Bias In Gladstone's 'Great Refusal'

In the modern century, Christian value creates the disagreement in the American society. The issue didn’t get solved, but become more controversial. But think about what we usually been told about Christians? Hate-filled hypocrites? Christian right? Against gay marriage? All the terms come from media and with their hidden bias. In Brooke Gladstone’s “Great Refusal”, she mentions some types of bias that the media frequently use in their work. In decades ago, George Orwell tells us that people use language to mislead others. However, in “Politics and the English Language”, he devises the six rules to fix the problem as Gladstone states in her article. So, if contemporary journalists were required to use Orwell’s rules, this would prevent hidden the biases within their work. It also can prevent increased tension between Christian and American.
Orwell’s rule and Gladstone’s bias both apply to Chris Pleasance’s report about the Kim Davis. Pleasance reports that a current social issue, which Kim Davis, a country clerk, uses religious liberty to defend for herself. Undoubtedly, Kim Davis becomes a national spotlight across the nation. In the article, Pleasance points out that “since

Davis’s arrest, as he [Mr. Mason, deputy clerk] is the only member of staff who has no religious objection to doing so”. This quote attaches with a picture in the below. According to Pleasance’s report, Mr. Mason has to issue marriage license even if it is not part of his work.

In Pleasance’s article, Gladstone’s narrative bias creates a problem because journalists make a story for their report. Pleasance uses the term, “no religious objection”, to contrast the religious beliefs between Mr. Mason and Kim Davis in her story. Pleasance tries to tell us that Kim Davis has a very strong religious belief, which leads her to challenging the law. Then Kim Davis gets arrested for a few days, since she refused to issue the gay marriage license. And as a result, she is not able to issue the license anymore. However, the story has not ended yet. Mr. Mason has to issue those license for homosexual couples, but people worry about it. This would continuous and never end. The issue that cause by “religious objection” never get solve.
George Orwell’s second rule, “Never use a long where a short one will do”, can fix the problem that made by Gladstone’ narrative bias. In the article, Pleasance indicates that Mr. Mason is taking Kim Davis’s job since she refused to issue the license for her religious belief, which leads more people dislike Kim Davis. Pleasance uses the term, “no religious objection” for Mr. Mason, but she can just use “liberal” as simpler word that she can use. The term, “no religious objection”, is a meaningless word that shows the main difference between Mr. Mason and Kim Davis. Pleasance also uses that to mention Kim Davis as Christian right. In other word, Kim Davis is conservative, but Mr. Mason is liberal. If Pleasance follows the rule and always use the short words, then people would not take it neither as oppress of religious liberty nor as against gay marriage. Kim Davis just a woman who refuse to do her duty work.
Journalist Mark D. Tooley states that there is an unpleasant disagreement between American and Christian. According to the news, Christians believe Starbucks’s new red cup design doesn’t respect to their culture and Christmas. However, Starbucks gives an explanation for it. “Creating a culture of belonging, inclusion and diversity is one of the core values of Starbucks…Starbucks will continue to embrace and welcome customers from all backgrounds and religions in our stores around the world”. They state red cup’s design is making everyone would love it and understand the hidden inspire, so that they make it as simple as possible. But, Christian dislike that design. So, aren’t Christian against the creating culture since they complain about the red cup? Nope, Christian never say they want to against the culture and diversity, but Starbucks makes others believe as this way.
Gladstone’s commercial bias leading the culture helps Starbucks’s business. Starbucks’s red cup has a fresh design in this year, which cause different groups of people notice it and have a dispute with it. Starbucks’s explanation includes a lot of long sentences to express the idea is unwise and more misleads other from its actual meaning. Starbucks uses so much terms to prove itself as a company support the culture and work on the diversity in the society and making people to believe it. On the other hand, it reveals Christians are a group of people who against Starbucks’s “creating a culture of belonging”. Although they claim the red cups just the cup without any holiday symbols, it more like an opinion for Starbucks’s red cups. However, Christian more like a group of people who against culture and diversity in Starbucks’ explanation.
Orwell’s third rule states, “If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out”, which means that hidden bias could be find from those long sentence article. Based on Gladstone’s commercial bias, Starbucks leads people to believe Christian as a group of people against the culture. But, if Starbucks cut its word out, this misleading message won’t be delivered to the customer. Starbucks can make a clear introduction for its new cup, but it is unnecessary to including the information with the hidden bias. They are cups, but nothing more.
Pamela Geller discusses the speech that President Obama made in the G20. She cites, “And when you start to exploit individual in positions of responsibility, suggesting that Christians are more worthy of protection than Muslims are in a war-torn land, that feeds the ISIL, narrative. It’s counterproductive, and it needs to stop”. Geller also states her own opinion in his article, “His administration scrubbed counter terror materials of all mention of Islam or jihad in connection with terrorism”. Geller tries to use media to express her thoughts about the refugees, which she cites President Obama’s speech and uses it to argue that President Obama is totally wrong. This leads people to believe that the American people would be safe if we only let Christian refugees come to the United States, since she disagree with President Obama and her argument looks make sense.
Gladstone’s fairness bias is most common one that the media would use when they are reporting the news. Whenever someone says something positive, other would make some negative judgement against it. Just like conservative and liberal. Although it is not to oppress another, it is fair to judge another as well. In those cases, people are easier convincing by one side because something just makes sense to them. The fairness bias influences people to pick a side, and prevent other to questioning them. In Geller’s article, President Obama supports and tries to convince American to allow refugee come to United States. However, Geller disagrees with his idea and list a lot of evidence to support her idea. Both of them making people have to pick a side from Christian and Muslin. In fact, we want to choose plan C- a solution just for American.
Orwell’s fifth rule states, “Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent”.

However, either Geller or President Obama, they both didn’t follow the rule. President Obama’s speech is so powerful since he uses such terms as “jihad”, “war-torn land”, and “ISIL”. People might not know the true meaning behind the word, but these words just impact to Americans and convince them. On the other hand, Geller’s opinion on the refugees also forces other to believe what she says. However, the fairness bias could get rid of. Never use a foreign phrase will be effective in the political controversy and making people can clear understanding the current situation. So that, people know what they need, neither political leader’s nor

media’s.
COI discuses about how government controls people’s behavior to leading to do what the government wants. It states a lot of psychological terms to define people’s behavior and makes people more believe what it is about and get easily under control by the government. Based on the information that it states, “we tent to put more effort into avoiding loss than ensuing gain”. This means how government can use this bias to influence people and the society since they can use this psychological way to make people to think in such way. It just reveals Orwell’s sixth rule and Gladstone’s status quo bias. The media never question the system since they never break those rules and maintain as same. As a result, people would prefer to believe the information from the media or system because they want thing remain as same as how they avoiding the loss.
Gladstone’s status quo bias affects people won’t be able to against the authority, since this information from the authority seems cannot be challenged. The information from those authorities are “facts”, which media believe it is how the system works. People never question the structure of the system, so that leading the media and government can be easier to make them to believe in some way for their needs. On the other word, media is hiding their bias of their work, but we didn’t realize it as soon as possible.
Orwell’s sixth rule states that “Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous” and it will fix the problem in the above. The authorities, like government and the media, are unable from to preventing the question by the people. People won’t be tented to make more effort on the information that given for them, but they would seek for the information that seem rational for them. If people really follow Orwell’s rule, they are free from those misleading information from the media and government.
Therefore, the modern journalists can avoid the hidden bias on their report by following Orwell’s six rules. On the other hand, the main reason causes the tension between Americans and Christian is the media tries to force us to stop questioning and thinking. The information is true, but they also express their bias on this information, which leads us under their control to thinking in their way. They won’t give us any objective information, but let us to choose to believe or no, and in most cases, we just get control. Back to Orwell’s six rules, these could help to resolve this issue, but it would take time to achieve it.