James Taranto has written his last “Best of the Web” column for the Wall Street Journal, moving now to another job at the WSJ. In his final column he writes about the collapse of journalism in the annus horribilis of 2016:
The fin d’année has occasioned a spate of columns about what went wrong with journalism in 2016. The column you’re reading now is in that category, although we have the luxury of extrospection. One who does not is Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times, who tackled the subject—or at least lurched in its direction—under the headline “Lessons for News Media in a Disorienting Year†in the paper’s Boxing Day edition.
We’ve come to regard Rutenberg as the liberal media’s chief spokesman. In August, as we noted at the time, he wrote a column urging reporters who “believe†that Trump is “dangerous†to “throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of the past half-centuryâ€â€”to abandon even the pretense of balance in favor of an “oppositional†approach.
That column appeared on the front page of the Times rather than in its usual spot in the business section. We construed that placement as a statement that Rutenberg’s opinions were Times policy, an inference that Dean Baquet, the Times’s top news editor, confirmed in an October interview with Harvard’s NiemanLab: “I thought Jim Rutenberg’s column nailed it.â€
Curiously, in his Dec. 26 column Rutenberg has nothing to say about his August advice, except that he disagrees with New York Post columnist Michael Goodwin’s characterization of it as (in Rutenberg’s paraphrase) “woefully unfair.†Does Rutenberg think the media followed his admonition to adopt an “oppositional†approach in covering Trump? In retrospect does he think it was wise advice? (Our answers, for what it’s worth, are largely yes and definitely not, respectively.)
[…]
Our advice to journalists who wish to improve the quality of their trade would be to lose their self-importance, overcome the temptation to pose as (or bow to) authority figures, and focus on the basic function of journalism, which is to tell stories. Journalists are not arbiters of truth; we are, unlike fiction writers (or for that matter politicians), constrained by the truth. But fiction writers bear the heavier burden of making their stories believable.
In the past you could reasonably rely on a distinction between the “News” and “Opinion” sections of a newspaper; that is no longer the case. Even in the “Opinion” section you could rely on statements of fact to have a basis in fact; that is no longer the case, either.
With that change firmly in place it is no longer even possible to filter opinion pieces through the corrective lens of the publications’ known biases. It is becoming increasingly difficult to figure out what is actually happening by reading diverse sources.
What is to be done? Are there reliable independent news sources? My experience has been that they are mostly propagandists of one stripe or another but I’m willing to learn.
If you have recommendations for good, solid sources of information, please leave them in the comments.
You mean Breitbart, or, say, MSNBC aren’t telling it straight? Shazam!
You used to think at least some outlets played it straight. When was the turning point? When Walter Concrite and CBS news, as they later admitted, decided to adopt advocacy reporting during the war, a tradition passed on to Dan Rather? Today, the tentacles of advocacy reach further than everyday news. For example, it’s very hard for me to take many reported economic statistics seriously, much less the context provided in their reporting. Academic or think tank pieces? With the now prevalent “data adjustments” not so much.
My conclusion is that personal experience or expertise, and common sense, have risen dramatically in importance. More than ant time in my memory you are on your own.
In August, as we noted at the time, he wrote a column urging reporters who “believe†that Trump is “dangerous†to “throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of the past half-centuryâ€â€”to abandon even the pretense of balance in favor of an “oppositional†approach.
If the media were to function in a oppositional approach to all politicians, they might be more trusted. As it is, what many suspected has been confirmed in the last year; namely, that many in the media are nothing but shills for the Democratic Party, and work hand in glove with them. They sold their souls for a combination of a seat at the table and ideological purity. I suspect this has at least something to do with news going from being a craft and trade to a profession and career.
If you have recommendations for good, solid sources of information, please leave them in the comments.
The Daily Planet? The Daily Bugle?
My conclusion is that personal experience or expertise, and common sense, have risen dramatically in importance. More than ant time in my memory you are on your own.
This is true, and is especially bad for the “innumerate”.