Idaho Media Reporting on COVID-19 the Last 7 Days from KTVB, Idaho Statesman, and Idaho Press

Because of the nature of the work I do for both the Idaho Second Amendment Alliance and Idaho Dispatch, I have the unfortunate duty to scour news across Idaho and see what is being reported.

I have been doing this for years and the left turn Idaho’s media is taking is deeply troubling. 

From blatant bias and the deliberate lies I have witnessed, it is no wonder Idahoans are losing faith in the media which is a dangerous to place to be in as a state and a country.

This year, in particular, the media has reported and used the Coronavirus to absolutely inundate Idahoans with Coronavirus stories. I have seen a number of Idahoans calling the reporting on Coronavirus “COVID-19 fear porn.” 

So, I spent a few hours going over the news articles posted on Facebook from KTVB, the Idaho Statesman, and the Idaho Press to see how much Coronavirus makes it into the articles and social media posts themselves.

The results were not really shocking to me. I had noticed a rather large amount of these news sites do discuss Coronavirus a lot. 

In the beginning of the Coronavirus, I can kind of get the news focusing more on what is happening and I want to be clear that I am not saying the media shouldn’t talk about it. But, at what point does it turn from real stories about Coronavirus and the media’s blatant attempt to keep Idahoans in a perpetual state of fear?

We are now 10 months into COVID-19 and the reporting hasn’t changed a bit. 

Sure, the political articles make some sense because of mask mandates, the legislative session, and more are centered around the fight between those who want government-forced reactions to Coronavirus and those who don’t. Articles based on those battles are expected. 

But what I found was that the media is constantly reporting news where they discuss COVID-19 in culture, death, political news, weather, shopping, and pretty much everything you can think of.

With that in mind, here are the results of my “research” that I did on the three outlets mentioned above.

First, let me explain what I did to get these results (results below if you don’t want to read my methodology), and please understand that this is not a scientific study and there could be a few errors in the numbers but they are going to be pretty close if you were to replicate what I did.

I went to the Facebook pages of the three outlets and looked at the posts and stories from December 18th back to December 12th. I put the articles into two categories: COVID or Non-COVID. If they use the word Coronavirus or COVID-19 in the article then it was labeled a “COVID” story. If none of those words were found in the article then I labeled it a “Non-COVID” story.

Some of the articles were obvious because they talked about COVID or Coronavirus in the headline so I didn’t have to dig farther. Some articles were not obvious and I had to click on them to see if the articles used the word Coronavirus or COVID.

However, it should be noted that some articles did not seem like they were going to contain COVID or Coronavirus wording so I just “assumed” they were not “COVID” stories. Some of those I could be wrong on and the “COVID” story numbers could be a little higher. 

For instance, a story about a family whose house burned down I wouldn’t click on because my assumption was the story likely didn’t have the words I was looking for. 

Let’s be honest here, I was very tired and I didn’t want my mind rotting any more than it needed to scouring these biased news sources. Lol. I do also want to note that sometimes these pages would re-post an article they had already shared earlier in the day or the previous day. I did count these as an additional COVID story because it may be a “new” story to others. 

Here is what I found:

My research says that just over HALF of the articles posted on social media by KTVB, Idaho Statesman, and the Idaho Press contain something about COVID-19 or Coronavirus. 

On the daily log, the green indicates that during that day the number of COVID/Coronavirus stories was more than the non-COVID stories. The yellow indicates that during that day the non-COVID stories were higher in number than COVID stories. 

My research also says the Idaho Press needs to fire its social media person. Lol. Or give them a raise since I didn’t have to go through nearly as many posts with their page as I did with the others.

Is this overkill? Is the media deliberately trying to keep people scared of what is happening? 

Are any of you surprised by this reporting? 

I am not saying you can’t be cautious about the virus or that you can’t make your own decisions on protecting yourself? But why the constant reporting in this manner?

Is it to push more government control on Idahoans? Is it to scare us into complying with their agenda?

Are these media outlets reporting the news or creating a narrative for Idahoans to follow and pushing an agenda on us?

This is just a taste of the problem we have with our media in Idaho. 

Throughout the year I have seen numerous articles from nearly every major outlet in Idaho with blatant lies in them. Misleading headlines, reporter bias, and no attempt to balance stories are the common method of operation for so many of these outlets. 

Are you sick and tired of it?

Well, we are trying to do something about it at the Idaho Dispatch! Our goal is to give you guys balanced news without any bias. 

We won’t be perfect either and we will make mistakes along the way but we are at least trying to do news the way it should be done. 

Check out IdahoDispatch.com today and become a monthly supporter for just $2.97! Is that worth it to help create an actual media outlet? 

3 thoughts on “Idaho Media Reporting on COVID-19 the Last 7 Days from KTVB, Idaho Statesman, and Idaho Press

  1. Kody Hall Reply

    I’ve stopped watching the local news. It runs just as perverted and biased as CNN and MSNBC. It majority propaganda and fear without facts.

  2. SCSlim Reply

    It seems as though a population infected with the fires of fear, stoked daily by the media and by the government, will accede to the loss of their corporate freedom and individual liberties not grudgingly, but willingly. Indeed, they nearly beg to be subjugated, ordered, regimented, and controlled, in hopes, whether founded in truth or half of that, they will somehow avoid that which by definition cannot be avoided. Can we hear the echo of Benjamin Franklin too often: “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

  3. Jeff Humphreys Reply

    And now we sit still gripped by fear. The fear-mongering will only grow, and it may even make sense! A new strain is spreading! Our new President will stop it if we comply!

    In the end, we all end. Either on our feet or on our knees.

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