Media ideology works through unspoken presumptions more than stated bias

Evidence

In its final sections, the paper returns to this question of how the media perform this critical mode of ideological work—in constructing the naturalized forms of (what passes for) “common sense.” As is shown, this mode of thought—which presents itself as eternal, unchanging, and beyond question—is readily demonstrated to always be a particular historical construct with a changing set of ideological contents. The analysis of how exactly these limits are constructed in different periods is of crucial importance—because it is through this process that the social horizons of potential experience and knowledge are delimited. The emphasis of analysis thus changes from questions of bias in what is said in the media toward an emphasis on the significant absences and the unspoken presumptions constituting that which is deemed too obvious to ever need saying explicitly. — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 766

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies the structuralist shift from overt media bias to ‘significant absences’ and unspoken presumptions as the locus of ideological work.
• XREF: Connects to the Hall-based critique of ‘common sense’ as ideological; echoes Gramscian and Barthesian frames used throughout the volume. — connects to: Evenhanded journalism can itself bias public scientific belief — Cailin O’Connor and James Owen Weatherall, The Misinformation Age: How False…, 61; Media could not comprehend altruistic motivations among student protesters — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1516; Post-truth predates 2016 with roots in cognitive bias, philosophy, and media change — Lee McIntyre, Post-Truth, 51