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Add to FavoritesBy writing this article I shall attempt to prove that citizen journalists are more trustworthy than professional journalists.
Before I start to present my argument, let me assure you that I am familiar with the Society of Professional Journalists, and that I have read their Code of Ethics. This code notwithstanding, I still think the facts will outweigh the legend in this case. That said, I'll begin my argument with a quote from a professional journalist ,a quote almost as old as I.
John Swinton, former Chief of Staff for the New York Times stated:
"There is no such thing at this date of the world's history in America as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dare write your honest opinion and, if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out in the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinion to appear in one issue of my paper, before 24 hours my occupation would be gone.
"The business of the journalist is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell this country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it. "What folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools of vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull our strings and we dance.
"Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."
- New York Press Club, 1953-
Well, you may say, that was then, this is now. We live in an age of information, the press cannot get away with lying anymore. To that argument, I present the following.
In Florida, some years ago, it was alleged in court that pressure from the hormone maker
Monsanto caused Fox TV to fire two of its award-winning reporters to prevent broadcast of what they had discovered concerning BGH, a hormone used to increase milk production in cattle. After a five-week trial and six hours of deliberation which ended August 18, 2000, a Florida state court jury unanimously determined that Fox had "acted intentionally and deliberately to falsify or distort the plaintiffs' news reporting on BGH." In that decision, the jury also found that Jane's threat to blow the whistle on Fox's misconduct to the FCC was the sole reason for the termination... and the jury awarded $425,000 in damages which makes her eligible to apply for reimbursement for all court costs, expenses and legal fees.
Fox appealed and prevailed February 14, 2003 when an appeals court issued a ruling reversing the jury, accepting a defense argument that had been rejected by three other judges on at least six separate occasions.
Excerpts of the ruling follow:
"The FCC has never published its news distortion policy as a regulation
with definitive elements and defenses. Instead, the FCC has developed the policy
through the adjudicatory process in decisions resolving challenges to broadcasters'
license s. The policy's roots can be traced to 1949 when the FCC first expressed its
concern regarding deceptive news in very general terms stating that "[a] licensee would
be abusing his position as a public trustee of these important means of mass
communications were he to withhold from expression over his facilities relevant news of
facts concerning a controversy or to slant or distort the news."
"...the FCC's policy against the intentional falsification of the news which the FCC has
called its "news distortion policy" does not qualify as the required "law, rule, or
regulation" under section 448.102. [A Florida law}
"Because the FCC's news distortion policy is not a "law, rule, or regulation"
Under [Florida statute ] section 448.102, Akre has failed to state a claim under the whistle-
blower's statute. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment in her favor and remand for entry of a
judgment in favor of WTVT."
It is important to note that this ruling does not say anything about the truth, other than the fact that, under Florida Law, News outlets, including radio and Television, which are regulated by the FCC , and their journalists, are not required to be truthful. Truth in Journalism is a policy of the FCC, not a rule, not a regulation and certainly not a law.
Next we go to Patrick J Buchanan, founder of "The American Cause".
"For generations, our media elite have fed the people the party line that journalists are
objective and neutral observers who call it as they see it, concerned only with fairness, truth and accuracy, and who are ever on guard to keep their opinions out of their copy. The media have a vested interest in perpetuating this myth.
But it is not the truth. In many cases, it is wholesale consumer fraud. Almost everyone in journalism, and much of the public, knows it."
Just in case you are still thinking that professional journalists are independent, you might want to consider that they are paid by someone who is also paid by someone. In every case, when the journalist works for a large organization, the money comes from corporations that are in business because of the public's perception of them as a reputable company'. It is not a financially sound practice to fund any organization which denigrates their company, and they don't do it. News agencies must, to survive, avoid biting the hand that feeds them.' If there were ever a time when newspapers made their money strictly on the sale of papers that might have been a time of honest journalism, but I doubt it. The paper has to look good, so that copies will sell. No businessman is going to hurt his sales by alienating part of his audience. If the news is universally unpopular, even if true, it won't be reported accurately.
My first experience with the dichotomy of truth versus employment came in college, when I was a student reporter trying to earn a living while going to college. I came up with what I thought was evidence that an organization, called the Humana Corporation, was unfairly trying to take over a local hospital. That story never saw the light of day, and I assumed that it was found to be inaccurate. Since then, Humana has become one of the largest corporations in the world, with branches in health care and insurance alike. On December 18, 2003, NTSP served a subpoena 'duces tecum' on Humana after learning from Complaint Counsel that Humana may have provided documents to them through voluntary process. Also, Federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Administrator Mark McClellan reported that 17,000 beneficiaries covered by Humana, Inc. health care plans are at risk from unsecured computer data containing their personal information. Humana has been sued as many as seventeen times by a single lawyer, in class action suits, and here's one more case of Humana in court.
"Big health insurers lost a motion recently to bar plaintiffs' lawyers
from obtaining internal records in cases that accuse the companies of
skimping on patient care, Dow Jones Business News reports. The federal
judge in Florida has lifted a stay blocking discovery in the lawsuits
that doctors and patients have filed against several leading health
insurers.In a court order, Miami US District Federico Moreno gave Aetna Inc.,
Cigna Corp., Humana Inc. and other insurers until
September 30, to begin providing the documents requested by the plaintiffs' lawyers,
said Archie Lamb, co-lead counsel representing the state medical associations of California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas. Mr. Lamb said this move allows lawyers for plaintiffs to investigate allegations against the HMOs, including racketeering charges. "We can now look behind the curtain of secrecy," he said. The plaintiffs have accused health maintenance organizations of conspiring to deny medical claims that insurers had given doctors incentives to limit care."
I begin to wonder if I was wrong, but I'll never know. The truth in journalism phrase is just that, a phrase that is used to inspire young reporters to try to get sensational stories. The actual "truth in journalism" is a sort of golden rule. " He who has the Gold, makes the rules." I wouldn't venture to say that commercial journalism is any worse than any other profession in terms of being controlled by money, but I will say that the journalists are not always forthcoming in admitting this fact.
Now we consider the citizen journalist. The writer, or speaker may be anyone and may be sounding off for any reason. He, or she, may have an ax to grind or just an issue that means a great deal to them. The only certainty is that they are not being paid to express their opinion. If they are actually journalists, and aware of Journalistic Ethics and responsibilities, then they should be more reliable than the professional. In most cases, they will not have any affiliation with a large corporation, or if they do, will be speaking out against it. In every case they will be speaking out of their own conviction, and no one else's. Just as we read more than one newspaper, and listen to more than one newscast, we should learn to balance the accounts of citizen journalists against other input, and try to make an informed decision about any story presented to us. I must remind my readers that without citizen journalists, much of what we now accept as historical and current fact would not exist.
As a final note, The Midnight Ride Of Paul Revere is not history, it is entertainment. It is a legend, and probably not even wholly true. There were other riders who actually did the work, Paul Revere was just easier to rhyme. Faced with this, and realizing that journalists would rather print the legend than research the facts.( The story of The story of Kodee Kennings leaps to mind) we should never rely on the major news for all of our information. In the world of news and the World News a safe motto would be "Caveat Emptor",(let the buyer beware) because too many of today's news outlets are trying to sell us a bill of goods.
Learn more about this author, V R Rutledge.
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No
Citizen journalists are not necessarily more trustworthy than professional journalists, though they do serve a crucial purpose in today's discourse.
Like any journalist, each citizen journalist possesses a personal "slant." He or she is liberal or conservative, a fan of the current White House administration or a critic. Even people who pride themselves on being non-partisan and issue-based have a personal opinion about the topics they cover that threatens to bleed through everything they write. This is human nature.
Professional journalists are trained to be aware of their biases and to affect an objectivity model that gives space to two or more sides of an argument. They learn the difference between a news or feature story and an opinion. They are taught to live and work by a code of ethics that includes fairness, accuracy and avoidance of libel.
What's more, the editorial process creates a system of checks and balances. Many complain of a liberal bias in the media. Studies have actually shown that, while journalists tend to lean a bit leftward, publishers tend to be politically conservative. Because of this, it is rare that anything truly incendiary shows up in the pages of the newspaper.
Some citizen journalists were once professional journalists. Even while at home in front of their computer, they try to maintain objectivity and abide by a code of ethics such as that devised by The Society of Professional Journalists. Other citizen journalists have been avid news watchers for years, and have a natural grasp of how to avoid the landmines of bias as best they can.
Some citizen journalists, however, display the hallmarks of the untrained writer. While at the keyboard, they do things that undermine a readers's trust: commit factual errors as well as making errors in grammar, punctuation and spelling; make unsubstantiated claims; doctor quotes or lift them out of context; and negect to contact those with a significant dissenting opinion. It is these writers that give citizen journalism a bad name.
However, it is better to have some good citizen journalists and some bad ones than not to have them at all. In many ways, the maverick reporter is the ideal journalist. He or she is free of the censorship, often subtle, that stems from the conflict between editorial and advertising concerns. Citizen journalists can dig as deeply as they want without having to kowtow to an editor or publisher. After all, you can't be fired from your own blog.
Armed with enthusiasm and sometimes weilding axes to grind, citizen journalist have broken important news, and covered stories that are overlooked by mainstream media. Even citizen journalists who regularly blog left or right can make a contribution to the media. This is because many professional journalists have taken the objectivity model so seriously that they no longer write news with any teeth or perspective. Obsessed with fairness, they answer every allegation on one side with an allegation by another, and match every quote with a dissenting quote.
It's important for professional and citizen journalists to know that objectivity is not the same as neutrality. If a company is engaged in documented environmental pollution, it's okay if they come out sounding like they are in the wrong in an article. By all means, call the company. Leave that message. Allow their PR specialist to give the company's spin on the issue. Allow the story to tell itself without an artificial attempt to render objective a story that, instead, should follow the proud tradition of journalistic mukraking.
Citizen journalists have become part of the vaunted Fourth Estate, which helps check the power of presidents and local politicians, of school district presidents and state legislators. As they gain influence, it is important that these self-appointed educators and pundits follow the same code of ethics that professional journalists are subject to. Only then are they as trustworthy as professional journalists who exercise caution, respect and responsibility.
Learn more about this author, Sarah Torribio.
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