Two Jobs, Both Important
Elizabeth Edwards wants journalists to do their jobs. As she writes in the Week in Review section of The New York Times:
If voters want a vibrant, vigorous press, apparently we will have to demand it. Not by screaming out our windows as in the movie “Network” but by talking calmly, repeatedly, constantly in the ears of those in whom we have entrusted this enormous responsibility. Do your job, so we can — as voters — do ours.
Edwards cogently points out how — and a bit of why — the press today fails its primary purpose: To give citizens the information they need to be free and self-governing. She is “talking calmly.” But no one is listening. They can’t hear you talk. They can’t hear you scream. They don’t want to hear. They want to keep doing what they are doing until the business of news drives “newspaper” journalism into the ground. Once it crashes and burns we may discover there is little left to replace it.
Yes, I’m a big proponent of citizen journalism–as an adjunct to the so-called MSM (but that assumes a MSM that fulfills the primary purpose of journalism). Citizens can do a lot of journalism for themselves. But can we cover such things as a presidential campaign? I wonder.
Political journalism today is about the trivial not the important. Why? There are many reasons. For starters, covering the trivial is cheaper than covering the important. It takes fewer reporter-hours to cover, say, Barack Obama’s bowling score than to examine any particular policy and report it in a way that helps citizens understand. It’s cheaper to put cartoonish blowhards in front of a camera and have them fuss like children in a sandbox than to take cameras into the lives of real people affected by governance. Sourcing is easy. Flacks are standing by to comment. Any nitwit can get 15 inches of copy out of 37 pins.
One would think journalists might be embarrassed. But no. The profession teaches them to be arrogant. And if you work at one of the big national news organizations, arrogance becomes the shining armor of absolutely knowing that you know sooooo much more about how the world works than all the rubes in fly-over land.
If you stop for a moment and listen you can hear voices crying the the wilderness. But can they be heard above the roar of tit-for-tat trivia?
No.
I have ideas about what journalists should do. But saving journalism from the business that’s killing it? No clue. I think the current business model has to collapse first. Then we can start over. Citizens will have to carry the load, i.e. do their jobs and journalism’s job too. I hope we’re ready when the time comes.
Tags: journalism, rhetoric, politics
Respectfully, I disagree. There are not two “jobs” but one. And that one job can be handled by the people.
As the torch is passed, the people are grabbing it and running toward the goal of basic facts, multiple viewpoints and strong opinions.
Its NOT that professional journalists are doing a poor job but that they shouldn’t have been doing that job anyway. In a democracy, the people share and speak. Not a self-annoited “elite” … but you. And me.
Kris… Let’s assume you are correct. Tell me how you would cover a presidential campaign, including the nuts-and-bolts stuff, e.g. gaining access to the candidates. Or are you supposing that politics will change as well?
Sorry about the delay. I didnÂ’t check back until now.
The challenge you pose is one I cannot accept. IÂ’m simply not up to it for IÂ’m neither brilliant nor a seer.
I can say this, however: I don’t want Edward’s “vibrant, vigorous press.” I want a vibrant, vigorous citizenry!
We disagree at a fundamental level, Mr. Cline. I think it is fair to assume that you believe a vigorous citizenry is enabled by professional journalism. In contrast, I believe that professional journalism is a layer of obfuscation between the people and their government.
In short, a robust democracy is predicated on citizen “journalism,” not professional journalism.
Please donÂ’t be grumpy, though! YouÂ’ve got a great blog which is part of the scaffold of information on which our democracy depends.
Kris… Close. I’d say it this way: I believe a vigorous citizenry is enabled in part by journalism–the professional product being important because of its resources and access. I do, however, agree with Herbert Gans: Professional journalism’s mythology about democracy does not obtain, i.e. it is far more likely that democracy makes journalism possible rather than journalism makes democracy possible.
Thanks for the vote of confidence. I appreciate your reading and participating.
Here’s an example of citizen journalism: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080502/ap_on_el_se/franken_s_foe
He is non-professional and non-paid.
He is biased (but so are oldline reporters.)
He is honest about its bias (as oldline reporters are not.)
This sort of reporting can be found on both sides of the political divide as well as between.
As he said, the information was “out there.” He didn’t need access, interviews or the media platform. As a single citizen, helped by other citizens, he is making news and potentially impacting the election.
This is the future.