Chapter 13 T HE C ULTURE OF J OURNALISM : Values, Ethics, and Democracy Kendall Rice

Chapter 13

THE CULTURE OF JOURNALISM: Values, Ethics, and Democracy

Kendall Rice

MODERN JOURNALISM in the Information Age

• Has allowed for informed, intelligent decision making• Has produced an excess of unimportant information

– Only adds to the problems and anxieties of everyday life– Too much “unchecked data” and too little meaningful

discussion generated by it– fails to make a significant impact on public and political

life• Opportunities to take part in public conversation and

civic debate

NEWS: What is News?

• Process of Gathering Information– Making Narrative Reports– Offering select frames of reference

• Within those Frames,– Helps make sense of

• Prominent people• Important events• Political issues• Cultural trends• Unusual happenings

in everyday life.

NEWS: What is News?

• 1963, Reuven Frank, NBC NEWS: “Every news story should…display the attributes of fiction, drama, it should have structure and conflict, problem and denouncement, rising and falling action, beginning, middle, and end.”

• Journalists as information-gatherers rather than storytellers

CHARACTERISTICS of News

• Conventional set of criteria determining newsworthiness has evolved:


• Timeliness:– Events that have just occurred recently


• Proximity:– Events that have occurred close by and are of

relevance to the reader or viewer


• Conflict:– Key ingredient of narrative– Representation of opposing views– Natural disasters and military confrontations


• Prominence:– Powerful, influential people who have important

roles in shaping rules and values of a community


• Human Interest:– Extraordinary events or occurrences happening to

otherwise “ordinary” people


• Consequence:– News that has any significant impact on the daily

life of the reader/ viewer


• Usefulness:– Information of value or benefit that may have

practical use to the reader/ viewer


• Novelty:– Extraordinary or shocking incidents outside of day-

to-day routine


• Deviance:– Any event that departs from established social

norms.

VALUES in American Journalism

• News is both product and process– Subtle values and shifting rituals – Adapted to historical and social circumstances

VALUES in American Journalism

• Horace Greeley, 1841: Reporters’ neutrality would make them “wimps who stood for nothing”

• That same neutrality now a major value of conventional journalism

• David Eason: “Reporters…have no special method for determining the truth of a situation nor a special language for reporting their findings. They make sense of events by telling stories about them.”

NEUTRALITY BOOSTS CREDIBILITY…and Sales

• Many modern journalists believe that their credibility is based in supposed objectivity and stance as neutral, unbiased observers

• Mass-marketing of newspapers in 1880s – Publishers become less opinionated and more

business-minded in order to reach a broader audience and increase sales

OTHER CULTURAL VALUES in Journalism

• Neutral journalism remains a selective process governed by deeper subjective beliefs.


• ethnocentrism – Perception of and writing about foreign affairs and

events from a strictly “American” perspective


• responsible capitalism – The naïve assumption that businesspeople

compete with one another not primarily to maximize profits but “to create increased prosperity for all.” Many journalists condemn monopolies but say little about the oligopolistic nature of the media


• small-town pastoralism– The tendency to favor the small over the large, the

rural over the urban, the innocence of the country over the corruption of the city.


• Individualism– Idealistic reporters are attracted to the profession

because it rewards the those who go to great lengths to confront and expose corruption and overcome personal adversity

– Dangers of focusing on personal triumphs• Failure to explain institutional decay• Preference for working alone• Difficulty in collaborative efforts

FACTS, Values, and Bias

• Facts with objective position • Values with subjective feelings• Offer the reader/ viewer details, data, and

description– Reporters as neutral “channels” of information,

responsible only for “getting the facts” and conveying them

FACTS, Values, and Bias

• Conservatives: Media as liberally biased• Liberals: Media as Favorable to Conservative

Positions• News bias toward storytelling, conflict, drama

and scandal• Evan Thomas, Newsweek: “Journalists are

looking for narratives that reveal something of character. It is the human drama that most compels our attention.”

ETHICS and the News Media

• Dilemma of disclosure vs. concealment• Deceptive tactics• Invasion of privacy• Conflict of Interest

ETHICS Ethical Predicaments

• absolutist ethics suggests that a moral society has laws and codes, including honesty, that everyone must live by

• situational ethics promotes ethical decisions on a case-by-case basis.

• Journalism Code of Ethics• Fine line between “right to know” and invasion of

personal privacy.• Avoidance of situations in which one may benefit

personally from the story being produced.

RESOLUTION of Ethical Problems

• Aristotle’s “Golden Mean”– Seeking balance and finding a middle ground between

two competing positions• Immanuel Kant – “Categorical Imperative”– Strict adherence to universal and unconditional moral

codes at all times and in all situations• Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill – “The greatest good for the greatest number,” to

distribute a good consequence to more people rather than to fewer, whenever we have a choice.”

DEVELOPMENT of Ethical Policy

• Laying out the case;• pinpointing the key issues;• identifying involved parties, their intents, and

their competing values; • studying ethical models; • presenting strategies and options; • formulating a decision.

REPORTING RITUALS and the Legacy of Print Journalism

• Journalists unfamiliar with being questioned themselves

• Rituals derived from American values

FOCUS on the Present

• Editors call for a focus on “the immediacy of the present”

• De-emphasis on political analysis and historical context;

• Accent on the new and the now• Rejection of “old news” for any new disruption

of daily routine

FOCUS on the Present

• “Get the story”• Getting the story first– ”Scoop behavior”• Herd journalism

– Invasion of privacy, exploitation of personal problems

• Getting the story wrong

RELY on Experts

• What vs. Whom a journalist knows• Use of experts to create conflict• Expert source bias• Blurred line between neutrality and expertise

ACT as Adversaries

• Adversarial relationship between reporters and figures, institutions they cover

• “Gotcha Story”• Use of “tough questioning”• “What is going on here?”– Vs. Why is it going on?• What can be done about it?

JOURNALISM in the Age of TV and the Internet

• The rules and rituals governing American journalism began shifting in the 1950s.

• Blurring the line between entertainment and information.

DIFFERENCES between Print and TV News

• Broadcast news driven by technology• Physical ad space; commercial slots• Detachment; Live, on-the-sport• Viewers’ regard for TV news anchors

SOUND BITES

• TV equivalent of a quote

PRETTY-FACE and Happy-Talk Culture

• Stereotypical, “ideal” news reporter– What topics should be covered, how one should

look and sound• Replication of past advertising images• Happy Talk:– Scripted banter; relaxed atmosphere– Often forced and at times inappropriate

PUNDITS, Talking Heads, and Politics

• Evening News – 24/7 News

• Decline in live reporting• Niche markets– Smart business[?]– Not so good journalism

• Strong opinions, not all the facts

CONVERGENCE Enhances and Changes Journalism

• Online news has added new dimensions to journalism

• Problems– Email instead of face to face interviews– Ease of access to and breadth of information• Plagiarism

• Demands on reporting and writing

THE POWER of Visual Language

• The visual language of TV news and the Internet often capture events more powerfully than words

• The Internet as a repository for news images and video

ALTERNATIVE MODELS: Public Journalism and “Fake News”

• Two competing journalism models– Informational• Neutral description of events

– Partisan• Analysis of occurrences and advocation of remedies

• Dominance of Informational on front page– Partisan confined to editorials

• Alternative models to challenge ideals

THE PUBLIC JOURNALISM MOVEMENT• Davis “Buzz” Merritt - key aspects of Public

Journalism:– Moves beyond “telling the news” to a broader mission of

helping public life go well…– Moves from detachment to being a fair-minded

participant in public life….– Moves beyond only describing what is “going wrong” to

imagining what “going right” would be like….– Moves from seeing people as consumers to seeing them

as a public, as potential actors in arriving at democratic solutions to public problems.

THE PUBLIC JOURNALISM MOVEMENT• Public journalism as a conversational model

for journalistic practice. • Modern journalism draws a distinct line

between reporter detachment and community involvement;

• public journalism—driven by citizen forums, community conversations, and even talk shows—obscures this line.

THE PUBLIC JOURNALISM MOVEMENT• Criticisms– Loss of • editorial control• Credibility• Balance• Diverse views

“FAKE” NEWS and Satiric Journalism

• “Fake” news shows appear as legitimate news sources

• Information seems truthful about politicians and manipulation of media and public opinion.

• Use of humor to critique news media and the political system.

• Greater range of emotions than “hard news”

“FAKE” NEWS and Satiric Journalism

• Journalism needs to break free from tired formulas—especially in TV news—and reimagine better ways to tell stories.

• We should demand news story forms that better represent the complexity of our world.

DEMOCRACY and Reimagining Journalism’s Role

• Journalism is central to democracy: – Both citizens and the media must have access to

the information that we need to make important decisions.

– the basic principles of democracy require citizens and the media to question our leaders and government.

DEMOCRACY and Reimagining Journalism’s Role

• Limitations of journalistic principals– No acknowledgement of moral or ethical duty to

improve quality of life– Value placed on news-gathering capability and

narrative

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

• Reporters first and foremost as observers and recorders

• Some have acknowledged a social responsibility

• Responsibility extends to readers as well

Documents

Chapter 13 T HE C ULTURE OF J OURNALISM : Values, Ethics, and Democracy Kendall Rice