Yesterday, I talked about why I think that “balance” in journalism is illusory. Today I’m going to talk a bit about how journalists’ pursuit of balance is a threat to democracy.
This isn’t some right wing (or worse) rant about how “evil” journalists are. In fact, I respect journalists and the work they do. I just want them to be better.
As a consumer of news, I want the best possible product. As an informed citizen, I want journalists to get the facts right, yes, but also to speak the truth in a way that current journalistic ethics seem to forbid.
The pursuit of balance and objectivity has led journalists to treat all points of view as if they have equal merit and standing, when they clearly do not. For example, yesterday the AP published a story about the healthcare reform “debate” and said, in part: “Unsubstantiated allegations that the legislation would promote euthanasia grabbed headlines.” [emphasis added]. That phrase implies that it might be possible to substantiate the “allegations”, as if the protesters who said it just hadn’t provided their sources.
In fact, one simple word change would have made all the difference: Had they said “unfounded allegations” that would have been factually correct and far less inflammatory than what I called them (“outright, bald-faced, deliberate lies” is the phrase I used elsewhere). This isn’t mere semantics: As the townhall charade was being played out, most of the mainstream newsmedia did little or nothing to point out that much of what was being screamed was simply not true, as if each lunatic conspiracy theory was as important to the debate as, say, questioning how it would be paid for.
I saw some refutations on ABC (US) News’ World News: One day they mildly pointed out that the rightwing charge for that day was incorrect, the next day they pointed out that President Obama was incorrect in saying that AARP had endorsed his plan, as if lunatic claims from the right were intellectually, politically or even morally equivalent to the mistake made by the president, as if the issues had equal weight.
The mainstream newsmedia has been doing this throughout the Obama Presidency so far. Rather than shooting down the “birther” movement as an hysterical conspiracy theory movement based on everything from imaginary nonsense through to deliberate lies (and racism), the newsmedia chose to simply report that it was going on, as if it were a valid "viewpoint".
The rightwing media—Fox Noise, the radio host “he-who-shall-not-be-named” and scores of others—have been actively promoting and distributing the latest conspiracy theories. We expect that. Similarly, the liberal media—MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann”, the “Rachel Maddow Show”, Democracy Now!, and publications like The Nation—have been countering the lies and distortions (as well as exposing the links between the “protests” and the corporate elites in the healthcare industries). However, the mainstream, supposedly centrist newsmedia have done little to nothing to end the lunacy.
I know that some argue that this isn’t the job of news reporters, it’s the job of columnists. Nonsense. Each news reporter has an obligation to the profession and a duty to his or her fellow citizens to report facts, including when claims aren’t true (and that’s true whether it’s someone on the left or the right who’s wrong, by the way). In that AP example, a simple word change would make clearer that the “allegation” was utterly without any merit whatsoever—it’s as simple as that.
And this is why I say that journalists’ pursuit of balance is a threat to democracy. By failing to provide citizens with the whole story, by being afraid to call a lie a lie (or an “unfounded allegation”, if you prefer), they are unwittingly helping to advance the truly lunatic, and to create an equal place for it with normal, reality-based political discourse.
Personally, I think there’s more than a bit of bias in this: They would never dream of letting loony leftwing claims or conspiracy theories be treated seriously, so their reluctance to call out the right seems suspicious. I admit that I don’t know why this is. Some would argue it comes from the inherent small “c” conservative mindset and goals of the media conglomerates that own most of the newsmedia. Others would say it’s the logical result of a generation of rightward movement in the body politic: What once was merely moderate is now called “liberal” and what once was liberal is now called “leftist” (often with a modifier in front implying an extreme).
Regardless of why this happens, it must stop. Journalists must take some responsibility for what they help to cause or advance, however inadvertently, and in presenting facts, they must present all of the facts—including calling out the truly crazy.
Update 09/09/09: Today ABC News' Dan Harris reported on the rightwing frenzy against President Obama's speech to schoolchildren, and after a commentator noted that anyone with a video cellphone can turn a story into national news, Harris said "And that's because the mainstream media love a good fight—even if the charges are unfounded." Exactly.
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