Customer Reviews

The Gospel According to the New York Times: How the World's Most Powerful News Organization Shapes Your Mind and Values

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I really enjoyed this book as it provided good documentation on how the New York Times along with other media outlets tries to force their belief systems on us.

The author does a great job with references and examples straight out of the paper.

The book is a fast read but gives the reader a lot to ponder.

This book should be studied by every high-school civics class. It's among the most useful and incisive studies of the print media's "idea" (or intellectual) content.

This book is not so much about familiar "liberal bias" claims; rather, it shows what the New York Times does goes beyond simple bias, to a conscious, deliberate, planned attack on opposing world-views with the goal of substituting its own set of absolute values.

A decision to engage in propaganda often arises from a strong set of beliefs or vested interests. Since the average person today has shallow or non-existent personal philosophies (generally developed by cobbling together beliefs based on what gratifies preconceptions one isn't even aware of), true-believers with convictions can often convince non-believers easily.

But if you understand the propagandists presuppositions -- those things he assumes are true, often without even realizing it -- and can identify and understand links to other organizations and philosophies, you will be in a better position to recognize the pattern, evaluate which assumptions are in play, and thus the correctness of the message.

This book can therefore serve as an excellent guide to fostering critical thinking when it comes to modern media, through its examination of the most powerful news organization in the world, the New York Times. Nearly all journalists determine what is important and 'the angle' from the NYT, thus extending it's influence to the smallest town or largest cable network.

The author shows how the beliefs of a handful of people are able to shape perceptions of reality in hundreds of millions by implanting assumptions in the public via decisions of what types of stories are important, headlines, picture selection, subtly slanted writing and the placement of opinion-shaping stories cloaked as news reports. Sheer persistent repetition is able to completely change the thinking and values of a public lacking intellectual foundations.

30 years ago, who could have even imagined the Boy Scouts would be banned from public schools that now dispense condoms? Or the country would be managing its own dissolution by allowing the importation of 3rd world populations exceeding the size of France in just 10 years? And that criticism of such things is called "controversial" (if not a "hate-crime"!) and can ruin people? Curious about how the complete inversion of right and wrong could be engineered within a single generation? Read this book.

The author also looks at conflicts of interest, giving examples where organizations the New York TImes had a direct undisclosed financial interest in were at the center of its reporting and editorializing to its benefit; the link between the NYT and the Pulitzer Prize committee which returns so many awards to it; the many examples in which Culture Creep techniques were used to alter public morality by using "the opinion piece in disguise", "the editorial blast", "the op-ed hit piece", and "the bombardment".

The author identifies the set of fundamentalist beliefs the New York Times promotes; "The Sin of Religious Certainty", "The Sin of Conservatism", "The Sin of Capital Punishment", "The Sin of Broken Public Trust", "The Second of the Second Amendment", the "Sin of Censorship", "The Sin of Limiting Abortion".

The NYT also defines certain cultural spirits as being positive: globalism, multiculturalism, total sexual freedom, environmentalism, entitlement, scientism and humanism.

The book analyzes coverage of stories ranging from the Columbine shooting to election coverage; both the coverage content, slanting, comparison of stories with the actual events, and statistical studies of the word usage and counts.

The book is well-written. Afterward, one can hardly read the New York Times without laughing, assuming you took it seriously before.

For example, two days ago I read in the NYT that public belief in the existence of absolute right and wrong, jumping to 38% after the Sep 11 attack, had now declined to "normal"; 22%. The message was "religion back to normal". Apparently, this was thought by the NYT a matter needing polling. Those religious leaders who had earlier remarked about the rebirth of religion in America could now be shown as wrong while simultaneously emphasizing how "religious certainty" was once again a declining minority. The effect of the attack, which reawakened patriotic sentiments and threatened the Times belief system, was now waning. Back to business as usual.

Of course, if you read the polling question, results would actually have to be 100% of the public believe in absolutes. If you think there is no absolute right or wrong, that belief itself is a claim to an absolute truth; a claim to be right.

But, two days later, USA Today picked up on the NYT priority, incoherent as it is, and ran it's own piece on the same subject, echoing the marching orders, as did countless other papers around the country and world. In this way, opinions are remolded in a specific direction without regard to reality.

The New York Times, unarguably the most influential news media in the world, has a way of shaping your way of thinking and beliefs. Such is the topic of "The Gospel According to The New York Times," by William Proctor.

"The Gospel" awakens your sense of inquiry as you read newspapers and pay attention to other forms of media releases. In the book, you'll find suggestions on ways you can read or listen to the news in an active manner, as opposed to a passive one.

I like the author's writing style of breaking down the subject matter in a simple way. "The Gospel" is easy to read and gives you a lot of food for thought.

Anyone who gets news information from the radio, television, Internet, a magazine or newspaper, not only The New York Times, will be interested in picking up a copy of this book.

Fafa Demasio

Excellent book. It is amazing how so many people are lead down a predetermined path by the media. Just like the book says, everyone is afraid of being called uneducated or intolerant therefore they mindlessly mouth the same message delivered by the mainstream press. Just like sheep. They blindly follow the leader. Ignore the Media. Think For Yourself. (...)

I'm a journalist, publisher and Christian, quite concerned about the role of the mass media in the world today. I bought this book hoping for insight into how to respond to the media. Instead, I was dismayed to find a paranoid attack on the Times, which assumes that its leadership, if not entire staff, is consciously promoting an anti-Christian moral code. Proctor endlessly argues his own conclusions, which is ultimately hypocritical, since his words make it clear that he is pushing a conservative agenda and he assumes that anything that disagrees with it is biased.

There are seeds of truth about the media throughout the book, which might inspire critical thinking by mature Christians who have substantial media knowledge. But Proctor is not that sort of deep thinker. He is a cheerleader for those who would swallow simple-minded conclusions, starting with the notion that responsibility for changes in public attitudes over the last few decades "must in large part be laid squarely at the feet of the mass media."

Proctor fundamentally goes astray in his assumption of *intent* on the part of the Times. In fact, no one had to plan to create a moral code; the implicit moral code in the mass media is the result of a society that puts faith in free markets to be an infalliable source of truth. By demonizing the Times, Proctor neglects the reality that human institutions *always* fall short of the truth. In an eagerness to place blame, he fails to see how the mass media could become a force of evil, in which we all share responsibility, unless people consciously chose to make it one. Proctor shows that he worships free speech and free markets -- the mass media's justifications -- more than God.

The subtitle -- "How the world's most powerful news organization shapes your mind and values" -- barely begins to pay tribute to the book's arrogant and often illogical over-simplifications.

Bottom line: Ignore it unless you plan to treat it as Proctor (correctly, I fear) says we should regard the Times: with great skepticism.