The myth of news with ‘just the facts’

Opinion is impossible to escape, and important stories are sometimes left untold

Note: This is not a criticism of a television show nobody has yet seen or those involved in it. It’s commentary on the nature of news and how it’s presented across all media.

In launching the 10News+ program, which will begin on June 30 after the demise of The Project, Martin White, vice president, news of Paramount Australia, said:
“... at the heart of everything we do is delivering news and current affairs that matter to you. No filler. No opinion. Just the facts.”

While the promise of presenting facts with no opinion is appealing, perhaps even admirable, it’s fundamentally impossible.

The very act of packaging news — from what you decide to include to what you leave out, and which stories you prioritise — is expressing an opinion.

It’s an opinion that declares one story more important than all others, and that we, the audience, need to know a lot about one or two events, a little less about a few others, and nothing at all about most things that have happened in the world around us.

Television news complicates this even further because it’s heavily influenced by what video footage is available. Given the near-ubiquity of mobile phones with cameras and wider use of closed-circuit television, there’s a lot of it around — and some of it is sensational (in both meanings of the word).

And the availability and quality of this video is now dictating the kind of news that makes it to air.

I watched a news bulletin recently that positioned as one of its top items a robbery at a family-owned jewellery store. The bulletin had CCTV footage of masked thugs entering the store, roughing up the proprietor and smashing their way into display cabinets to steal their contents.

It was dramatic and, in the grand scheme of things, “good television”. However, when you look at local, national and global events, it’s hard to argue that this was truly one of the most important news events of the day.

It was a crime story, involving a substantial monetary loss and a measure of violence that must have been harrowing for those involved. It could be argued that it was symptomatic of a wider problem in our society.

However, if the TV network hadn’t had that compelling footage, the story would not have been so prominent in the bulletin. It may not have even made the final cut.

This illustrates how critical vision is to television news and especially commercial television news, which relies on getting viewers to hang around long enough to see the advertisements.

It’s rare for a commercial news station to run a story that doesn’t have vision. When there’s nothing but a map with an arrow to illustrate it, you can assume it’s an inescapably important piece of news.

This isn’t just about television news; it also applies to radio, where there’s a strong preference for “actuality” — the voice of someone on the spot or who has insider knowledge — and newspapers, whose editors want first-hand accounts, photographs (preferably of attractive people) and, increasingly, video that they’ll imbed in their online iterations.

Beyond the availability of sound and vision, other unspoken filters are applied before the “news” reaches us.

When natural disasters, accidents or battles occur, somebody is weighing up factors such as: where it happened, how many people were killed or injured (along with their nationality, skin colour and religion), and how far away the event is from us, physically, culturally or emotionally.

There’s a hell of a lot happening in Africa that never reaches our eyes or ears, because it’s deemed by those making these decisions to be irrelevant to our lives.

It’s not only a matter of whether something is “news”, it’s whether it’s considered relatable. The editors ask themselves: does our audience care about this? Sometimes, it’s: do we want are audience to care about this?

And on top of all that is the fact that everybody has agendas — including and especially the people who own or control the media. In commercial media, we can see the promotion of stories in which the proprietor or key shareholder has a personal or business interest, the avoidance or glossing-over of negative stories about their friends, and the vilification of their enemies.

There are agendas, too, at the ABC and many organisations that declare themselves “independent”. Even humble bloggers subtly push their own opinions from time to time.

It doesn’t end with story selection. You can’t really declare yourself impartial because you didn’t express a personal opinion about a story if you’ve cherry-picked the vision and the people you interview.

If you only speak to certain “talent” because you know them and approve of the things they say, then you are not being impartial.

Some news outlets might only present positive stories about certain politicians, while ignoring their shortcomings, or highlight specific court cases involving particular defendants or groups of defendants.

Equally, they might choose to ignore social problems affecting only a marginalised group, on the grounds that the wider audience isn’t interested.

Sometimes a particular piece of news doesn’t fit the publication’s worldview or preferred narrative.

Of course, decisions have to be made, because there is only so much space in the bulletin or between the front and back pages. But that very act of including one thing over another is the expression of an opinion.

Facts are always presented through filters of what is deemed as important, what is engaging, what is entertaining, and sometimes, even what will make people feel frightened.

The amount of CCTV and mobile phone footage of car theft that appears on the television news these days would tend to suggest it is society’s biggest problem.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t be worried about the bad things that happen on the streets, but we should be equally, or more, concerned about the truly awful things that happen behind closed doors.

Domestic violence and elder abuse don’t get a lot of coverage because they are often “invisible” crimes. There are usually no compelling or confronting pictures to show, or there are reasons why that can’t be shown, and the victims are sometimes on the fringes of society.

It’s much easier to show a bunch of kids stealing a car than to delve deeply into the realm of family, domestic and sexual violence. (You can read some disturbing statistics here.)

Facts are left out of news bulletins, newspapers and websites all the time, for both very shallow and hugely complex reasons.

I’m not suggesting the 10News+ team won’t strive for objectivity and impartiality. I’m sure they will, and I know that journalists in other newsrooms already do so on a daily basis and under difficult circumstances. But any journalist who says they haven’t “beaten up” (exaggerated) or shelved a story for reasons other than its newsworthiness is a liar.

So, consumers of news need to be aware that there is no such thing as “just the facts”.

The best we can hope for is a large and diverse number of sources presenting their versions of the truth so that we can come to some sort of understanding of what’s really going on.

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©2025 Brett Debritz. If I’ve inadvertently used copyrighted material, failed to give credit where it’s due, written or said something you disagree with, or otherwise upset or unexpectedly delighted you, please leave a comment, email me or connect with me at @debritz on X and Mastodon, @brettdebritz on Facebook, Instagram, Threads and BlueSky, and @radiobert on YouTube. Links provided as a courtesy; I take no responsibility for their contents or give any warranty of their veracity. Image: ChatGPT