The New York Times Presents Islam More Negatively than Cancer and Cocaine

[unhappycamper]

http://www.juancole.com/2016/03/the-new-york-times-presents-islam-more-negatively-than-cancer-and-cocaine.html

Researchers say they were shocked to learn that Islam receives more negative coverage than cancer.

The New York Times Presents Islam More Negatively than Cancer and Cocaine
By contributors | Mar. 6, 2016
TeleSur

The New York Times portrays Islam and Muslims more negatively than cancer, cocaine and alcohol, according to a report that studied the newspaper’s headlines.

“Since 9/11, many media outlets began profiteering from the anti-Muslim climate. Though you could probably trace a similar trend back to the Iranian Revolution,” said Steven Zhou, head of Investigations and Civic Engagement and co-author of the study ‘Are Muslims Collectively Responsible? A Sentiment Analysis of the New York Times.’

“We talk a lot about media and Islamophobia, but nobody has done the math. So, we thought it is long overdue to have a quantitative investigation of an agenda-setting newspaper,” Zhou told the Middle East U.S. Policy watchdog Mondoweiss Friday.

The study, which was conducted by Toronto-based 416 Labs, looked at New York Times headlines from the period 1990-2014. Researchers found that Islam and Muslims were “consistently associated with negative terms,” at least 57 percent of the time, says the study. Only 8 percent of news headlines about Islam/Muslims was positive.