Yeah, I agree, in general. I generally need outside evidence to corroborate stuff from the NYT to believe it at face value these days. But I don't even know if the article shown in the OP is the best thing to show that.
I haven't read all of it, I only have time to skim right now, but the second-to-last line was not what you would expect from the title.
She still seems to think that the new market economy — with its meritocracy and freedom of choice — will finally allow women to be masters of their minds and actions.
It may be that the main thrust is fine, but I'd need to read it closely to know for sure. And it's fine to take their stuff with skepticism, but it's important to me not to call something fake or misleading if it really isn't.
It's hard with news organizations in particular because they have so many staffers, writers, editors, columnists, etc. It may be that one writer is extremely ethical and does his research thoroughly and tries to give an objective opinion, and another staffer will write what he can to further their own viewpoint, facts and reality be damned. So, like I said originally, I don't like painting with that broad a brush, and maintaining skepticism in general is probably still healthy.
That's a good point. I shouldn't judge a news corp solely because I think some articles are bad. I'd generally expect the editors to stall any sketchy articles, but with an org that has thousands of journalists you can't associate the organization with certain articles that get published.
The bigger problem comes when even the editors are sketchy, and what the demands of people who really make decisions (upper management I guess, I don't know news organizations' structure) are.
So imagine you have journalists Alice and Bob, and they bring stories to editor Charlie. Charlie is an upstanding editor - he believes in journalistic integrity, wants his writers' stories' fact-checked and with supporting evidence, etc. He's the editor we all need, but not the one we deserve. :p
But then Mr. CEO or whoever isn't interested in all that - they have a narrative to push, and if that means breaking a few journalistic codes, it's whatever - gotta get the narrative and the dollars flowing. So Charlie gets fired, and replaced with Dave, who is much more amenable to the demands of the higher-ups, and it shows in what articles he allows through versus what Charlie allowed through.
In a situation like that, the problem isn't individual writers and editors - it's systemic because of the goals and philosophy of the organization.
There's no easy way to handle this; the best way I can think of, which is extremely difficult and time-consuming, is to individually analyze each writer/columnist and see what you think of their articles (and so can go into each new article by them with an impression of their good and bad qualities as a writer). Then, consider overall how the publication publishes stuff - is it well-researched and fact-checked? Do they hold obvious bias toward one opinion or another? Do they publish things that are obvious and empirically false, like the gender wage gap? By examining the publication as a whole like this, you can decide how to handle their reputation and integrity en masse and also use that in future readings of their work.
But like I said, this is a difficult thing to do, and it's not like I do it. Someone with enough time, effort, and desire definitely could though, and it's my impression some of the very good professionals (like Mr. Greer at The Scholar's Stage) do think about who the reputable and good writers are and aren't; but for an ordinary person, this is a tall order.
Thanks for that post. They're narrative, not news. That's why I brought it up.