An unpopular truth about the news you read

[unixronin]

Orson Scott Card on lies, damned lies, and election campaign reporting

OK, so you think Card is a religious fundamentalist.  In many ways, you may be right.

You may consider Card a homophobe.  I doubt he sees it that way, but you're within your rights to say that too.  If you're gay, I doubt the practical distinction matters to you.

Neither of those change the fact that what he has to say on this particular issue — honesty and objectivity in journalism — is perfectly true.  Judge the message, not the messenger.

Comments

[luke-jaywalker.livejournal.com]

I'd add another line of reasoning to that "news is a business" thing. I'm a former journalist, and I have a number of friends who are. This is a typical resume, belonging to one friend:

- English degree at small college in upstate NY near his hometown.
- 2 years of interning, his junior and senior college years, at a chain of local papers in upstate NY near the college.
- After graduation, worked for 1.5 years as a junior reporter for the same chain he'd interned for.
- Went to Boston University School of Journalism, a top-5 school in that field, for his masters' degree. Graduated.
- While doing his masters', freelanced a bit.
- Hired as an editorial assistant at the Boston Herald. Starting salary (1.5 years plus freelance experience, 2 years interning, masters degree from top-5 school): about $23k.

He's thirty-one, now. A few months ago, more than five years after graduating from BU with that masters, he exuberantly let me know that his salary had finally hit $30k. Oh, and we're talking Boston cost-of-living here.

You don't do journalism for the money. The same skillset is applicable in areas like corporate PR and communications, which pay *far* more - twice as much or more. My friend is an idealist, and it doesn't hurt that his wife, as soon as she graduates with her Ph.D, will be making six figures. He's fine because of *that* income.

But if you don't do journalism for the money, why do you do it? It's fun, but that's not always enough. The people who *do* value money tend not to last long as reporters: they get offered a PR job for twice as much money and take it. The ones who last long enough to become desk editors or managing editors, the ones who make editorial decisions... why do they stay?

a) It's fun hanging around high-level people. It's also fun and very possible, although absolutely immoral, to fancy yourself a player. I know a couple of journalists who figure that it's their *right* to play power games with facts because, after all, they get so little monetary compensation. b) People who are driven primarily by stuff other than money - who don't mind, in their thirties, not being able to afford a car or a place of their own. These people tend to be leftists.

It's a screwed-up culture and a 100-150% pay raise would fix it, eventually (in that right-leaning people and moderates wouldn't have the incentive not to be reporters, would give fair and even coverage and eventually become editors), but where's that money going to come from? Especially right now, due to all this downsizing and cost-cutting, journalism salaries are lower than they've ever been.

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Thanks for the perspective.

[cymrullewes.livejournal.com]

Your stuff is stowed in the crawlspace. You owe me $1 per month and I'll keep it and use it to send your stuff to you when you're ready.