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Comment by boplicity | Hacker News Reader

Don't try to be "objective" or "impartial." That's an impossible task, and anyone claiming to do so is being dishonest.

Instead, own your biases. Make them explicit and public. That way people can understand were you're coming from, and take that into account.

There will always be bias in any reporting. It's better to make it visible than to pretend it doesn't exist.

This means having a clear perspective and "owning" that perspective, instead of shying away from it.

Coincidentally, this type of thinking can dramatically increase brand loyalty and trust.

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Anyone arguing for “owning your bias” is trying to justify using media to influence instead of inform.

We can never be perfectly unbiased, but we can certainly try. We dedicated entire higher education programs to the process of doing exactly that — it was called journalism.

I'm not saying that media should be used to influence instead of inform.

Rather, I'm saying you should acknowledge that you are influenced and will influence, and be explicit about what those influences are. This is the only way to actually combat bias; not by eliminating bias, but by making it visible, so it can be accounted for with everyone's thinking.

I think if you e.g. added "Disclaimer: this is super left-wing biased" (or equivalently "Disclaimer: this is super right-wing biased") to the top of a heavily biased article, you are not appreciably combating bias.

If you say "Our goal is to represent the views of the right wing", then you're making it clear that you are being honest about your perspective. This then encourages both you and your readers to be aware of the bias, which does combat hidden influence of bias, making it more likely to be a choice.

I agree that it is more honest. I disagree that it has a significant impact on the readers' awareness of the bias.

Anyone claiming that they are trying to be impartial is being dishonest?

You can't be impartial; everyone has their own sets of biases that they can't get around. These are sometimes obvious, sometimes not, but they're always there. It's not necessarily intentionally dishonest to say you're impartial, but it fundamentally is dishonest to claim you're capable of the impossible.

You seem to be conflating "try" with "being" (and possibly also "a little biased" with "a lot biased"). If I currently have a 12 minute mile and I try to get it down to 6 minutes, but only mange to get it down to 8 minutes I have both:

1. Not lied about my goal

2. Accomplished something similar to my goal.

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