From: Sheldon Rampton Regarding the idea of simply "reporting things that really exist," Cunctator wrote:
Yes. Fortunately we can rely on the pool of perfectly accurate, non-propagandizing, value-judgmentless historical references to do
so.
Oops, they don't exist.
Actually, they do. For example, "Napoleon Bonaparte died on May 5, 1821" is a statement whose accuracy no one seriously disputes, and it doesn't carry any particular propaganda or value judgments. Whether you believe that Napoleon was a great leader or a foolish despot, you're bound to agree on the date of his death.
There's a difference between accurate statements and accurate references. I didn't say that accurate statements don't exist. I said that "perfectly accurate, non-propagandizing, value-judgmentless historical references" don't exist.
Even in that one sentence are a variety of value judgments, starting with the language used to express such a statement, as well as the name used to describe "Napoleon Bonaparte", to the choice of calendar by which to mark the date of his death. Those are minor choices, and I would agree that it would be counterproductive to challenge the statement.
But when you accumulate the sum of the thousands of minor (and major) choices that go into any reference work (such as whether or not to discuss the death of Napoleon), you get an unavoidable bias.