News consumers must wonder how many polls, surveys and studies it takes for the journalism industry to get the message that it is failing the nation’s citizens. A most disturbing study released recently by the Knight Foundation found that half of Americans now believe journalists actually intend to mislead or misinform the citizenry.
Alarm bells should be going off in newsrooms around the country.
An industry based on dissemination of information can’t survive long if the customers think they are being snookered. Instead of pondering a redirection, however, many news editors and producers now proudly acknowledge that delivering accurate news of substance is… so yesterday.
A startling report out of Arizona State University’s Cronkite School of Journalism concludes that the objectivity standard for effective journalism is “outmoded.” The old notion of covering all sides of a story is now dismissed as “bothsideism,” an approach surprisingly criticized as misleading and disrupting the search for truth.
Today, over half of reporters believe it unnecessary to cover all sides of any particular topic equally. The study from the Pew Research Center confirms this activist approach to journalism, and it does not sit well with news consumers, who view unbalanced coverage as pushing journalists’ agendas. Clearly, citizens want a news presentation that separates reporting of facts and information from advocacy.
The presumptuous journalists who push this new “onesideism” apparently are now convinced they have a corner on “truth” and thus should steer news consumers to approved conclusions. If this is the future of “journalism,” there is no longer news reporting, just the dissemination of propaganda.
This trendy view of journalism’s mission is diminishing a once noble profession and harming the image of the many solid reporters who still want to serve the public’s interests instead of their own.
The public status of journalism has been on the decline for years, but journalism’s leaders apparently haven’t noticed. A Gallup poll released last fall showed only a third of all Americans trust the news media. A generation ago, that figure for trust was over 70 percent. A record 38 percent of Americans now indicate they have no trust at all in the news industry’s ability to report “fully, accurately and fairly.”
Not surprisingly, journalism rated poorly in Gallup’s recent ranking of public opinion by profession. Fortunately for the journalism profession, there are car salesmen, members of Congress, and telemarketers to fill out the bottom of the rankings.
A study from the Reuters Institute at Oxford University found the percentage of Americans who report being “very interested” in the news has declined from 67 percent to just 47 percent in the last seven years. Further, 15 percent of Americans acknowledge they don’t follow news at all, five times the number of just nine years ago.
This disengagement in news is dangerous for a self-governing citizenry. Constitutional Framer James Madison said, “A people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power knowledge gives.” A free press was supposed to be the mechanism through which citizens informed themselves. If people stop absorbing news, or don’t believe the content of news, they can’t do the duty expected of citizens.
It is difficult, however, to blame the public for disengaging from news. Those detached, former news consumers — now bystanders — likely figure there is no reason to read news from sources they can’t trust. And, sadly, a Rasmussen Reports study shows a wide majority of the public senses that media bias is only getting worse.
What’s more, declining and unstable readership and viewership puts a dent in media revenues, both from advertising and subscriptions. Newsroom cutbacks and other cost-saving measures have been announced recently at high profile journalism corporations, including CNN, USA Today/Gannett, News Corp, NPR, Washington Post, Associated Press and others. Obviously, fewer resources and staffers make it even harder for news outlets to provide extensive, enterprising and accurate news of heft.
But the worst fallout of journalism’s decline is more concerning than economics. Citizens who can’t rely on traditional press outlets for information will turn instead turn to social media or polarizing websites for “news,” where misinformation, confirmation bias, news silos, and conspiracies rule the day.
Self-preservation, and indeed the health of America’s “conversation of democracy” now demand the leaders of the news industry reverse course from journalistic crusaderism and re-embrace professional standards of fairness and public service.
Jeffrey M. McCall is a media critic and professor of communication at DePauw University. He has worked as a radio news director, a newspaper reporter and as a political media consultant. Follow him on Twitter @Prof_McCall.