Posted on 09/14/2001 7:02:19 AM PDT by conservatism_IS_compassion
The framers of our Constitution gave carte blance protection to “speech” and “the press”. They did not grant that anyone was then in possession of complete and unalloyed truth, and it was impossible that they should be able to a priori institutionalize the truth of a future such human paragon even if she/he/it were to arrive.
At the time of the framing, the 1830s advent of mass marketing was in the distant future. Since that era, journalism has positioned itself as the embodiment of nonpartisan truth-telling, and used its enormous propaganda power to make the burden of proof of any “bias” essentially infinite. If somehow you nail them dead to rights in consistent tendentiousness, they will merely shrug and change the subject. And the press is protected by the First Amendment. That is where conservatives have always been stuck.
And make no mistake, conservatives are right to think that journalism is their opponent. Examples abound so that any conservative must scratch his/her head and ask “Why?” Why do those whose job it is to tell the truth tell it so tendentiously, and even lie? The answer is bound and gagged, and lying on your doorstep in plain sight. The money in the business of journalism is in entertainment, not truth. It is that imperative to entertain which produces the perspective of journalism.
And that journalism does indeed have a perspective is demonstrated every day in what it considers a good news story, and what is no news story at all. Part of that perspective is that news must be new--fresh today--as if the events of every new day were of equal importance with the events of all other days. So journalism is superficial. Journalism is negative as well, because the bad news is best suited to keep the audience from daring to ignore the news. Those two characteristics predominate in the perspective of journalism.
But how is that related to political bias? Since superficiality and negativity are anthema to conservatives there is inherent conflict between journalism and conservatism.. By contrast, and whatever pious intentions the journalist might have, political liberalism simply aligns itself with whatever journalism deems a “good story.” Journalists would have to work to create differences between journalism and liberalism, and simply lack any motive to do so. Indeed, the echo chamber of political “liberalism” aids the journalist--and since liberalism consistently exacerbates the issues it addresses, successful liberal politicians make plenty of bad news to report.
The First Amendment which protects the expression of opinion must also be understood to protect claims by people of infallibility--and to forbid claims of infallibility to be made by the government. What, after all, is the point of elections if the government is infallible? Clearly the free criticism of the government is at the heart of freedom of speech and press. Freedom, that is, of communication.
By formatting the bands and standardizing the bandwiths the government actually created broadcasting as we know it. The FCC regulates broadcasting--licensing a handful of priveledged people to broadcast at different frequency bands in particular locations. That is something not contemplated in the First Amendment, and which should never pass constitutional muster if applied to the literal press. Not only so, but the FCC requires application for renewal on the basis that a licensee broadcaster is “operating in the public interest as a public trustee.” That is a breathtaking departure from the First Amendment.
No one questions the political power of broadcasting; the broadcasters themselves obviously sell that viewpoint when they are taking money for political advertising. What does it mean, therefore, when the government (FCC) creates a political venue which transcends the literal press? And what does it mean when the government excludes you and me--and almost everyone else--from that venue in favor of a few priviledged licensees? And what does it mean when the government maintains the right to pull the license of anyone it does allow to participate in that venue? It means a government far outside its First Amendment limits. When it comes to broadcasting and the FCC, clearly the First Amendment has nothing to do with the case.
The problem of journalism’s control of the venue of argument would be ameliorated if we could get them into court. In front of SCOTUS they would not be permitted to use their mighty megaphones. And to get to court all it takes is the filing of a civil suit. A lawsuit must be filed against broadcast journalism, naming not only the broadcast licensees, but the FCC.
We saw the tendency of broadcast journalism in the past election, when the delay in calling any given State for Bush was out of all proportion to the delay in calling a state for Gore, the margin of victory being similar--and, most notoriously, the state of Florida was wrongly called for Gore in time to suppress legal voting in the Central Time Zone portion of the state, to the detriment of Bush and very nearly turning the election. That was electioneering over the regulated airwaves on election day, quite on a par with the impact that illegal electioneering inside a polling place would have. It was an enormous tort.
And it is on that basis that someone should sue the socks off the FCC and all of broadcast journalism.
Journalism has a simbiotic relation with liberal Democrat politicians, journalists and liberal politicians are interchangable parts. Print journalism is only part of the press (which also includes books and magazines and, it should be argued, the internet), and broadcast journalism is no part of the press at all. Liberals never take issue with the perspective of journalism, so liberal politicians and journalists are interchangable parts. The FCC compromises my ability to compete in the marketplace of ideas by giving preferential access addresses to broadcasters, thus advantaging its licensees over me. And broadcast journalism, with the imprimatur of the government, casts a long shadow over elections. Its role in our political life is illegitimate.
The First Amendment, far from guaranteeing that journalism will be the truth, protects your right to speak and print your fallible opinion. Appeal to the First Amendment is appeal to the right to be, by the government or anyone else’s lights, wrong. A claim of objectivity has nothing to do with the case; we all think our own opinions are right.
When the Constitution was written communication from one end of the country to the othe could take weeks. Our republic is designed to work admirably if most of the electorate is not up to date on every cause celebre. Leave aside traffic and weather, and broadcast journalism essentially never tells you anything that you need to know on a real-time basis.
To the extent the journalistic concensus exists to some extent because of external reality conservatives have no need to oppose it--but then, liberal politicians are not about to, either. In such case no controversy exists and journalism would drop the issue from disinterest.
If one blind man touches the elephant's trunk and perceives a snake and another blind man feels the elephant's leg and perceives a tree, their courage to disagree ultimately allows someone to listen to the various reports and infer the elephant itself--the truth, at least approximately. But what if the second blind man--and the third--hearing the first report, each trims his report to avoid contradiction for fear of seeming "biased"? How long will we then "know objectively" that the creature is a snake??
And if a politician knows that you believe the snake hypothesis, is there not political profit in proposing a snake control program whether he himself believes it or not? And will not the blind men and the politicians then make common cause against the person who scents peanut breath and somehow ferrets out the truth?
"Liberalism" is a combination of cowardice and duplicity. It is the ideology of the feckless--the preference for group solidarity over truth. And it calls itself "objectivity."
Well, my comments go back to what I said about journalism not being a monolithic culture. My view is even more extreme -- I'd say there are actually many _cultures_ of journalism.
I think you're right, in regards to some of them. There are expedient and exploitative scum right there in the very open at the very top of the journalism world -- in some parts of it. (And you're also right about the bias of the various media used to _implement_ journalism in the contemporary world. There are cultural biases that make conservative journalism next to impossible, and there are explicit technical bias built into all the different media -- different media, different technical biases. In many cases, these technical biases make conservative journalism difficult.
In the "mainstream" the situation is hopeless. But if a person "shops around" and knows what he's looking for, he can usually find what he wants in terms of objective info. Mark W.
I hear you saying, and I think I agree, that pieces of the truth--big pieces of the truth even--reside in things like advertisements which are more truth than poetry. Other pieces of truth, perhaps, in dogs that don't bark. But you have to know where to look, and who it is sensible to believe about what.
But the "mainstream"--the quasi-official propaganda organs which we are practically ordered to believe--is hopeless. And they are the "trains" of your parable . . .
I once saw a nature documentary ("Acorn the Nature Nut," with John Acorn) which devoted a half hour to discussing the differences between lizards, salamanders and newts. After discussing the technical differences, Acorn observed that, in the field, when you actually start observing real animals, most people have no troubles telling the three kinds of animals apart (well, two kind -- newts are a sub-type of salamander).
I think modern media is kind of like a couple dozen different kind of lizards, salamanders and newts... Differences that may seem hard to spot in theory are easier to spot in real life.
My impression of media these days is that although it may seem hard to keep track of biases and misdirection and exploitation etc., once you start attempting to keep track of such things, it gets easier. (That book "Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television" in fact provides tips for becoming aware of manipulation techniques, things to practice watching for and such.)
I've thought of a fairly non-controversial example of two bits of modern journalism which I think make my point about different cultures within journalism, about how bias can exist, and how a journalist can aspire to objectivity. Lurkers in the thread can read for themselves if they're interested in this stuff, to see the difference. Both of these books are written by experienced reporters (each has spent more than 15 years doing journalism). Oddly, one is a European living in America, and the other is an American who lives in Europe.
The book "Short Circuit," by Michael Mewshaw is an entertaining and very detailed view of a year on the pro tennis circuit. Mewshaw attends lots of events -- many with press credentials, one or two without), and he speaks to lots of insiders and paints a very vivid picture of what happens on court and off. This book, however, has a very heavy bias. The reporter believes that the businessmen running tennis are mostly low-rent people. Toward the end of the tour, the people running the game _pull_ his press credentials and he doesn't hesitate to indulge in some name calling and unflattering personal evaluations. It's fun stuff, but clearly the writer has an agenda. (This is the American living in Europe.)
The book "The Courts of Babylon : Tales of Greed and Glory in a Harsh New World of Professional Tennis," by Peter Bodo has a much seemier title, but is written in an amazingly different style. Bodo also paints a detailed and vivid picture of the world of pro tennis based on meetings and interviews with insiders (he's a vertern reporter from "Tennis" magazine -- a European living in America). But he is amazingly even-handed in his approach to events and people. (Indeed, he devotes a chapter to Born Again Christians in tennis and, although he speaks of his own bias opening the chapter, his coverage of the topic is like a textbook example of how a person can recognize his own point-of-view, recognize that others have points-of-view, and do a great job of stepping back from all that subjectivity and create a great account which seems to be a reasonably objective and fair assessment of the overall reality of at hand.)
Sorry to go on at such length here, but I wanted to give specific example of objective vs. subjective journalism. Mark W.
Sorry to go on at such length here
--but how can you speak of apology when you have taken my discussion seriously, and given serious thought to my opinion, and your own? By no means! Mark, two things--first, that the tenor of your reply reminds me of--me. Do you have to edit and reedit to come out with a post that you can bear to reread after posting? I do. Second, it seems to me that you are pretty close to making my own point when you say that the writer who declares his own I have a thing about the use of the term "bias". Because ironically, I see it as journalism's favored critique. As long as you are speaking of "bias" you are playing on their home field--for they then can assume a posture of high dudgeon that you have the effrontery to accuse them of being unethical. Seeing that coming, I prefer to use the morally neutral term "perspective." They are after all entitled by the First Amendment to have a perspective--the actual legitimate beef against them is that, having a blatantly obvious perspective hiding in plain sight, they have the gall to claim to be "objective." And to sniff that, for example, "Rush Limbaugh is not a journalist." No, he's not--because he declares up front that he is conservative, and thus predictably will be closer to the truth than the "objective journalist" will be.bias perspective up front is the one whose writing is less, rather than more, tendentious. The one who affects to have no perspective is the one who is insufferably self-righteous. And tendentious.
On reflection the thing to understand about "liberals" who discuss the Constitution is that most of their references to it belong in quotes. Here is the present case, and my argument precisely on First Amendment grounds is critiqued as an attack on the "First Amendment."
But they do not mean the text as written but what they wish that text said--and what they arrogantly pretend that it does say. The liberal "First Amendment" says that Christianity should be viewed with suspicion by the government--not the other way around, as intended. The liberal "First Amendment" says that political parties' campaign activities can be subsidized for the purpose of controling them.
The liberal "First Amendment" says that a concensus of the powerful (i.e., "the establishment") determines truth--especially the WRT the lie that journalism is not the establishment.
If you listened to Mr. Gore talk about judicial nominees during the 2000 campaign, he promised to uphold the "Constitution"--his meaning, pretty explicity, was that liberals were not to be bound by any inconvenient strictures of the actual text of the Constitution.
However... who in their right mind can regard the current gaggle of blow dried air head news readers as "journalists"??? They collectively wouldn't know a true journalist if one came up and socked them in the nose and bit them on the a$$!! These people are teleprompter readers, nothing more. I admit, that requires a specific talent, but they can be no more considered "journalists" than can the food demonstrator at the local Safeway. In fact, I surmise that the food demonstrators at Safeway, when viewed by "objective standards", probably has more moral and ethical qualities than said "news readers".
While I can wholeheartedly agree that nobody can be "objective"- we are all influenced by our life's experiences- the skill of imparting the facts of a given situation minus the subjective trappings of same is something that can be learned, taught and probably quantified.
I am reminded of the "judges" in Heinlein's Stranger In A Strange Land, who were trained to set aside "subjective" biases and to base their work only on "objective" observations and facts. True Journalists would strive to be able to describe situations factually, without their own or other subjective biases coloring their work. Editorial commentary would have none of those restrictions, nor should it.
I have many times in the past called one of the local teevee stations, "our National Enquirer affiliate". Listen to their "news" anchors, and you can literally see the words jumping out of the front page of the National Enquirer/Globe/Star/World News editions. They choose the most emotionally charged words and phrases to describe a situation, then cut to a self serving commercial for their news casts calling them "the most trusted". Hah! Most sensational, most emotional, most biased, yes. Most trusted- not by anyone with an IQ greater than their hat size! And these people call themselves "journalists". Yeah, right.
I recently did a movie production, and for my "cameo", I played one of those teevee-teehee "reporters" from one of the local snooze stations. I wrote the "report" as strongly biased, over-the-top, sleazy newstype as I could to attempt to create as strong a parody as I could, and when I saw the finished tape, it was so tame that it couldn't hold a candle to the real snooze guys on the teevee than evening. Just shows to go ya that you have to work hard to get to be in-credible. And these guys do it daily, and make it look easy! Sheesh!
The "news business" has become exactly that- business. If it bleeds, it leads, ad nauseam. And teevee snooze business has turned newspapers [and I use the term "news" papers very advisedly] into competitors for the biggest, bloodiest "if it bleeds it leads" business. Watch the White House "news" gaggle... I cannot believe that these sub-moron IQ idiots are even allowed to work for a business, let alone one that calls themselves "journalists". I honestly believe that any one of them that can watch their performances and questioning in those news conferences and actually believes that look like anything higher than a mental retard shouldn't be allow to walk around with a sharp pencil. And these are the people that then go back and "file a report" that will be read my thousands or millions of people as gospel. If that were me, I would be too ashamed to even write my report, let alone put my name on the by-line. I wouldn't want anyone to know how obviously screwed up I was.
I am sincerely glad that I didn't go to journalism school, from what I've seen of the results. I have run a small publishing company, which put out a weekly newspaper. Fortunately, we didn't consider ourselves "journalists", and so we were just a thorn in the side of the local politicos, because we published a lot of true things about the local corrupt government. The big local paper was in the pocket of the gubbmint, and no one else would say anything against the corrupt regime; then there was us. We had government employees from all levels (grunt levels, of course) bringing us letters, documents, memos, etc., showing the corruption. We double checked them and then printed them. Wow! Want to start feeling the pressure!! Just shine the spotlight of public attention on the cockroaches of the bureaucracy! Amazing!
Unfortunately, it was a labor of love and a full time job (and more) that was being done in addition to our real full time jobs, and circumstances led to its demise... although not from the political pressure. Looking back on it, I'd really, immodestly, have to say that we were 100 times more the "journalists" than any of the snooze-media airheads of today. But then again, there is that "lack of self-importance" that contributed to the journalism, not the ego that seems all encompassing in today's "news busybodies"
Have any of the older Freepers noticed the rather new technique of these so-called "journalists" of keeping the camera on an interview subject while they break down in tears, blubber incoherently, wail, moan, gnash teeth, or whatever is applicable to the "story" they are telling, and completely useless to the "objective" interview? I seem to remember when real "journalists" on teevee would never include long moments of tearful breakdowns by the interview subject or similar subjective pap. In fact, I'm sure that there were probably written guidelines or stylebooks which real journalists went by that prohibited such emotional crap in their pieces. Now, that is all you ever see. In fact they seem to pride themselves on just how much of a "Jerry Springer moment" they can include as many times as possible in a short snooze segment interview. This is exactly the kind of "sensationalizing" the "news" that we seem to be decrying. Good journalists wouldn't allow that stuff to creep into their reporting, because that's what they are doing is reporting. Not selling, not convincing, not proselytizing- reporting.
As soon as more people wake up to the fact that these enterprises are a business, not a Constitutionally protected enterprise, and that they are subject to economic pressures, we will start to see changes, viz., the Politically Incorrect/Bill Maher situation. Don't call, email, fax or Pony Express the newspaper or teevee station about their air-heads blatant liberal bias. They already know that and encourage it, and they ain't about to change unless there is an economic incentive to do so. Like one of Maher's ex-sponsors said: He has every right to say what he wants, but we have every right to put our advertising dollars where we want. Peter Jennings would be on a bus, train or plane back to Canada in a second if every business that had a commercial on any of his snooze shows were to receive cogent, coherent, non-ranting letters stating that the writer would no longer purchase their product if they continue to advertise on his show. Granted, there are millions of sheeple watching him, but very few will actually make the effort to put a coherent message down on paper, research the highest executive in charge, mail it with a "return receipt", and then follow up with either a response to their response or just a follow up later on, to let them know you are serious.
Sorry for the long rant, but this has been an enlightening discourse, with the exception of the posts by the "journalism" idiot previously identified- but then, again, maybe his liberal idiocy is part of what stimulated this dialogue. 8^)
Seems that our Founding Fathers had infinitely more wisdom and vision that we sometimes think:
"Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper."
--Thomas Jefferson to Nathaniel Macon, 1819
And for our young "journalist" who cited Mr. Pulitzer:
"An able, disinterested, public-spirited press, with trained intelligence to know the right and courage to do it' can preserve that public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery. A cynical, mercenary, demagogic press will produce in time a people as base as itself."
--Joseph Pulitzer, American newspaper publisher
Your "up close and personal" account is fascinating . . .
Trying to parody broadcast journalism! LOL!
I applaud your efforts at doing what journalist claim is their job. But I have concluded that the best thing to do is just throw the term "objective journalist" overboard.
Rush Limbaugh says, "I am not a journalist," and it used to bug me; after all there is no such thing as a "journalism license" so why did he cede the point? But now I agree--he is not what journalists claim to be--nobody is, and that's the point.
The "objective journalist" needs to be asked how he knows that what he is reporting is the most important thing to talk about? History will probably show that the real deal was ignored at the time. Like Osama Bin Laden's antiAmericanism of long standing . . . and the consequences of the fall of the Shah of Iran. Being off-point can be a huge 'bias', to use the term as it applies to broadcast journalism.
The FCC claims the power to regulate communication systems
not because of their physical effects, hazards, and the like,
but precisely because they enable communication.
How can such restrictions pass constitutional muster?
They were not "judges" (which would require sitting in "judgement", i.e., forming an opinion). They were "Fair Witnesses" who could be relied to testify only to objective facts perceived by the senses. It is a talent/profession our society badly needs (sorry, I am not "the real thing"), but does not currently have in sufficient abundance.
It was pretty effective in telling us about: The death of Princess Diana
The death of JFK Jnr
The attack on the World Trade Center.
I will grant the need to learn about the disruptions caused in NYC, especially of traffic. But WTC is, thankfully, a one-of-a-kind event. Do we sit glued to a radio or TV 24/7 so that we will know instantly if another such incident occurs? Do we lie awake nights listening to the radio to learn of such a thing instantly? Clearly you are paraniod if that sounds like a good idea.
As to the other two I await your explanation as to what, exactly, you think I might have done about JFK's assassination or the princess' death, had I been given a blow-by-blow account of it in real time?
Factor in that the media is also the perfect tool to beat political correctness into everyone's head like a torture drum and you have the perfect fascist social engineering machine.
Okay there is 20th century political TV news in a nutshell.
. . . I await your explanation as to what, exactly, you think I might have done about JFK's assassination or the princess' death, had I been given a blow-by-blow account of it in real time?
I'm not asking you to do anything.Truly? I am not sure about that.
If, heaven forefend, you were to find yourself in peril because the ice on the lake was thinner than you suspected and you are now in frigid water, you would draw my attention to your plight and earnestly ask me to venture in some way to help you escape. I on the other hand would be put in a different distress: lacking a rope I must now choose between behaving as a coward, and venturing into harms' way myself at the risk of sharing your fate.
Journalism creates certain emotional facts. It is not entirely clear that they are healthy for the audience. Of course I wasn't in Dallas when JFK died, nor in Paris when the princess died--but still, I am being asked at some emotional level to participate in the event by being a passive--hence implicitly cowardly--bystander to tragedy.
Of course drama does the same thing, even when we have conscious knowledge that in fact it's all "pretend." But your heart rate doesn't seem to know that, does it? Certainly I am not proposing the abolition of drama, but having said that I can and do question the dosage level to which we subject ourselves.
The holocaust movie footage of emaciated Jewish corpses represent a historical reality. It is well to be clear that we must face down any temptation towards a slippery slope headed in any such direction, and seeing that footage once is perhaps therefore salutory. But seeing that same footage daily could, I would argue must, tend to desensitize the viewer in whom it caused no worse imbalance.
"Dosage makes the poison." I consider broadcast journalism to be an overdose.
Most people have no idea what goes on even in Journalism 101. Kids, aspiring newhounds, are taught that "objectivity" is impossible. Kids are taught that rather than _trying_ to be objective, the reasonable thing to do is to choose a point-of-view and deal with it. (I heard a journalist on talk radio just yesterday discussing this point.)
Not in my clases they ain't.
I mention to my students that objectivity is nearly impossible (we carry a mind-set to every story we write, for example) .. but that we should at least strive for impartiality, which is as close as we can ever get.
Regards
Sadim
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