Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism

by Alexandra Kitty, Robert Greenwald

The director of 2004's smash hit documentary Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism teams with journalist Alexandra Kitty in an even more detailed and updated examination of how media empires, led by Rupert Murdoch's Fox News, have been running a "race to the bottom" in television news. They examine media consolidation by focusing on the Fox News How did Fox gain prominence? How did the Fox News Channel gain audiences and influence public debate? How does Fox report reality? Is the network merely interpreting events or is it pushing propaganda? Who are the main players and how do they treat their friends and enemies? Why should readers care about how Fox takes liberties with its facts? Each chapter blends interviews from Greenwald's documentary, transcripts from Fox programs, and other research pertaining to Fox News not only to illustrate the Fox "mentality," but also to show the factual, ethical and structural problems with the news channel. Interviews and transcripts are analyzed to give readers a strong sense of what Fox is actually telling its audiences. As well as Outfoxed, Robert Greenwald executive produced The 2000 Presidential Election , produced and directed The War On Iraq and most recently produced The War on our Civil Liberties , about the erosion of American civil liberties following the events of September 11.

Genres: Politics, Journalism, Nonfiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2005

About the author

Alexandra Kitty is an award-winning author of twenty books, including The Art of Kintsugi, The Dramatic Moment of Fate: The Life of Sherlock Holmes in the Theatre, The Mind Under Siege: Mechanisms of War Propaganda, A Different Track: Hospital Trains of the Second World War, and The Sport of Presidents..

Reviews

[Shant · Rating 4 out of 5]

I haven't watched the documentary yet, so this review will just be for the book.

It was probably around 3.5 stars, partially due to changes in Fox News/ politics since its release, and partially because of how the author wrote. I don't know how to explain the latter but it has the same tone as AP US History textbooks did, kind of dry/smarmy where you see jokes written but it doesn't exactly succeed.

I thought that there was too many vague jabs towards a lot of women who were involved in Fox- from the attractive anchors to Greta Van Susteren to the adult film industry participants- Stay on target! I was really surprised when towards the end I found out that the author is a woman.

I thought that the author did a good job at including issues like media consolidation or not investing in enough journalists/foreign bureaus in addition to focusing on the general 'Presenting opinion as fact' problem.

I'm impressed that the author correctly predicted that Bill O'Reilly would only get kicked out of Fox because of his sexual harassment lawsuits.

[Katrinka · Rating 3 out of 5]

The documentary was so much better-- probably because it felt less self-righteous. With the book, it seemed that a lot of assertions were left without concrete examples to back them up. Kudos for undertaking the project-- but in the end, I wanted something that felt less like a snide comeback.