Recently leaked documents suggest that the students behind the Stanford University newspaper are intentionally tainting their work with a progressive bias.
According to a report from The College Fix, the student operators of the Stanford Daily are intentionally letting their progressive bias seep into their reporting.
It’s unusual that campus bias stories are accompanied by the direct proof that is available in this one. Republican students at Stanford uncovered internal documents from the paper that reveal a staffer’s push to make the paper’s political partisanship more transparent.
In one of the leaked documents, a current leader of the paper directly argues that the publication should embrace its left-wing bias. “Shirking away from this or pretending that we offer truly unbiased reporting is not only intellectually dishonest, but also hinders us from pursuing the topics and ideas that matter and can make a difference,” the student wrote.
In a statement, the Stanford Daily editor-in-chief published a statement defending their organization against the claims made by the individual staff who wrote the leaked document. In the statement, the editor, Courtney C. Douglas, wrote that while the paper is not a “biased left-wing organization,” they do occasionally let their progressive bias slip into their reporting.
Defining objectivity — let alone achieving it — isn’t easy. In the course of our editing cycles, we frequently debate whether to include details, analyses or even adjectives that might vaguely insinuate that we are aligned with one side of an issue. Further, journalism, especially student journalism, is a human enterprise. As with all other papers, despite our best efforts, we occasionally slip out of the objectivity that our craft demands, or otherwise make mistakes. In these cases, we are transparent in our corrections and unrelenting in our quest to do better in our future coverage. We also leave room for dissent, welcoming Letter to the Editor submissions and additional comment for follow-up news reports.
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