The Fourth Estate
While I've never been a big fan of the Corporate Media, it's still shocking to see that people can't identify "freedom of the press" as part of the First Amendment, and even more saddening that 22% think the gummint should wield censorship. All this comes from a survey, which you can see here. Of course, polls and surveys aren't 100% accurate, but they still serve as barometers of sorts. I think it's fair to say part of the problems the CM has is self-inflicted; it's pretty hard to trust the press when you have people like Janet Cooke, Mike Barnicle, and Jayson Blair, among others. It's also difficult when you have news outlets like Fox News abandoning any pretense of objectivity or journalistic standards. Sometimes it's a bit mixed, as in the case of Dan Rather and the memos regarding Smirk's "service" in the National Guard-- some say Rather and CBS screwed up, while others say it was a red herring planted by Smirk's political operatives designed to deflect the heightening coverage of Smirk's missing months from the Texas Air National Guard. Other times the credibility gap for the press is external, as seen in the case of the payola scandal with journalists like Armstrong Williams being paid to shill for the White House, or the scandal involving Jeff Gannon/James Guckert [you can tell I really like Wikipedia! *grin*], the "reporter" who was revealed to be a gay escort service employee, and gained access to the White House press briefings, even though he wasn't really qualified to be credentialed. The latter is a case that I think has been neglected by the Corporate Media, and is rather serious (though not as serious as the Downing Street Memo).
There are other cases, such as Robert Novak's exposing Valerie Plame's identity as an undercover CIA agent. This case is still being investigated, though I don't have much hope for the truth to come out and the person(s) responsible being brought to justice. Although I've cited quite a few cases where right-wingers/conservatives would scream that I'm biased, I'm sure there are examples from the other side of the political fence. All in all, it looks like J-schools aren't doing the job they're supposed to be doing, and a lot of editors and newsrooms need brush-up courses in journalism 101.
This still leaves out tabloid journalism, which has spread from the likes of the National Enquirer and the Star to "mainstream" news. I don't need to hang out at the checkout stand anymore; I can just open my front door in the morning. From the O.J. trial to L'Affaire Monica to Janet Jackson's boobs to the current fiasco involving one of Janet's relations to... oh, you get the point. We've got a steady diet of "news" shoveled out to us in place of the things that really matter. No one I know cares for all this, but the sad thing is, *somebody* out there does, or the Corporate Media wouldn't be piling it on all the time. Everything now is about titillation, instant gratification, sound bites, marketing, and profits. It's disturbing when we increasingly have media outlets that are controlled by fewer and fewer people and organizations. Most newspapers have no real competition anymore; where once dozens of cities had at minimum two papers and often half a dozen, now there's only one game in town. Even when there were huge syndicates in existence (the Hearst chain being one of the most celebrated examples), there was always competition from other papers, whether morning rags or evening publications. Now it's just one large regional periodical, such as the L.A. Times or the Washington Post. New York City is one of the few markets left where there's some competition of sorts.
The interesting thing is that people saw all of this coming ages ago. For a prescient example of this, check out the movie "Network"; for something that came out nearly 30 years ago, it could just as easily have been made yesterday and be playing at the nabes today.
If you're a journalist, a potential journalist, a wannabe, or someone who has some influence in the media, I strongly encourage you to read this statement from www.journalism.org. These are principles that desperately need to be applied again.
That doesn't excuse the public, however. When people aren't willing to read the news, critically examine the state of affairs as they exist, or educate themselves, then it's that much easier for people to just sit back and let the CM spoonfeed them. From the same website is a set of "citizen expectations". If we don't follow through on making the media work, then shame on us. Credulity is not exclusive to the fourth estate.
There are other cases, such as Robert Novak's exposing Valerie Plame's identity as an undercover CIA agent. This case is still being investigated, though I don't have much hope for the truth to come out and the person(s) responsible being brought to justice. Although I've cited quite a few cases where right-wingers/conservatives would scream that I'm biased, I'm sure there are examples from the other side of the political fence. All in all, it looks like J-schools aren't doing the job they're supposed to be doing, and a lot of editors and newsrooms need brush-up courses in journalism 101.
This still leaves out tabloid journalism, which has spread from the likes of the National Enquirer and the Star to "mainstream" news. I don't need to hang out at the checkout stand anymore; I can just open my front door in the morning. From the O.J. trial to L'Affaire Monica to Janet Jackson's boobs to the current fiasco involving one of Janet's relations to... oh, you get the point. We've got a steady diet of "news" shoveled out to us in place of the things that really matter. No one I know cares for all this, but the sad thing is, *somebody* out there does, or the Corporate Media wouldn't be piling it on all the time. Everything now is about titillation, instant gratification, sound bites, marketing, and profits. It's disturbing when we increasingly have media outlets that are controlled by fewer and fewer people and organizations. Most newspapers have no real competition anymore; where once dozens of cities had at minimum two papers and often half a dozen, now there's only one game in town. Even when there were huge syndicates in existence (the Hearst chain being one of the most celebrated examples), there was always competition from other papers, whether morning rags or evening publications. Now it's just one large regional periodical, such as the L.A. Times or the Washington Post. New York City is one of the few markets left where there's some competition of sorts.
The interesting thing is that people saw all of this coming ages ago. For a prescient example of this, check out the movie "Network"; for something that came out nearly 30 years ago, it could just as easily have been made yesterday and be playing at the nabes today.
If you're a journalist, a potential journalist, a wannabe, or someone who has some influence in the media, I strongly encourage you to read this statement from www.journalism.org. These are principles that desperately need to be applied again.
That doesn't excuse the public, however. When people aren't willing to read the news, critically examine the state of affairs as they exist, or educate themselves, then it's that much easier for people to just sit back and let the CM spoonfeed them. From the same website is a set of "citizen expectations". If we don't follow through on making the media work, then shame on us. Credulity is not exclusive to the fourth estate.
posted by Mr. Sandman | 10:35 PM
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