Have you heard the news?

“They couldn't print it if it weren't true.”

Have you ever heard that statement in regards to the veracity of a newspaper or magazine article? Maybe you've heard someone use a variation of the saying in regards to a radio or television broadcast, or a news story from the world wide web.

I've always preferred musician Lou Reed's maxim on the news, “Don’t believe half of what you read and three-quarters of what people say to your face.”

That may sound a little cynical -- okay, a lot cynical. But then again, Lou Reed ain't exactly Edna St. Vincent Milay. But I've always interpreted the statement to mean that information received from even the most respected source still needs to be critically analyzed.

I spent my formative years in the 1970s and 80s in an environment that would best be described as Evangelical Christian. If you've ever talked to people who was brought up in that subculture, I’m sure they've clued you in to the -- uh, unique worldview that’s fostered in those surroundings.

I remember reading "news" articles that ranged from just plain goofy (Can a Christian be a Mason?) to some dangerous seeds that could be planted in unbalanced individuals (None Dare Call It Conspiracy, a book-length expose of social movements, business and government that implicated everyone from the Rockefellers to the Beatles in a global domination scheme that makes The X-Files look positively reasonable by comparison.)

Police cover-ups of satanic ritual child abuse? AIDS, the product of a military research and development lab? A hoax called the Holocaust? Hey, they couldn't print it if it weren't true! Well, yes they can… and frequently do.

As I became lot older and a little wiser, I began to question more of what I read in newspapers and magazines, heard on the radio, and saw on television. In fact, I can vividly recall the first instance I recognized bias in the right-wing press.

I was 19 or 20 and worked for a small religious radio station in the northwestern hills of Pennsylvania. In between our mostly sad attempts at culturally relevant music, we would play short daily commentaries from various churches and parachurch icons like Tim and Bev LaHaye, James Dobson, Marlin Maddox, and Phyllis Schafly.

The particular commentary I recall was from conservative pundit Charles Colson. He was arguing against public schools adopting safe-sex curriculums. He mentioned that it wasn't just a conservative issue, but that the actual tide of public opinion had turned to abstinence and that liberal school board members had better wise up to their constituency.

As an example of "the tide of public opinion," he referenced an article that had recently appeared in a fashion magazine. I can't recall for the life of me which fashion magazine it was… Cosmo, Elle, Glamour, they all look alike to me. But what I will always remember is the name of the article: 2000 Virgins. I remember chuckling and thought it would make a great name for either a band or John Waters movie (I still do).

A few weeks later I was waiting to get a haircut. (Actually, I was getting my hair styled… This after all, was the 1980s.) I was at one of those salons where it never occurs to the stylists to get a Popular Mechanics or Consumer Reports in the waiting room in case a man wanders in. So out of sheer boredom I dug through a pile of heavily perfumed fashion magazines. And there it was, tucked between magazines offering to teach me how to undress for my man and lose the fat on my thighs: The cover story 2000 Virgins.

I decided to read this story of people choosing abstinence. However, I was rather taken aback when I discovered that the article turned out to be about "technical virgins." A few thousand words were devoted to interviews with women about the enjoyment of petting, oral, backdoor, etc.

I remember being very disillusioned with Chuck Colson. He took the tiny part of the article that agreed with his conservative agenda (abstinence) and omitted any mention of the actual details of the article, which was a far cry from the Christian ideal of "purity of heart."

In the weeks that followed, I began to question more of what I heard on my radio station: America is a "Christian" nation. Says who? People on welfare are capable of work and just playing the system. What case studies have you done? Glasnost is a Soviet trick. Really? Did Gorbachev whisper it to you over vodkas? I guess owe my membership in the Democratic Party to Chuck Colson!

Nowadays I wince when I recall a lot of my youthful news sources. I recognize that a lot of it qualifies less as “news” than straight-up urban legend.

I’m sure that a lot of religious magazine or book editors (and their readers) would be horrified that I consider a lot of their stuff biased. After all, they are just telling the truth that the other media ignores! But whose truth? From what sources?

I’m sure that in many cases their religious beliefs muddle up their critical faculties: "If the right reverend doctor says that this new bill in congress is an attack on the church -- and I already feel marginalized by society -- I'll take it as the Gospel Truth."

But by what right does the reverend speak as a political commentator? Will any members of congress be interviewed for an opposing viewpoint? What is the actual wording of the bill? A passionate editor can too easily allow his worldview (persecution of Christians) to short–circuit a more balanced handling of the story.

Bias isn't just a problem with the media of the religious right. It's always existed in various news organizations and probably always will. Bias isn't just a problem of the conservative right. Heck, I know each issue of the ultra-liberal Sojourners will have at least one article so out of reality that it’s good for nothing but a big belly laugh!

Rodger Streitmatter, in his book Mightier than the Sword: How the News Media Have Shaped American History describes how an anti-British bias was utilized by the press to help sow the seeds of discontent that came to a head in the American Revolution. Many papers relied more on editorial techniques that created emotional reactions in readers rather than constructing logical arguments for colonial self-rule that could be intellectually examined. In fact, many news journals of the day are known to contain highly exaggerated versions of real events, many more have been discovered to contain outright fabrications and lies.

This information was something that had been passed over in my public school education (or maybe I was just absent that day due to being ill) and I have to admit that this section of the book left me somewhat disturbed. It’s not like I walk around with rose-colored glasses or anything, but I became aware of America in the era of the Bicentennial: school assemblies watching Johnny Tremain, church and community picnics dressed in 1776 fashions, and the cartoon and comic book The U.S. of Archie (don’t ask). Discovering that the press chose to use made-up stories to create a suitable atmosphere for rebellion is somewhat akin to finding out that Batman receives payoffs from the mob, Mister Rogers donates his salary to the Man-Boy Love Association, or that America’s girl next door, Britney Spears, had breast implants. (Wait a second, the last one really happened. But you get the gist.)

It always hurts to find out that a hero has feet of clay. But it will make me question a little more of what I see on television. How do I really know what social and political life in "Country X" is like? Especially when the images I’m fed -- say, an orphan refugee child -- is certain to prey on my sympathies. I’m being asked to choose sides in a complex political/social/economic action by looking at one single image in the newspaper or on the television. Is that enough information to decide if I should support U.S. military strikes against "Country X"? I don’t think so.

Maybe I can make that argument clearer if I reverse it. What if "Country X" sent a news crew to document the human rights abuses in America? Night after night of prime time television, its citizens would be treated to images of urban slums and homeless people, news reports of the differences between rich and poor and racial profiling. Would the television viewers of "Country X" support military action against the oppressive regime of the United States of America? Darn right they would!

Remember the news footage of Islamic Fundamentalists celebrating after the collapse of the World Trade Center? It made my blood boil, but even then I realized that my image of America and their image of America are two different things, just as my image of the Islamic world is alien to their experience. The maxim of propagandist Samuel Adams is just as true today as it was in the 1700s: "Arouse the masses -- the real shock troops -- by instilling hatred of enemies."

Sometimes biased stories can backfire and bring harm upon the very cause an editor is trying to promote. Abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison spent forty–nine days in jail after losing a libel suit against a slave trader. Although it's highly unlikely that he could of corroborated his story by interviewing the trader, the libel suit and jail time couldn’t have helped advance his abolitionist stance among people who's opinions were yet undecided.

Citizen Kane himself, William Randolph Hearst, and Joseph Pulitzer raised news bias to an art form in the latter part of the nineteenth century, resulting in the Spanish-American War. In an effort to boost circulation, newspapers daily pushed the cause of Cuban rebels against Spain, even if that meant exaggerating their suffering and manufacturing untrue news items. America actually developed what was known as a "war psychosis" that involved the country in a conflict that could have easily been avoided.

The Spanish-American War is probably the most extreme example of the damage that can be inflicted by a biased press. But another, maybe even more insidious form of damage can occur in the attitudes (and later, actions) of readers who they just unquestionably accept whatever information is handed to them.

News bias will exist as long as certain passionate members of the press let their ideology overwhelm their critical thinking skills and their integrity. Believe me -- I couldn't print that if it weren't true!