[danielktdoranie]

Yes. One man's "propaganda" is another man's news. It's an assault on Freedom of Speech and Freedom of the Press.

I also note other news networks have been happily spouting anti-Russian propaganda as well (i.e. "Ghost of Kiev", "Miss Ukraine Fighting", and the "Snake Island Martyrs" to name but 3).

I also note none of the Western Media talk about shelling, murder, and rape of the ethnic Russian civilians in the Donbas since 2014. They call it "propaganda" now but 6 years ago these same western media outlets reported that "Fascist Azov Battalion Ukrainian Military were shelling and murdering Donbas "separatists" (now western media calls them terrorists).

News shouldn't have bias, full stop. news should just report the facts and let the viewer/listener decide. However, bar that both sides should have their voices herd in a democracy.

[panda-giddiness]

> News shouldn't have bias, full stop.

Sorry, but this sort of absolutist thinking is just naive. Nobody ever won a Pulitzer Prize in journalism for "just reporting the facts, full stop". Good journalism requires context which is messy and, indeed, political.

That said, propaganda isn't good journalism – it doesn't provide context so much as manufacture it. That isn't to suggest that propaganda is necessarily obvious. Bias lies on a spectrum, with facts-only reporting on one end and propaganda on the other. But just because grey areas exist doesn't prevent us from identifying the black.

It would be illegal, for example, for a publication to knowingly engage in defamation. As a society, we recognize that a publication's right to freedom of expression does not outweigh the harm dealt to an individual subjected to baseless harassment. Similarly, if a "news" organization is so divorced from the facts as to make its audience more ignorant of the actual happenings, then we as a society should recognize the harm caused by that organization and sanction them appropriately.

[an9n]

> Good journalism requires context

Almost uncanny how that context always leans in a certain direction, almost like all the MSM were owned by the same people.

[archi42]

I haven't watched RT in the recent years, so I can't judge that instance (but I have do admit that, unless there is some heavy misrepresentation going on, I can understand why they want to ban it. That's without judging the ban as good or bad, which I find exceedingly difficult; and I don't want to [and will not] engage in that discussion, at least not without thinking more about it and considering the facts and implications).

However, I think you're [technically] wrong about "news shouldn't have bias". I'd like to start by pointing out that there is a huge gap between biased news and propaganda. A conservative and a liberal news outlet might report on the same thing with different point of views and come to different conclusions (why did it happen? is it good that it happened? what effect has the thing happening? and so on). That's bias; and it's not even too bad a thing. Reading multiple outlets with different biases will give you a good idea of what different people think about an event, allowing the reader to keep an open mind and engage in a more fruitful discussion. Good journalism will even do that for you, by mentioning opposing views without discrediting them. That's the reasoning behind "I think you're [technically] wrong".

Now, what you have in mind goes beyond simple bias. Given the example, either outlet might use their news to push their own agenda, and in my book that's dangerous and on the verge of being propaganda. They might also knowingly misrepresent the facts to do so, or outright invent things (or leave out important bits), which I'd classify as full blown propaganda. Yes, a lot of popular/mainstream "news", especially in the US (but also in the EU), are closer to propaganda than to being just biased (or are propaganda, think "stolen election" narrative). So one man's "propaganda" is indeed another man's news. Or, more precisely, some man's "news" is propaganda.