Photo (cc) 2010 by Todd Huffman
Three people — a progressive, a liberal and a moderate — have already sent me this commentary at The Free Press by NPR senior business editor Uri Berliner arguing that the network has lost trust and audience in recent years because it has lurched toward the progressive left. I’m putting it out there so that you’ll be aware of it and can have a chance to read it. Anything but the most cursory commentary will have to wait — I want to see how it settles in.
I will say that Berliner mischaracterizes the Mueller report and the Hunter Biden laptop story, which isn’t a good sign. He strikes me as squeamish about race and transgender issues as well. But there’s one point he makes that deserves some attention:
Back in 2011, although NPR’s audience tilted a bit to the left, it still bore a resemblance to America at large. Twenty-six percent of listeners described themselves as conservative, 23 percent as middle of the road, and 37 percent as liberal.
By 2023, the picture was completely different: only 11 percent described themselves as very or somewhat conservative, 21 percent as middle of the road, and 67 percent of listeners said they were very or somewhat liberal. We weren’t just losing conservatives; we were also losing moderates and traditional liberals.
An open-minded spirit no longer exists within NPR, and now, predictably, we don’t have an audience that reflects America.
This is a consequence of the great ideological sorting-out we’ve seen, especially during the Trump years. These days, the audiences for NPR, The New York Times, The Washington Post and other mainstream news organizations are overwhelmingly liberal and progressive. It’s not their fault; these are institutions that, however imperfectly, have tried to seek truth and report it, as the Society of Professional Journalists would have it, and have been attacked by the right as a result.
But their left-leaning audience in too many cases demands to be coddled. The Times drives me as crazy as it does anyone else, but it is constantly attacked on social media (especially on Threads) for not getting every pro-Biden, anti-Trump nuance exactly right. With advertising dead, editors at outlets like the Times and the Post have to balance the demands of their subscription-paying readers with their desire to cover the news fairly. A parallel situation exists at NPR, which is likely to become more dependent on membership fees from listeners as foundations cut their funding.
Anyway, those are a few preliminary thoughts. It will be interesting to see how Berliner’s essay resonates in the days ahead. And please post your own thoughts in the comments.