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July 20, 2005

name calling

Are we winning the war of words? Both sides of the abortion issue have a vested interest in what labels are most commonly applied to them. Here is a breakdown of the names we use when we talk about this issue online.

First I Googled six relatively common labels to see what terms are being used on the web in general:

It would appear the anti-abortion side fares well on the web when it comes to positive portrayal. The web obviously prefers the "best possible light" column for both camps, making the pro abortion side's victory in the mudslinging event less significant. There isn't as much mass in the center as I would have expected, but the neutral column tends to favor the pro abortion crowd.

Next I used Google news to take a look at how both sides are being labeled in news stories:

The media is a fascinating departure from the baseline of the web. The media vastly prefers "pro choice" for that camp over any other moniker. For the lifers they've settled solidly on the "anti-abortion" designator. Between that and the few intrepid "anti-choice" articles, the neutral plus negative outnumbers positive portrayals almost two to one.

And finally I took a look at Technorati to see what the bloggosphere's reporting guidelines are:

Bloggers seem to roughly reflect the web, which tends to reinforce its status as a societal baseline against which we may juxtapose the media.

* The term "abortion" was added to the search to ensure a count only of blog entries on the topic.

Posted by joel at July 20, 2005 01:43 AM

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