Religion in Journalism

I think journalists definitely need to put more of an emphasis on faith.  That's not to say that they need to declare their faith or even write from a faithful viewpoint.  I'm just saying that it is a basic and enduring component of life for every single person on the planet.  Every person has some kind of belief.  Even an atheist or agnostic believes in those views.  Therefore, religion shouldn't be such a taboo subject.  I feel that it can "enhance coverage of almost any topic" as this article states.  I feel like religion needs to be less of a topic that is an occasional factor in a story and instead focus on it more often.  Religion and beliefs often drive people's actions.  Even politics has a place for religion that needs to be reported on.  A candidate's faith may influence his or her actions and a voter's faith may influence his or her vote.  Denying this fundamental element of human life is detrimental to the field of journalism and to journalists as a whole.

There are many solid reasons why religion stories need to be covered.  This article points out a few, one of which I would like to share:

6 in 10 Americans say that journalism is very important in their lives.  Clearly, this shows that there is a need for reporting on religion.  Newspapers report regularly on sports and business and other aspects of life, so it makes sense that religion needs to be covered as well.  I think that a lot of papers and news outlets do a good job of reporting it sometimes, but I do feel that it needs to be more instrumental in our articles as journalists.

There does need to be balance in journalism which covers religion, it's true.  But it's also true that without a focus on religion, there is really less for people to connect to.

Beckham Lecture Impressions

I attended Dr. Nicholas Mason's lecture entitled “The Rise of Mass-Media Puffery and the ‘Death’ of Literature in Georgian Britain.”  I am glad I went because it was definitely worth the time I spent there.  I have often considered going into the field of writing myself and hearing this lecture definitely made me think more about advertising in our modern world.  Something that really struck me was that the puffery and buttering up of advertising goes on on websites like Amazon.com.  I checked out this website after hearing the lecture in an attempt to focus on Dr. Mason's point and apply it to real life.  I also looked at Barnes and Noble.com, which was very interesting to me since I am a writer for that company.  I even looked at Sparknotes.com, which is the website I write for.  I found that there was some of this going on as there were reviews from editors and readers on all of these websites.  I don't know that I condemn it so much, though.  I think that these are lucrative industries and there isn't anything wrong with advertising or in trying to make a work look good.  It's up to the consumer to make a good buy.  All in all, I was interested in the idea that advertising does have this puffery involved and I'm definitely on the lookout for it now, especially being bombarded with it the way that I am.  I hope I can use this information to further my understanding of writing, publishing, and even advertising in journalism.

Journalism as a public forum. Everyone has a freakin' opinion.

With new technology being introduced basically every other week, journalists have become like foreboding soothsayers of doom and destruction.  Actually, so has everyone.  If I ever tell anyone that I'm going into journalism, they immediately start up with the, "But it's a dying field" and "I never read the newspaper" and "I care very little about you and your life choices" types of comments.  But I can't agree with them.  I think that technology is a tool that journalists can use, and I think open forums are one of the best ways to use that tool.

A universal truth about every person on the planet is that they all have an opinion, and they ALL want to share it.  The internet has made it incredibly easy for everyone, from the level headed normal citizens to the crazy psycho nut jobs who believe that Ford is a conspiracy, to post their opinions.  A LOT.  The best thing journalists can do with this phenomenon?  USE IT.

As journalists, we can use Twitter, blogs, niche websites, actual forum sites, video hosting sites, and more to spread the news, report unbiasedly, and open up discussion with citizens.  We don't HAVE to be bound by a newspaper company anymore.  It's an entirely different course and career from professional journalism, and yet at the same time, it's journalism at it's core.  Providing an unbiased, fair view of current events, independently and unhindered by so many market and time pressures.  I definitely think this is something we can use.  I mean, look at the Associated Press's Twitter feed.  People can retweet, comment on it, etc.  Newspapers online even have a sense of community because people can comment on any article.  They can talk about the paper itself, about the article, about how Ford is a conspiracy, ANYTHING.  That's the beauty of this time.

We are in an age of communication.  Might as well use it to our advantage instead of trying to preserve the old ways of journalism.  Or anything, really.  Except, like, electricity.  We should probably stick to that formula for a while.

And now here is a series of interesting links that has absolutely nothing to do with the link requirement on the grading rubric.  I assure you, these are all relevant.

Ethics: Because Printing a Photo of a Dead Body on the Front Page is Generally Frowned Upon.

The subject of ethics is one widely discussed by journalists and journalist students.  As well it should be; I think it could be argued that an  unethical journalist cannot be a good journalist.  What are ethics, though?  There is room for a whole lot of debate in this area.  I think that there are facets or principles of ethics wherein there can be room for interpretation.  There are many hard and fast rules for ethics in journalism, though.  Every newspaper has a code of ethics, such as the New York Times.  These codes can largely be found on this list of freaking everyone's code of ethics.

Everyone has their own idea of ethics.  Everyone has their own limit to how far they will go to cover a story.  I think one of the most interesting aspects of ethics in journalism is whether or not the benefit of the story counteracts the harm done.  The Society of Professional Journalists says that "Ethical journalists treat sources, subjects and colleagues as human beings deserving of respect."  The Society goes on to explain several rules such as treating children with compassion, providing fair coverage of trials, being discreet about names of victims of sex crimes, etc.  There is some amount of specificity, clearly, but the above statement and even some of the rules can be somewhat vague.  In the end, as journalists we have to decide ourselves what is and isn't ethical.

I really think that an ethical journalist is a trustworthy journalist.  As journalists, we need to be sensitive and compassionate as well as honest and willing to investigate.  That is part of our chosen profession.  I think that anyone who disregards ethics in reporting clearly does not understand the field of journalism and what it means to be a reporter in this field.

Watchdog journalism is dying slowly.

In our last class we discussed watchdog journalism.  Which is the best way of saying "investigative journalism" ever, except for a term I have coined: super spy reporting 2.0.  This term has not caught on.  Yet.

Anyway, investigative journalism sounds awesome and exciting and all that, but what I learned is that it isn't.  Why?  Because it doesn't really exist anymore.  Investigative reporting used to be incredibly interesting because it brought to light political scandals and important secrets being hid from the public.  Now, as we discussed in class, it brings to light malfunctioning washing machines.  The fact is, it just isn't interesting or exciting or ANYTHING like that anymore.

There just isn't money to put a team of investigative journalists on a story that will take a lot of time to uncover.  We live in a society where people want their information ten minutes ago.  Uncovering something WORTH investigating takes a lot of time and time is money, as the old saying goes.  So it's pretty safe to say that watchdog journalism is on the decline, and plenty of internet sources will back me up on this.

For example: this article and this article and this article all point out the decline of watchdog journalism and attempt to figure out WHY it is declining.  There are a lot of different opinions out there, but I still have to think that it's the fact that a good investigative article takes time and no one wants to put in that much time when the focus of journalism right now increasingly has become keeping up with the internet.  Newspapers are worried about circulation, not how in-depth their stories are.

Basically the problem is all about money, which is actually what every problem in journalism is these days.  Good thing we've chosen a field so rich with opportunity.

Journalism, independence, and a terrible metaphor involving a lemonade stand.

Journalism ought to be independent.  As far as I know it should be, anyway.  You have advertisers, politicians, readers, and basically everyone else in the world offering their take on events, and as journalists, there's a balance.  We have to be separate from all these people and groups in order to report fairly and without bias (which, by the way, has also been called into question in class.  Can you report unbiasedly?  Do biases show through your writing no matter what?  Should we just accept our biases and declare them openly as journalists? WILL I EVER GET TO HAVE A PET KOALA?  These are the questions that haunt me).  But seriously, though, if news outlets are constantly worried about what the sponsors say and what the politicians say and what the readers say then the news gets distorted.

Think about it.  Let's say Timmy has a lemonade stand.  His lemonade is awesome, unbiased lemonade (?) and everyone is all, "TIMMY.  YOUR LEMONADE MAKES ME WANT TO DIE BECAUSE IT IS SO GOOD."  Well Timmy is makin' bank.  Then an economic miracle occurs (I'm a journalism student.  Don't judge me.) and Timmy needs to have enough money to buy, like, lemons.  So Timmy gets Mr. Dodson, his piano teacher, to pay him for advertising.  Well now all of Timmy's cups say "TAKE LESSONS FROM MR. DODSON BECAUSE HE IS AWESOME AT PIANO" and all is well cause Timmy has enough money to sell his lemonade AND to make money doing it.  But his mom gets all up in his business because, noticing that all the neighborhood kids come over to the stand to sip lemonade in the afternoon, she starts urging Timmy to tell all his friends that they must wear bicycle helmets, lest they die on their way to the stand in a horrible and gruesome accident.  Timmy doesn't want to because he isn't lame, but if he doesn't, his mom will ground him.  And now Mr. Dodson is all, "YOUR LEMONADE NEEDS LESS SUGAR BECAUSE I HAVE DIABETES AND IF YOU DO NOT LEAVE OUT THE SUGAR I WILL NOT ADVERTISE" and his mom is freaking out because he won't tell all that they need helmets to purchase lemonade, and all the kids are ticked cause suddenly there is no sugar in the lemonade and nobody is happy and then Timmy has a nervous breakdown and doesn't go to college and becomes a traveling hobo.

Are you happy now, MR. DODSON??

What does this have to do with journalism?  Well, as my clever metaphor demonstrates, when separate parties get involved, even out of necessity, things are gonna change.  You HAVE to please people from different groups, otherwise no one buys your lemonade.  This is a unique situation with Journalism because journalists don't just have to sell lemonade, they have to make that lemonade unbiased and it has to tell the truth, despite what Dodson or Mom or the neighborhood kids say.  But how do journalists become independent of advertisers and politicians and readers?  Well, I'm not sure.  I feel like I'm just discovering a lot about journalism as an unbiased news outlet AND a business AND a forum for the public.  How to balance these elements is definitely at the root of this issue.

We all have our resources that we THINK are independent.  We all have our own perceptions of what "independent" really means.  For example, I trust The Drudge Report pretty freaking explicitly.  I feel like the news I get there is unbiased and unaffected by too many outside parties.  But is that just my perception?  CNN International is known for straight reporting, but CNN America panders to a culture obsessed with "soft" journalism and celebrities.  In fact, even now as I looked at these different web pages, I see that International has a story about revolution taking place across the world.  On the U.S. page, the headline is about the "snowiest, craziest" winter ever.  Also, 6 rebellious women in history.  I weep for America.  Not really, we have soft pretzels and Jimmer, so I actually figure we're in good shape, but still, you get my point.

So basically what I'm trying to say is that independence in journalism is a pretty difficult topic.  I mean, there are funds dedicated to this stuff.  I think journalism needs to be as independent as possible, but at the same time, I realize that it kind of can't be.  Without money for lemons, you don't have lemonade.  (Notice how I cleverly incorporated my incredibly clever metaphor involving a business niche that has rarely been explored in metaphors previously.)