NPR Senior Business Editor Uri Berliner authored an op-ed claiming that the network has “lost its way” and has lost the trust of the American people.
In his candid piece titled “I’ve Been at NPR for 25 Years. Here’s How We Lost America’s Trust” in The Free Press, Berliner highlights instances where he believes NPR’s coverage has alienated a significant portion of its audience.
Berliner laments the perceived lack of diversity in viewpoints represented in NPR’s reporting, characterizing the network’s content as a procession of stories focused on alleged instances of racism, transphobia, climate change concerns, negative portrayals of Israel, and critiques of conservative policies.
“It’s frictionless — one story after another about instances of supposed racism, transphobia, signs of the climate apocalypse, Israel doing something bad, and the dire threat of [conservative] policies,” Berliner said.
The NPR veteran also criticized the network’s handling of transgender issues, particularly its avoidance of terms such as “biological sex.”
“In a document called NPR Transgender Coverage Guidance—disseminated by news management—we’re asked to avoid the term biological sex. (The editorial guidance was prepared with the help of a former staffer of the National Center for Transgender Equality.),” Berliner explained.
Furthermore, Berliner points to what he views as NPR’s embrace of an “intersectional” lens in its coverage of the Israel-Hamas conflict, which he contends disproportionately emphasizes the suffering of Palestinians while downplaying or overlooking actions taken by Hamas and the rise of anti-Semitic sentiment worldwide.
“More recently, we have approached the Israel-Hamas war and its spillover onto streets and campuses through the ‘intersectional’ lens that has jumped from the faculty lounge to newsrooms,” Berliner added. “That’s meant highlighting the suffering of Palestinians at almost every turn while downplaying the atrocities of October 7, overlooking how Hamas intentionally puts Palestinian civilians in peril, and giving little weight to the explosion of antisemitic hate around the world.”
Berliner’s critique confirms the belief by the American public that many of the media institutions which claim to be impartial are actually intending to push a certain ideology or political belief.
