Issues in Journalism

1. Weeks 1-7 Study Points from The Elements of Journalism lectures Issues in Journalism

2. Issues • NPR fires news analyst Juan Williams • “He was explicitly and repeatedly asked to respect NPR’s standards and to avoid expressing strong personal opinions on controversial subjects in public settings, as that is inconsistent with his role as an NPR news analyst.”NPR CEO Vivian Schiller • Should news people be allowed to express “strong personal opinions.” • http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/10/22/kurtz.reliable.sources/index.html?iref=allsearch • http://www.mediaite.com/tv/rachel-maddow-on-npr-as-election-issue-will-gop-go-after-big-bird-next/

3. Monitor power • Investigative reporting is an important tool • Today journalists see watchdog as central to their work (pg. 143) • This role differentiates journalism from other forms of communication • “Comfort the afflicted and…(pg. 141) • The concept is much more nuanced • Monitoring institutions: reporting the good and bad. • Constant criticism is meaningless if you lose your audience

4. Wiki leaks • Iraq war documents published on web site • Used by mainstream media • http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/w/wikileaks/index.html?scp=1-spot&sq=wikileaks&st=cse • Is this the traditional watchdog role? • Is this investigative reporting? • Is this meaningful information/criticism? • Does the public’s right to know outweigh the impact on the military? • http://www.mediaite.com/online/the-weekend-of-wikileaks-begins-embargo-ends-and-the-torrent-of-classified-info-starts-to-seep-out/

5. Investigative forms • Original investigative reporting • Digging through documents, employing police-style work, anonymous and on the record sources • Digital analysis taking larger role amassing documentary evidence (pg. 146)

6. Forms • Interpretative investigating reporting • Uses same enterprise skills as investigative reporting but brings together information in a “new, more complex context that provides deeper public understanding.” • Wiki leaks, Pentagon Papers, “America: What went wrong?” (pgs. 146-147) • Approach criticized as unbalanced • Defended for bringing change

7. Forms • Reporting on investigations • Widely used reporting that piggybacks on the work of other investigators, primarily government officials. • Audits, inspector general/congressional reports on spending or programs provide fodder for news. • Critics say the info is valuable but can be subject to spin from the agencies producing the material.

8. The watchdog role weakened • The explosion of “I-team” units in the ‘80s and ‘90s has subsided somewhat but still around. • But… what are they investigating? • Sweeps topics: breast implant health concerns, consumer ripoffs, car repair schemes • Canned investigative reports • Watchdogism becomes amusement • Talk radio “investigative reporting” • Public wants investigative reporting but hates duplicity

9. Prosecuting • Investigative reporting as prosecution • IR is like a criminal/civil prosecution as you make your case to the public • IR assumes wrongdoing • Advocacy reporting: IRE • Honest, open-minded approach • But approaching every story as an expose can be overreaching or confuse the public

10. Investigating:Extreme Makeover: Home Edition

11. The end of investigative reporting? • Advances in technology threaten the watchdog press • Corporations owning media outlets (General Electric, Walt Disney etc) have assumed the status of nation states • The corporate owners of news outlets do not favor investigations of their actions • The independent voice monitoring institutions is stilled

12. The end of investigative reporting? • Will corporations bear the cost of watchdog journalism or have the will to do so? • Print and online entities from the left, right and center purport to monitor the media today • Nonprofit competition: The Center for Public Integrity is created in 1990 by Charles Lewis • Mission: Compete with and monitor the press • See how broadcast news media covered itself

13. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • “Journalists must maintain an independence from those they cover.”

14. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • Who is a journalist? • What separates the journalist from the political partisan, the activist and the propagandist? • “As the media landscape broadens and evolves to meet the need of a more inclusive and activist public … what makes something journalism?” (page 115) • Truthfulness, commitment to the public and watchdog role.

15. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • What about opinion journalism? • Isn’t neutrality a key part of journalism? (page 115) • No. Not a core principle. • The difference between journalism and propaganda= Holding true to the facts and accuracy. Pursuing the truth wherever it goes despite your political leanings, philosophy or bias.

16. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • Principle 4: Journalists must maintain an independence from those they cover. • Independence of mind (page 119) • Opinion in editorials may be based on point of view… but the facts are still the facts. • Those that only care about opinion and not the facts are propagandists or activists. They are not journalists. • You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts.

17. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • The question is not: Who is a journalist? • But are they doing journalism? (page 120)

18. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • Reporters as activists • The conflict of interest test

19. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • Independence reevaluated (page 1264-131) • The journalist as activist undermines journalistic credibility: George Will, William Kristol, etc. • Media personalities who are really political operatives. Best described as “media activists.” (page 127) • The best example: Fox News

20. One critic’s view of Fox

21. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • Rupert Murdoch’s Fox is “focused heavily on argument and ideology.” (page 127) • Creating “balance” by giving airtime to conservatives • But… who is running Fox? Roger Ailes, a political operative from the Nixon and Bush administrations. • The partisan press reinforces the preconceptions of the audience and abandons the watchdog role over the powerful. (page 128)

22. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • The partisan press is all about the Journalism of Affirmation (page 128) • Speaking to like-minded people and not necessarily following the facts because it runs contrary to preconceptions. • The blurring of journalistic identities: political operatives become news people. Is that a bad thing?

23. Chapter 5: Independence from Faction • Independence from class or economic status • Class isolation of journalists is a threat because the public sees them as an “elite” or a part of the establishment: The Mainstream Media. • Independence from race, ethnicity, religion and gender. • Do hold allegiance to core principles of journalism or are you held hostage to your situation?

24. Journalism of verification • “The essence of journalism is a discipline of verification.” • It is what separates journalism from “entertainment, propaganda, fiction or art.” (page 79) • Verification is the central function of journalism. • Getting the facts straight about what happened.

25. Journalism of verification • “[Journalists] are in what we call the reality-based community…That’s not the way the world works anymore …When we act, we create our own reality.” (page 30 TEOJ)

26. Journalism of verification • Campaign spokesman Brian Rogers told Politico.com on Friday, "We recognize it's not going to be 2000 again," when McCain wooed the press with his "Straight Talk Express" campaign. "But he lost then. We're running a campaign to win. And we're not too concerned about what the media filter tries to say about it."

27. Journalism of verification

28. Journalism of verification • The role of verification in society • Journalists don’t always articulate its importance as it is seen as a no-brainer to get the facts right. • But note Walter Lippman’s quote: • “There can be no liberty for a community which lacks the information by which to detect lies.” (page 80)

29. Journalism of verification • Discipline of verification under pressure: • Publish first because you can always correct it later. • Publish news simply because it’s already “out there” in this new media system regardless of its worth or relevance. • The UPI motto: “Get it first, but get it right.”

30. Journalism of verification • The Lost Meaning of Objectivity (page 81) • Fantasy world: Journalists are unbiased • Real world: It’s much more complicated and that’s a good thing. • Realism emerges with the inverted pyramid as a way to divorce bias from verification in the 19th century. • 20th century media thinkers say cultural blinders can distort “realism” and notions of objectivity are naïve. • “…the journalist is not objective but his method can be. The key was in the discipline of the craft, not the aim.” (page 83)

31. Journalism of verification • What is the system of verification journalism employs to report news? • Is it an exact methodology like a chemistry experiment that can be replicated time after time with guaranteed results? • Not exactly but it needs to be based on standards and practices. • “The notion of an objective method or reporting exists in pieces, handed down by word of mouth from reporter to reporter. “ (page 85)

32. Journalism of verification • Journalists have techniques of verification (Investigative Reporters and Editors methodology) but not much of a system testing “the reliability of journalistic interpretation.” (page 85) • Unless journalists communicate to the public how they reach conclusions, report facts and present “truth” the public will be skeptical. • That’s a danger to journalism and healthy public debate on problems. • Bottom line: There must be a professional method employed

33. Journalism of verification • Journalism of assertion vs. journalism of verification • Internet influences weakening methodology of verification • Less time spent on gathering facts and more time spent on reusing and reinterpreting already reported facts. • Herd mentality • Balloon boy

34. Journalism of verification • Gore example. (page 87) • Journalists run the risk of becoming more passive receivers if they continue to process all the data coming in. • Fairness and balance can help counteract the problem. • But each has a trap for the journalist (page 88)

35. Journalism of verification • A need for a system of objective method of verification all journalists can agree on. (page 89) • 1. Never add anything that was not there • 2. Never deceive the audience • 3. Be as transparent as possible about your methods and motives • 4. Rely on your own original reporting • 5. Exercise humility

36. Journalism of verification • 1. Never add anything that was not there • “Journalism’s implicit credo is “nothing here was made up.” (page 90) • Narrative devices, embellishing of facts, reporting things that were not said, reporting things that happened out of sequence for dramatic effect, using composite sources and staging photographs/video.

37. Do not add: The case of Jayson Blair • http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/11/national/11PAPE.html?pagewanted=3 • In an article on March 27, 2003 that carried a dateline from Palestine, W.Va., Mr. Blair wrote that Private Lynch's father, Gregory Lynch Sr., "choked up as he stood on his porch here overlooking the tobacco fields and cattle pastures." • The porch overlooks no such thing. • He also wrote that Private Lynch's family had a long history of military service; it does not, family members said. He wrote that their home was on a hilltop; it is in a valley. • The article astonished the Lynch family and friends, said Brandi Lynch, Jessica's sister. "We were joking about the tobacco fields and the cattle." • Asked why no one in the family called to complain about the many errors, she said, "We just figured it was going to be a one-time thing."

38. Do not deceive • False photographs • Changing quotes • Manipulating video sound bites • Messing with chronology • Fudging facts • http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-november-10-2009/sean-hannity-uses-glenn-beck-s-protest-footage

39. Be transparent about method • Want to stand for truth? Then explain your method to your readers/audience. (page 92) • Reveal your sources and methods of verification. • Then the audience can judge your motives, the process followed and the validity of the information. • This signals respect journalists have for their audience. Reinforces public interest mission.

40. Transparency • The problem with anonymous sources • The reason we need them • How to protect everybody involved if we use them • Misleading sources is wrong: no bluffing or deception • But what about undercover reporting? • The test: Must be vital info, no other way to get the story and reveal to the audience why you engaged in deception.

41. Rely on your own original reporting • Do you own work. Get out of the herd mentality of reporting because “it’s out there” already and we have to get it. (page 99) • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECwPAzqj4SA

42. Journalism of verification • We fail the audience when we make factual errors, typos and jump to conclusions. • Don’t assume anything • We must be self-correcting and watchful over our own product and methods.

43. Who Journalists Work For • Journalism is a business • Corporate incentive programs • Bonus pay for news executives based on profits, not quality of journalism • This shift has impacts: Loss of faith with news consumer, plummeting newsroom morale and restricts journalists’ ability “to provide the news “without fear or favor.” (p.52)

44. Who Journalists Work For • In this climate of profit over public advocacy, a journalist’s devotion to pursuing the truth is not enough. • Journalism’s first loyalty is to citizens • This covenant with the public trust is vital • It is based on the belief that the journalist’s work is not slanted, shoddy or influenced by the media outlet’s owner or financial interests

45. Who Journalists Work For • “The allegiance to citizens is the meaning of what we have come to call journalistic independence. “(p.53) • Pew Survey: 80 percent of journalists surveyed said the core principal of journalism was making the viewer, listener, reader “your first obligation.” (p.53) • http://people-press.org/report/?pageid=315

46. Who Journalists Work For • In interviews with psychologists, 70 percent of journalists “placed audience” as their first loyalty above employer, themselves, their family and their profession. (p. 53) • This code of loyalty to the public has caused friction in newsrooms around the nation.

47. Who Journalists Work For • Journalistic independence becomes isolation and disengagement from community (p. 57) • Moving away from the covenant of loyalty • Journalists moving up the chain, business decisions to target specific demographics (the richest or biggest audience) and ignoring others. • Smaller circulation but more affluent customers for advertisers

48. Who Journalists Work For • The Wall • Advertising, circulation and the business of running a newspaper/broadcast outlet is firewalled from the news operation. • Risk of having no firewall: Advertisers dictating news coverage. Integrity challenged by the public • The Citizen as Customer runs contrary to the mission of journalism

49. Who Journalists Work For • If the wall fails, then what can be done to bolster the allegiance between citizens and journalists? (page 69-75) • The owner must be committed to citizens first • Hire business managers who also put citizens first • Set and communicate clear standards • Journalists have final say over news • Communicate clear standards to the public

50. Who Journalists Work For • “The allegiance to citizens is the meaning of what we have come to call journalistic independence. “(p.53) • Pew Survey: 80 percent of journalists surveyed said the core principal of journalism was making the viewer, listener, reader “your first obligation.” (p.53) • http://people-press.org/report/?pageid=315