Why Media Bias on Guns Is Such a Major Problem

A lot of people get tired of folks like me going on about media bias. Believe me, I get it. I used to be blind to the bias, and so when I started to see it, it was impossible for me not to just glare at it, but to try and make sure everyone else sees it, too.

But the truth is that bias in the media is a major problem. While many in the media have long claimed to lament “misinformation,” they push their own version and pretend they’re really just about finding the truth and sharing it with the world.

Over at Ammoland, Bill Cawthon calls what anti-gun groups engage in “the Big Lie.” Yes, he invokes the Nazi regime, but he does so because it’s relevant. And in so doing, he gives a prime example that I want to expound on in a different direction.

The survey’s final question received almost no notice at all, but it revealed a critical bit of information.

The question was: “From what you have read or heard, do you think, compared to 25 years ago, the per capita gun murder rate in the U.S. is higher, lower, or about the same?”

59% of participants said the rate was higher; 23% said it was about the same; only 11% said it was lower.

This is kind of a trick question: Since the question was asked in 2019, the 25-year period would have covered 1994 to 2018.

The CDC’s homicide rate figures can’t be used; they include all three offenses in National Incident-Based Reporting System’s (NIBRS) 09 code and “gun murder” covers only Code 09A, murder and non-negligent homicide.*

The data closest to accurate is found in the FBI’s annual Crime in the U.S. reports. These reports are sourced from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting system (UCR), which has been in use since 1929 and operated by the FBI since 1930.

Using the firearm murder figures and population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, the per capita U.S. gun murder rate plunged 42% from 1994 to 2018.

82% of the Americans polled believed something completely at odds with reality. It will surprise exactly nobody to learn neither the mainstream media nor the gun control zealots mentioned this. Lies of omission work as well as lies of commission.

Let’s understand that the media is complicit in this messaging. They’re anti-gun activists masquerading as unbiased journalists and doing a terrible job of it.

This should be a big red flag to them that they’re doing something wrong, but instead of recognizing that and addressing it, they opted to focus on other parts of the survey that they claim show support for anti-gun measures.

Yet if people who are polled think there’s more violence than there actually is, at least some of them have been misled into offering that support. They’re supporting restrictions on our rights based on their misinformed perception of what’s going on around them, and the people who misinformed them see nothing wrong with it.

I harp on media bias on guns because that bias is not just pervasive, but leads to people thinking that gun control is the solution. Far too few people look beyond the mainstream media to find out what’s really happening. They live in their bubbles and genuinely think that they’re well-informed. These are the people who vote for failed gun control policies, fight to keep them in place after they’ve been proven not to work, then call for more of what just failed.

They don’t know what they don’t know, and yes, their thinking isn’t based on reality at all. It’s based on what they’ve been told by media outlets that are on board with the anti-gun agenda.

Media bias isn’t just an annoyance.

It’s a disease.

Editor’s Note: The Schumer Shutdown is here. Rather than put the American people first, Chuck Schumer and the radical Democrats forced a government shutdown for healthcare for illegals. They own this.

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