What’s Going On Here?

Yglesias:

I never, ever, ever watch prime time cable news because it makes me want to kill extremely large numbers of people. Tragically, I walked through the door yesterday and my roommate already had Hardball on. There were two people debating the issue of . . . whether or not The New York Times should be brought up on charges of treason. Seriously. Treason. For publishing an article in a newspaper. Treason. And there was Chris Matthews happily presiding over the whole thing as if this was a serious conversation that people should be having. This all taking place on a network that, allegedly, does journalism.

Atrios:

Torturing people, jailing journalists for treason, the president being allowed to disobey the law at whim… The mainstream media has made all of these things a part of the normal conversation. They’ve allowed “two sides” to all of these things to be debated on equal footing. Left wing bloggers on the internets complain about the media and they get ignored and accused of “blogofascism.” Conservatives call for the New York Times to be blown up and their reporters and editors jailed and they get treated seriously on MSNBC’s flagship political talk show.

There’s a problem here. You’ve been playing this game for years, letting these people control the terms of the debate. This is where it has brought you. Congratulations.

This is exactly why I decided to go into law instead of journalism.

I like to write. I’ve been told I’m a good story-teller, and I do like to tell stories. I like to meet people, to hear about their lives and experiences, and to be a part of sharing those experiences with others. Journalism was a natural choice for me, and in high school I fell in love with feature writing — longer, less news-y pieces which gave the writer the chance to be creative and to share a part of someone else’s life. In college I studied journalism, and found that I just couldn’t get excited about news writing — which is a problem, since news tends to dominate in newspapers (duh). My frustration came from two sources: First was the fact that most of what we were covering in journalism classes was pretty boring. And second was my digust with how journalistic ethics played out in newrooms across the country.

The mainstream media (I abhor that term enough, and certainly will not say “MSM,” sorry) prides itself on objectivity. I’m not sure that any credible journalist would claim that she is unbiased, but she will almost definitely assert that she tries to make her stories as fair as possible by preventing both sides of an issue. And while this sounds good in theory, it ignores the fact that often, “both sides” aren’t equally honest, equally credible, or equally supported.

One example: Abortion clinic bombings and murders of doctors. When these were especially popular among the “pro-life” crowd,there were several news shows which dedicated episodes to discussing them. So they’d bring, say, Gloria Feldt on to represent the pro-choice side, and pair her with some right-wing anti-choice wackjob who would often defend bombings and violent tactics, or at the very least derail the conversation while quietly standing up for the bombers, arsonists and murderers. Because, hey, that’s “both sides of the story.”

Imagine what the outrage would be if, in discussing September 11th, network news brought out a supporter of Osama bin Laden argue with any reasonable American that the 9/11 attacks were necessary and justified. It would be outrageous, and unnecessary — the “other side” of that story doesn’t even merit acknowledgment. And when some wackjob does defend it (see Ward Churchill), his views are quickly taken to task by the media elite and conservatives alike. But when it comes to mainstream conservative issues — abortion, “treason,” etc — they demand to have the greatest wackjob possible represented.

And the media enables it. Another example: Terri Schiavo. The vast majority of the country thought that the government should stay the hell out of that situation. But you’d never know it from the media’s “fair” representation of both sides. I remember several pundits noting that the Schiavo controversy had “deeply divided the country,” when it did no such thing — a vast majority of the country thought one thing, and a much smaller minority thought another. So, yes, the country was technically divided, just as 100 people are “divided” when 99 of them think one thing and 1 thinks another (the Schiavo issue wasn’t 99/1, but I think it was something like 80/20). But it just wasn’t such a big deal for most people. But the right-wing lunatic fringe demanded representation, and so they got it. Without qualification, without question.

Which brings us to the Bush administration and the media’s soft-peddling on so many political issues. They uncover a scoop, and they get a quote from someone in the administration who either categorically denies it or spins it in their own favor — and the reporter just leaves it as-is. They don’t present information which would counter the administration’s claims, nor do they say that they know the administration is flat-out lying, because that would disrupt the balance. Honestly, there’s only so much blame we can lay on the reporters — the Bush administration is more adept at manipulating the media than any previous administration, and they make it clear that journalists who ask too-difficult or too-challenging questions, or who betray the administration by revealing embarassing information, will be punished. They’ll lose their press passes, or they’ll be stuck in the back of the room, or they won’t be called on, or their questions will be avoided. Reporters have to pay the bills too, and they have to answer to editors who expect that their questions will get answered, and that their reporters will come back with a story. So reporters don’t rock the boat; it’s not worth it.

And so we get fed a bunch of crap by an administration that knows exactly what it’s doing. They lie to reporters, and the reporters usually know that they’re lying — but in the name of fairness, balance and objectivity, they feel obliged to present “both sides” without qualification.

Now, we see right-wing pundits calling for the heads of a handful of brave journalits who risked quite a bit, personally and professionally, to give the American public a little taste of the truth. We see the New York Times being called “terrorist-tippers” (What about the Wall Street Journal, guys?), and one right-wing pundit called for the Times to stand in front of a “firing squad.” And we see these people being taken seriously, and presented as “one side” of the story.

I think another part of the issue is that journalists tend to be more left-leaning in their political orientation. And no, this is not part of the conspiracy of the liberal media, but rather, I would guess, something more inherent to the type of person who seeks out journalism as a career. Working as a journalist requires a sense of adventure and open-mindedness. It means that you’re going to be presented with complex situations to which there often aren’t simple classifications or black-and-white answers. It means that you’re going to have to examine issues from various angles, and you’re going to have to deal with the fact that life is highly nuanced and not everything is good or evil. It requires you to work in the service of others. It puts you in contact with people from all walks of life, and constantly challenges your ideas and assumptions. The type of person who is attracted to that career — and who thrives in that career so much that they get a job at the New York Times or the LA Times — is, I think, more likely to be a liberal than a conservative for all the obvious reasons.

And the “liberal media” has been criticized so much that liberal reporters reflexively want to prove themselves to be fair by including even the more ridiculous, irrational, out-of-the-mainstream conservative perspectives. Most reporters really do value balance, and aren’t just paying lip-service to it — but unfortunately, the journalistist ideas of “balance” and “fairness” are more than a little flawed.

Journalism can be a great career, and there are hundreds of good, honest, hard-working journalists out there who are just as fed up with this bullshit as the rest of us are. And I’m certainly grateful to the journalists everywhere who do the hard, on-the-ground work so that people like me can read their stories and learn something.

It’s a tough field, and its current incarnation isn’t making anyone happy. I figured out pretty quickly that I couldn’t do it, and that I’d rather be an advocate. But I think it’s about time that we had a conversation about media standards, and exactly what the heck is going on here.