Guilt and Innocence: A daily primer

What I Suspected All Along, and Still Will

Maybe I should look into changing schools, or majors. At least I would if payed much attention toAn Open Letter to Journalism School Grads:

To have made it this far, you've had to inhale the usual bromides like "the reporter's job is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable"--a noble sentiment that overlooks the fact that anyone who can spend $30,000 on j-school should be considered "comfortable." You've been trained to be skeptical of every truth and every detail ("If your mother says she loves you, check it out") but you've been steered away from skepticism about j-school itself.

Of course, I already know all of this. I am already critical of the J-school. (J-1100 anyone?) Actually, I'm already critical of the whole damn profession, so maybe there's hope for me yet.

Garrison Keilor: Newspapers have taken a wrong turn.

I think part of my revernce for Garrison Keilor has something to do with growing up in a Unitarian Universalist church. There's something in his demeanor that seems to universally attract Unitarians to the Prarie Home Companion, so when Garrison Keilor has something to say, especially about what will, hopefully, some day be my profession, I take note.

Keilor on traveling in a cocoon populated by readers, has something to say about Journalism:

"I think that I would want to talk about the beauties of journalism and say a word in its behalf, as against, say, the personal essay and the memoir and other genres that seem more in vogue. ... But I think that American newspapers have taken a very serious wrong turn, and that aside from a few newspapers the quality of the product is in decline, especially for the reader, and I think that newspapers have forgotten that their readers are readers and love writing - writing is what people want. They don't want a sort of concept of journalism; they want writers. And writers are always individuals.

"This is what people turn to newspapers for. They don't turn to newspapers for advice and for personal service and for sort of glossy pieces about lifestyle and home decor and cooking and how to bring up your children. They're really looking to newspapers for the same thing that people looked to newspapers for back before television - television didn't change anything and USA Today didn't really change anything."

Pre-Packaged News (or Beating the Dead Horse of Journalistic Integrity)

I know that most of you are probably sick to death of hearing about the  Video News Releases, but this is one of those issues that makes my blood boil so intensely that I can't resist dissecting it.

From the NY Times Article:

It is the kind of TV news coverage every president covets. "Thank you, Bush. Thank you, U.S.A.," a jubilant Iraqi-American told a camera crew in Kansas City for a segment about reaction to the fall of Baghdad. A second report told of "another success" in the Bush administration's "drive to strengthen aviation security"; the reporter called it "one of the most remarkable campaigns in aviation history." A third segment, broadcast in January, described the administration's determination to open markets for American farmers.

...

This winter, Washington has been roiled by revelations that a handful of columnists wrote in support of administration policies without disclosing they had accepted payments from the government. But the administration's efforts to generate positive news coverage have been considerably more pervasive than previously known. At the same time, records and interviews suggest widespread complicity or negligence by television stations, given industry ethics standards that discourage the broadcast of prepackaged news segments from any outside group without revealing the source.

This sort of covert, almost malicious activity on the part of the government, with our tax dollars is appalling. What's worse about this particular situation is that I know I can't blame this whole mess on the government. The media, who are supposed to be protecting the public and revealing this sort of smoky thing to them, have been force-feeding us non-news.

Journalism is supposed to serve to protect the public from the government and when they fail to do so, they are betraying the public trust. Furthermore, when they willingly hand their audience over to the government to save money and maximize profit...  Well, it seems almost like treason.

The Times also wrote:

It is also a process in which all participants benefit.

Local affiliates are spared the expense of digging up original material. Public relations firms secure government contracts worth millions of dollars. The major networks, which help distribute the releases, collect fees from the government agencies that produce segments and the affiliates that show them. The administration, meanwhile, gets out an unfiltered message, delivered in the guise of traditional reporting.

...

In essence, video news releases seek to exploit a growing vulnerability of television news: Even as news staffs at the major networks are shrinking, many local stations are expanding their hours of news coverage without adding reporters.

When I first saw that phrase, "It's a process in which all participants benefit," in J-1100, I remember immediately thinking, "Everyone but the public." Furthermore, at the same time I was reminded of Jon Stewart's appearance on Crossfire, when he kept asking them to stop hurting America. Now, the talking heads on Crossfire seem benign after all the scandal and torrid money that's flowing through journalism right now.

After reading all this, I'm having a crisis of faith about my major. My parents are currently paying the University of Missouri a quarter-grand a year, because a year ago I was still convinced that, even though I knew the media was having its problems, that journalism was still an important role in democracy. But now, I'm just not sure that's true anymore.

I'm trying not to think apocalyptic things, but words like propaganda are turning into warning signs about the coming year of 1984 in my head, and I'm no longer sure that I want to be in journalism. Now, I'm thinking politics may actually be the less corrupt way to go about things. When everything has turned into a careless search for profit, what's the point?

In the words of Jon Stewart, Could everyone please stop hurting America?

Who Is a Journalist? - Anybody who wants to be.

I have to admit that as much as J-1100 can drive me crazy sometimes, a lot of the topics that we touch on in that class are deeply interesting to me. So, this Slate article about what define journalists seems intriguing:
Who Is a Journalist? - Anybody who wants to be. By Jacob Weisberg.

One interesting point that Wesiberg makes is:

If you don't like this raucous clamor emanating from cyberspace, you're not really comfortable with democracy.

I was just commenting last night that sometimes I feel like I want to talk the easy route of journalism, because rather than go out and find the news, and investigate it, I would rather write the columns that critique the actions of the government or other agencies. But, for me, the opinions on the editorial page are jsut as important as the "objective" reporting leading up to them. I don't think reporting the news is enough. I believe there needs to be some voice who can suggest what the people need to be doing about the news.

This, I think, is where blogs can serve an important purpose. Since the media has gotten so commercialized, it needs its own watchdog to ensure that the media is playing its role as watchdog.

I hate to admit it, but I think Professor Craft had a point in J-1100, when she pointed out that maybe we shouldn't be so concerned with defining who journalists are and protect them, as we should be concerned with indentifying the activity of journalism and protecting that.

Though I like that Wesiberg ends with this: "Properly understood, journalism has never been simply a trade or a profession. In a democracy like ours, it's a basic right."

Saying Farewell to Fear and Loathing: Hunter S. Thompson passes away at 65

For once, I didn't hear about this online. I was actually sitting down at lunch, yesterday, in my temporary state of grace before I check my e-mail for updates about the world, when Graft mentioned that some author died. I inquired further, only semi-curious, and he said, "Thompson or something, I think?"

"Hunter S. Thompson?" I asked.

Turns out I was right and a bit shocked.

Hunter S. Thompson, 65, Author, Commits Suicide

For one thing, he's not that old. He was only sixty-five and as of last year was still publishing articles. Furthermore, this is the first time an author's death really struck me. I remember being a little bit disappointed when Douglas Adams died a few years ago, but I suppose I wasn't expecting anything more from him.

When Arthur Miller died earlier this month, I was half-surprised to hear he was still alive.

The thing is, as far as the authors I'm familiar with, this is the first time I can recall being truly cognizant of one of them moving from the group of living authors I admire, to the ones who have passed away.

Furthermore, I think its clear that I admired Thompson's work more than some others. After all, the name of this blog itself came from a quote from The Great Shark Hunt. Thompson was so distinctive to me. He seemed to be one of the last individual voices.

The first thing I was reminded of was my sophomore year in High School when my friend Rob, who absolutely admired Thompson, came to school one weekend in an ecstatic glee after visiting Thompson's "fortified compound" in Aspen. "You guys," he yelled, "I got shot at by Hunter S. Thompson!"

In retrospect, the whole incident seems a bit sadder, now.

Jon Stewart the King of Broadcast News?

Link: Could Jon Stewart have encouraged broadcast news to turn away from pundits?.

This is a very speculative editorial, but it got me thinking. If Jon Stewart is the only one who is even vaguely telling journalists what "partisan hacks" they're being, journalism is in an even worse state than I previously thought.