Why Journalists Speak Out
Neutrality, fairness, and the myth of objectivity
Over many decades of teaching classes, appearing on panels, speaking at ethics seminars, not to mention doing or supervising hundreds of reporting projects, one of the most frequent questions I faced was how journalists were supposed to possibly stay objective when doing this work.
The short answer to that is that we can’t. And we don’t.
In the course of producing stories, we learn so much about the various people and institutions we cover, it is simply not possible to avoid drawing conclusions and forming opinions about them.
So of course we do. And the more informed we become, the stronger our opinions tend to become. It’s only human.
The question is what do we then do with our opinions? Can we keep covering the same stories, pretending to be objective?
Traditionally, in newspapers, there was a strict line between the reporting we did in news coverage and the opinions expressed on the editorial page. Beat reporters rarely ventured over to the opinion side, which was considered unseemly. But there was more than a bit of irony in that as we were often the best-informed people employed by the paper on the subjects on the editorial page.
One attempt to bridge this gap was to have the beat writers produce analysis pieces, which bridged the gap between reporting and opinion and were traditional journalism’s answer to the objectivity problem.
The distinction between “analysis” and “opinion” was largely fictional but it was a useful fiction that newspapers employed successfully for many years.
Another aspect of the objectivity problem was that the ownership of the newspaper often held different opinions and loyalties on the major topics of coverage from the reporters and editors who provided that coverage on a day-in, day-out basis.
This led to a great deal of tension on occasion between the news staff and those in charge of the editorial pages. Trust me, anyone who ever visited the nearest bar to a big-city newspaper office knows exactly what I am talking about.
When baby boomers — the largest generation ever to hit American workplaces including media — came along, we brought a new level of tension to this traditional dichotomy between news and opinion — and the myth of objectivity.
For one thing, we were better educated than the older generation and way too many of us had been shaped by the civil rights and anti-war movements to remain neutral on the great issues of the day. We weren’t neutral at all on questions like racism or colonial wars — we knew right from wrong.
Furthermore, we didn’t like what we found of the culture inside most newsrooms, which was all too often misogynistic, racist, homophobic and more like an arm of the local police union than a force for truth.
At the same time, we met heroes — established reporters and editors who resisted all those entrenched prejudices and practices that simply acted to reinforce powerful interests. These guys challenged those very interests on more than one occasion.
We also discovered that there were plenty of enlightened owners and executives in media who would support the type of crusading journalism we aspired to, so we worked for them whenever possible and joined the great muckraking traditions that long have served as a counterweight to mainstream, by-the-books news mongering in America.
When it came to remaining objective, we agreed that it was absolutely necessary to stay open-minded when we were gathering the facts about any situation. We needed to be open to adjusting our analysis as those facts came to light, and it was vital that we remained our own worst devil’s advocate to counter the biases and prejudices we inevitably brought to the story.
But you can’t discover the truth as you wish it to be, you have to accept the truth as you discover it to be. Equally importantly, you can’t bend the facts to fulfill the wishes or desires of your bosses or your audience — the chips must fall where they may.
But once all of that was said, once you’d been as fair as you could possibly be during the process of gathering facts, it became completely appropriate and indeed obligatory for any journalist of conscience to speak out when asked about the meaning of what we had found.
That’s how many of us became what some considered advocates or activists as well as journalists during our careers. We were often called “alternative journalists” or “new journalists” or “gonzo journalists.” Take your pick. And of course the traditionalists denounced us, for good reason. But once our reporting was complete, we made a point of speaking out.
That practice remains controversial to this day. But as my esteemed former Stanford colleague, Prof. Ted Glasser, once observed (and I paraphrase), “In the end, being a good citizen has to trump being a good journalist.”
Amen.
Today’s Stories (37 from 21 sources):
Days after Uvalde massacre, Trump rejects gun reforms at NRA event (Yahoo)
Key Republicans pull out of NRA forum as political pressure mounts (CNN)
The NRA has weakened. But gun rights drive the GOP more than ever. (WP)
Will Anything Change After Uvalde? (New Yorker)
Police response to Texas school shooting criticised (Guardian)
Mass shooters exploited gun laws, loopholes before carnage (AP)
Thousands of students across the country walked out of school in protest of lawmakers’ inaction on gun control, two days after the latest school shooting in Texas. [HuffPost]
The gunman in the Texas school massacre barged unchallenged through an unlocked door, then killed 19 children and two teachers while holed up in their classroom for an hour before a tactical team stormed in and killed him, police said. (Reuters)
Police Response to Uvalde Shooting Infuriated Parents Clinging to Hope (NYT)
As new timeline emerges, police criticized for response (WP)
A Uvalde, Texas, mother said she was handcuffed and threatened with arrest while imploring law enforcement to enter Robb Elementary School during Tuesday’s massacre. She persuaded Uvalde cops she knew to free her before jumping the school fence, running inside to grab her two children and sprinting out with them. [HuffPost]
Police Made ‘Wrong Decision’ in Waiting to Storm Shooter (WSJ)
'Joe died of a broken heart': Husband of beloved teacher killed in Texas shooting dies two days later (CNN)
Senate GOP signals an openness to talking about gun legislation (The Hill)
Senators Grasp for a Bipartisan Gun Deal, Facing Long Odds (NYT)
Gun deaths dropped in California as they rose in Texas: Gun control seems to work (LAT)
The Boudin recall is entirely based on local media mythology. They should own it. (48 Hills)
Russia's separatist proxies in eastern Ukraine claimed full control of the important battlefield town of Lyman, and Ukraine appeared to concede it, as Moscow presses its biggest advance for weeks. (Reuters)
Russia Gains Ground in Bid to Encircle Troops Defending Ukraine’s East (WSJ)
U.S. leans toward sending powerful multiple launch rockets as Ukraine seeks "heavy weapons" to stop Russia's Donbas offensive (CBS)
As Russia Diverges From the Global Economy, Soviet-Style Scarcity Looms (NYT)
Israel deliberately killed Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Aqla, Palestinian report says (BBC)
Shireen Abu Aqleh: killing of reporter referred to international criminal court (Guardian)
The White House is planning to cancel some student loan debt. The plan, which isn’t final, would wipe out $10,000 per borrower for Americans who earned less than $150,000 annually. (AP)
As DNA Donors’ Secrets Emerge, What Should the Children Know? (WSJ)
The energy industry is still shaping California policy (Politico)
Physicists predict Earth will become a chaotic world, with dire consequences (LiveScience)
An Entirely New Kind of Highly Reactive Chemical Has Been Found in The Atmosphere (ScienceAlert)
Hydrogen may be a climate solution. There's debate over how clean it will truly be (NPR)
US to retain focus on China as greatest threat to international order (Financial Times)
Coronavirus cases on decline across much of Japan (NHK)
Uber and Lyft’s New Road: Fewer Drivers, Thrifty Riders and Jittery Investors (WSJ)
What a Book Can Do for a Girl (Atlantic)
Documents Shed Light on Secret U.S. Plans for Apocalyptic Scenarios — Dating back to 1950s preparations for nuclear war and revised after the Sept. 11 attacks, the presidential directives are not shown to Congress. (NYT)
Never-Before-Heard Buzzword Flying Around Office Can’t Be Good (The Onion)
Well said, David. Many of the problems of today’s journalism result from political reporters bending over backwards to “appear” objective and retain connections with right wingers in ways that distort the truth and misrepresent reality.