Black news consumers believe local journalists cover black communities better than national media, according to a recent study by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center.
Black leaders in South Florida’s media landscape say it’s because black news organizations — as well as black journalists at mainstream media outlets — better understand local issues and are less likely to engage in hackneyed clichés and racist stereotypes than national journalists.
Bobby Henry, publisher of Westside Gazette, a black family weekly based in Broward County, said black readers favor local coverage “primarily because of the fact that there are black newspapers here.”
Dexter Bridgeman, CEO and Founder of M•I•A Media Group, said, “Local Black journalists…they have the chance to really know us. »
Bridgeman’s three news magazines — Legacy Miami, Legacy South Florida and MIA Magazine — have been distributed as inserts in the Miami Herald and Sun-Sentinel newspapers for more than a decade, with a readership exceeding 220,000 for Legacy Miami and 350,000 for Legacy South Florida.
The group also produces local television programs and has an email base of over 100,000 subscribers.
“It takes someone with exceptional foresight and understanding of our community,” Bridgeman said, “if you’re reporting on a national issue, to be able to tell the story to our community and tell it from a way that doesn’t.” It doesn’t make us feel like we have two heads.
Age and party affect how black consumers perceive the news
A previous Pew study found that Black Americans are more likely than people of other races or ethnicities to follow local news closely.
THE new search goes further, surveying the news consumption preferences of Black Americans. It was based on a survey of more than 4,700 black adults of varying ages and partisan affiliations across the country.
According to the study, Black people who consume local news are more likely to view local coverage of Black communities as fair than unfair. But there is a slight generation gap, according to Michael Lipka, associate director specializing in news and information research at Pew.
“Older Black Americans are more likely than younger Black Americans…to express a more positive opinion…that local journalists are in touch with their community and that media coverage is generally fair,” Lipka told WLRN.
More broadly, however, black adults generally have negative feelings toward media coverage of black people. And there is not much hope that the situation will improve.
Less than 20% of young respondents were optimistic about improving media coverage of black communities. “So this is a finding that I think is particularly revealing,” Lipka said.
The study also showed how political affiliation tends to shape black respondents’ opinions of local media coverage.
“Black Democrats are more likely than black Republicans to express positive opinions about local media coverage and local journalists,” Lipka said. “And that sort of fits into a larger pattern that we see across parties, regardless of race, in which Republicans tend to be more skeptical of news media journalists in general than the Democrats.”
Black media challenges racist narratives in the news
Since the country’s founding, there has been a need for media outlets that provide fair and nuanced coverage of black people and issues, as well as an alternative to traditional white-owned media outlets, many of which have a long history of racism.
Black media played an important role in the abolition of slavery as well as the civil rights movement. The weekly Freedom’s Journal, for example, was the first black-owned and -operated newspaper, founded in 1827 in New York.
Concerns about the lack of fair media coverage of black people came to a head fifty years ago. In the late 1960s, through an executive order, President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed what is known as the Kerner Commission to investigate urban riots and racial divisions across the country.
THE report, citing “instances of sensationalism, inaccuracy and distortion” in newspapers, radio and television, concluded that the media had failed to adequately represent the underlying issues affecting black communities to of their predominantly white audiences and had lacked diversity in newsrooms. “Significant segments of the media have failed to adequately report on the causes and consequences of civil unrest or underlying problems in race relations,” the report said.
Many Black news consumers still believe that national coverage of Black people is too often inadequate, which has led communities to launch their own local publications.
M•I•A Media Group’s publications primarily cover positive stories about Black people in South Florida, serving an audience of professionals across all industries to “educate and inform the community about heroes and heroines and talk about the success and accomplishments of our community,” according to Dexter Bridgeman, publisher.
Bridgeman said his media’s editorial theme is necessary to combat a history of negative portrayals of Black Americans in the media, particularly in national media, producing solutions based on solutions. stories surrounding community health and education to championing top arts and culture professionals, the American Black Film Festival and Jazz in the Gardens.
Nicky Gelin, editor-in-chief of M•I•A magazine, said local news is “more reliable.”
National news “misses community outreach” and claims that “local reach is always better whenever the community sees it being recognized for its accomplishments on a popular public platform.”
Bridgeman said maintaining community trust also requires profiling people who make a difference in people’s lives.
“What we’re trying to do is let people know that our community has wonderful individuals who are doing wonderful things and great things, whether it’s in medicine, education, banking or finance,” he said. he declared.
Levi Henry, founded the West Side Gazettethe oldest African-American newspaper in South Florida, 52 years ago, used the motto at the time: “A positive newspaper for positive people.”
His son and the paper’s current publisher, Bobby Henry, said that although it was founded on “positive news” about black people, the paper eventually shifted to covering general news, such as social justice, current affairs, crime and education.
“At the time the publication was founded, along with many other black publications, the news we read and the daily newspapers were just a bunch of negative stuff,” Bobby Henry said. “The only time you saw or read a story about a black person was usually during a robbery or shooting – something that wasn’t positive.”
Henry said its readership is about 150,000 people, mostly black women and older people throughout the tri-county area.
“Black newspapers are rooted in the community, and therefore our concerns are with the community,” Henry said. “Our pillar is the churches and stories within the community. Finding our niche, writing our story and telling who we are allows us to continue to be in the news business.
Joe Wesley | MIA Media Group
Even local outlets can do better
Peter Webley runs The Caribbean todaya free monthly newspaper that has covered the news, immigration, food and sports of the Black Caribbean diaspora for more than three decades.
Webley was born in Jamaica and raised in Miami. He said local media coverage is not exempt from its own problems. He said he founded his media outlet because he saw cultural gaps in the way major local publications covered the Jamaican community, particularly what he saw, at the time, as an overemphasis on the stories surrounding Jamaican posses or gangs.
He called for more balance.
“Who better than you (the Caribbean diaspora) to highlight what is needed, where and how it is needed?” he asked.
The newspaper circulates from Homestead to West Palm Beach, to doctors’ offices, grocery stores, restaurants and hair salons.
Webley said black readers feel closely connected to local media coverage because it is a “historical reference.”
“Once the ink dries, they become part of the story. This cannot be undone. And a lot of people recognized that,” Webley added.
“They now have a voice. They now have representation. And it’s not awake. It’s real,” he said.
