Rhetorica: Press-Politics Journal

What does it mean for a journalist to be objective?

There are many answers to that question, and I think most of them are misguided largely because “objective” means so many different things. There is, for example, the philosophical ideal of an objective point of view that allows us to see and understand reality “as it is.” I think this is plainly nonsense.

A human being has a point of view by virtue of being a human being. We know reality as humans are supposed to know it. This is another understanding of the term. On the level of human senses, this way of understanding objectivity makes sense. We’re all equipped, for example, with ears and eyes that work within a range normal for the human animal.

But culture disrupts this objectivity. Assuming a normal range, we all see an object the same way physiologically, but we may not all understand its meaning the same way because we are taught by our cultures to evaluate it. And each culture (and individual) may evaluate it differently.

Objectivity in journalism cannot be the philosophical ideal for obvious reasons. And it cannot, or should not, be only the physiological kind because this level cannot take into account human understanding and evaluation on a cultural level.

So what is it? I have argued that objectivity in journalism is a set of practices–a procedure–for arriving at something like an accurate portrayal of events that comports with cultural and experiential understandings of reality. For example, a reporter encounters an event, seeks information from multiple and competing sources, seeks to verify that information through other sources, writes the report based on a standard professional rhetoric that dictates how information should be stated and arranged, and submits the product to an editing process that checks the work for professional standards.

Operating within this process is a set of biases that structure the entire practice of journalism. One of the most tightly held may be called the fairness bias. It dictates, among other things, that journalists should get “both sides” of a story and refrain from making judgments about the contributions of various sources.

I have said that the structural biases are far more important to understanding journalistic behavior than false presumptions of an overall political bias in the news media.

To see the strange consequences of the fairness bias, I recommend Bryan Keefer’s article in the current edition of the Columbia Journalism Review. He contends that the “campaign ‘04 information war is fast, deep, and fraught with lies.” And he further contends that journalists are reluctant to identify lies in campaign discourse because of the professional ethics of fairness and objectivity.

The objectivity that Keefer identifies bears some resemblance to the process objectivity I identity, but there’s still something missing: the physiological objectivity. I think a complete understanding of objectivity in regard to journalism must contain both concepts.

Here’s why: Keefer is obviously arguing that journalists should be custodians of fact. This means that reporters, as human beings, are as capable as other human beings of comparing information to their experiences of reality. So if I hold up an orange can call it an apple, any reporter with a lick of sense knows that I’m either mistaken or a liar. They are simply barred from saying so by the fairness bias. They must verify and seek a competing source. But shouldn’t a concept of objectivity also include our shared human experience with reality? In other words, how is publishing without comment my ridiculous claim that an orange is an apple objective?

Here’s how: The journalistic concept of objectivity operates with a bit of the philosophical ideal. Journalists are thought to operate as outside observers. And this is a problem for at least two reasons: 1) Journalists do not operate outside of anything; they are players in all the games they cover because coverage is part of the game, and 2) journalists are in no position to claim a point of view with an understanding of reality greater (or “above”…pick your metaphor) than any other.

The fairness bias becomes a detriment to journalism when journalists fail to call a lie a lie–especially when the facts are plain to see. It’s an apple, not an orange. Any dope can see that. And to fail to point it out does cognitive violence to a human understanding of objectivity.

Adopting a custodial relationship to facts certainly challenges the fairness bias. But such a stance does not require the reporter to take sides in political reporting. Professional standards of news writing still exist. Here’s an example from Keefer’s article:

Jim VandeHei of The Washington Post recently did something political reporters almost never do: he authoritatively debunked a misleading statement by a political operative in the same news cycle that the statement was made. In a May 13 front-page article about a speech by John Kerry, in which the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee attacked President Bush’s Iraq policies in light of the Abu Ghraib torture scandal, VandeHei included a response from Marc Racicot, the chairman of the Bush-Cheney campaign. “Racicot told reporters Wednesday that Kerry is relentlessly ‘playing politics’ and exploiting tragedy for political gain,” he wrote. “Racicot, for instance, told reporters that Kerry suggested that 150,000 or so U.S. troops are ’somehow universally responsible’ for the misdeeds of a small number of American soldiers and contractors. Racicot made several variations of this charge. But Kerry never said this, or anything like it” [emphasis added]. VandeHei went on to explain exactly how the campaign chairman had tried to mislead reporters.

Does this mean VandeHei has a liberal bias? Hardly. But VandeHei has violated the fairness bias. By doing so, he has added political utility to the article. He has become a custodian of fact, an objective observer unwilling to call an orange an apple. He has resisted, in this case, the move toward stenography in political reporting.

Political bias should always be challenged. But there is no single political bias in the news media. It is not liberal. It is not conservative. Such instances that seem to indicate an overall bias are always local (i.e. local to a news organization, a reporter, an issue, etc.). Charges of political bias do not predict journalistic behavior.

But the structural biases do predict journalistic behavior. These biases, however, do not predict and do not condone what VandeHei did. I believe this is an indication of two things: 1) That the structural biases are far more important to the understanding of journalistic behavior than simplistic charges ideological bias, and 2) Certain structures of journalistic practice hamper the political utility of the news product. And for a profession that sees itself as crucial to the exercise of democracy, this ought to be disturbing news.