. \u201cThe Upheaval.\u201d The Upheaval, April 7, 2021. Last modified April 7, 2021. Accessed October 5, 2022. https:\/\/theupheaval.substack.com\/p\/the-upheaval.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

[2] Publishing, Harvard Health. \u201cRecognizing and Easing the Physical Symptoms of Anxiety.\u201d Harvard Health<\/em>, 2020.\u00a0https:\/\/www.health.harvard.edu\/mind-and-mood\/recognizing-and-easing-the-physical-symptoms-of-anxiety<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

[3]<\/span>\u00a0Ibid, Lyons.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

[4] \u201cAcceptance Address by Mr. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.\u201d Templeton Prize<\/em>. Last modified December 7, 2021. Accessed October 5, 2022. https:\/\/www.templetonprize.org\/laureate-sub\/solzhenitsyn-acceptance-speech\/.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

[5] \u201cAmerican Views 2020: Trust, Media, and Democracy.\u201d Knight Foundation<\/em>. Accessed October 5, 2022. https:\/\/knightfoundation.org\/reports\/american-views-2020-trust-media-and-democracy\/.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Is it possible to be an unbiased news source in our era of relative truth? N.S. Lyons\u2019\u00a0The Upheaval\u00a0seeks to rise above the noise of political and social ideologies to examine what is happening in our times and how it is changing our world. In his post, \u201cIntroducing the Revolutions Upending Our World,\u201d Lyons examines the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2372,2375,2374,2253,2373,2370,2371],"class_list":["post-28951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-aleksandr-solzhenitsyn","tag-explicit-bias","tag-gallup","tag-implicit-bias","tag-knight-foundation","tag-ns-lyons","tag-the-upheaval","cohort-lgp11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28951"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29012,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28951\/revisions\/29012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}