Is objective news coverage a worthwhile objective?

6-1-03

By EDWARD CONE
News & Record

The widespread glee over the problems at the New York Times involves more than just glee over the problems at the New York Times. The concept of objective journalism itself is under assault, and the recent failures of the nation’s most prestigious newspaper are held up as examples of a decline in credibility at an institution that embodies this outdated ideal.

Certainly a healthy part of the reaction to the Times’ travails comes down to seeing the smartest kid in class flunking a test, a whistle-blower hearing some whistles of its own. There are serious problems at the paper. Serial liar Jayson Blair fooled too many senior staffers for too long, at great cost to the Gray Lady’s reputation, and some managerial seppuku would seem to be in order for allowing that to happen.

A lesser scandal, the use of uncredited stringers by reporter Rick Bragg, kept the Times-bashers clucking last week. Bragg’s transgressions were nothing compared to Blair’s. Experienced writers often add value to – and receive credit for -- the work of their junior colleagues. Bragg seems to have abused this privilege, and in the poisonous post-Blair atmosphere this erstwhile favorite of editor Howell Raines ended up resigning. 

But there is something larger than schadenfreude at work here, and that is an ongoing reassessment of the notion of objective journalism, or more accurately, a denial that such a thing even exists. The idea is that all journalism reflects a point of view, so trying to pretend otherwise is somehow dishonest.

It’s an interesting argument, especially coming as it so often does  from the same conservatives who complain about relativism and the vanishing notion of absolute truth. When I hear it, I think of the guy who leans in close and tells you that everyone cheats on his wife, which means of course that he cheats on his wife.

In this scenario, the Times has a left-wing agenda that bleeds from its editorial pages into its news coverage. The same is said of the BBC, and of the mainstream media in general. The answer to this perception of a liberal media is an avowedly conservative press, which pretends its competitors are playing the same game that it is. Reporters and editors who strive to deliver facts without political bias are called biased for not adhering to somebody else’s orthodoxy and presenting the facts to support it– if you are not with us you’re against us.

When the influential InstaPundit weblog chortles that the New York Post had a better year for circulation growth than the Times, it’s comparing a serious if deeply flawed news organization with an infotainment product that pulls stunts like superimposing pictures of weasels on news photographs of anti-war allies. Funny, perhaps, but no more an example of serious news than, um, a Jayson Blair article.

The red-hot Fox News Channel, which mocks the ideal of objectivity with its ironic use of the slogan “fair and balanced,” is the most visible example of the trend toward pushing opinions via editorial content. Greensboro’s own pugnacious Rhinoceros Times was ahead of the curve in its ideological approach to covering local issues. Weblogs of various colorations, which have assumed a key role as idea-generators at the top of the media flowchart, are part of the same phenomenon.

Allowing ideology to serve as news editor can be great fun and often provides energy that drives valuable reporting and analysis. But the leap from the fact that we all have opinions to the rejection of the objective ideal is a perilous one. It empowers extreme viewpoints at the expense of any carefully vetted, widely recognizable recitation of the facts. If the definition of “truth” becomes “the truth as I spin it,” then all competing truths are equal. That’s a radical idea, not a conservative one.

Institutions are only as perfect as the humans that populate them, which is to say not very, as proved with wearying regularity in government, religion, the press, and pretty much everywhere else. Even when a Jayson Blair isn’t committing fraud, points of view can shape what gets covered and how. Sometimes reporters just get stuff wrong. Objective truth is an ever-receding target, like Gatsby’s green light, but the pursuit remains worthwhile.  

There are greater threats to the quality of news than a rogue reporter or an out-of-touch editor at the New York Times. The increasing concentration of media power in corporate hands, which could be blessed by the FCC tomorrow, is a big one. The assault on the ideal of objective journalism is another.

Edward Cone (efcone@mindspring.com or www.edcone.com) contributes a column to the News & Record on Sunday.

Last update: 6/1/2003; 10:29:34 AM.