Man bites dog (journalism)

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The phrase Man bites dog and the related phrase Dog bites man are used to describe a phenomenon in journalism, in which an unusual, infrequent event is more likely to be reported as news than an ordinary, everyday occurrence. This can be explained by the fact that the news media generally consider an event more newsworthy if there is something unusual about it. On the other hand, a situation which is commonplace is unlikely to be taken as newsworthy. The result is that news items carrying titles such as "Man Bites Dog" occur more often than those such as "Dog Bites Man," making it seem as though the former event is more common compared to the latter than it actually is.

Similar phrases related to this analogy include, You never read about a plane that did not crash, or You don't hear about the laws that a politician did not break.

The phrase comes from a quote attributed to New York Sun editor John B. Bogart: "When a dog bites a man, that is not news, because it happens so often. But if a man bites a dog, that is news."^[1]

The Santa Cruz Sentinel ran a story titled "Man bites dog" about a San Francisco man who bit his own dog. The story appeared in the "State Briefs" column of the Sunday, November 5, 2000 edition of the paper, page B-16.

Reuters ran a story about a man biting a dog in December 2007.

The AP ran a story about a woman biting a dog in April 2008.

A slightly different meaning is sometimes applied to reports of political conflicts that are perceived as being one-sided or biased. In such cases, the news agency accused of the bias treats the party it ostensibly favors as the "Dog" in the analogy, and the party it ostensibly disfavors as the "Man." The result of this is that it may devote more time or space to reports of attacks carried out against the side it favors to deliberately portray them in a more sympathetic light.

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