Journalism used to be about telling the story - I won't rehash the modern history here but basically it became about making a difference. And that is the wrong reason to be a journalist because 'making a difference' is going to come down on where you sit regarding your personal advocacy and advocacy prevents journalists from being trusted guides for the public.
Fox News Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes spoke at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the group included journalism students. He told them to 'change majors' though it is clear the journalism students in the audience did not know what he meant so I will explain - if you want to be a rock star, going to an expensive university and majoring in music is not going to be much help. Practicing guitar would be a better way to go and if you must get a degree, get it in something more useful. That degree means absolutely nothing in the real world. If you really want to spend over $89,000 for the two-year environmental journalism program at Columbia, go for it, but it won't make you good at writing about the environment or anything else unless you practice so if you really want to be better journalist in the modern world of the 21st century, you should probably major in statistics instead.
When he wasn't trying to be funny - and Julie Moos at Poynter, a journalism school which bills its program as "the kind of journalism that enables us to participate fully and effectively in our democracy" (can your physics degree claim that, huh??) - dutifully shows when he failed, he made two good points, though they don't seem to like them. Because they are journalists. And maybe because they want to do progressive good works rather than telling the story.
“If you’re going into journalism if you care, then you’re going into the wrong profession … I usually ask (journalists) if they want to change the world in the way it wants to be changed.”
He's right. Editors 50 years ago said the same things. Journalists who go into it beset with intellectual cancer like they 'care' more than others end up mastering framing or being cheerleaders for causes, not trusted guides for the public on complex issues.
“Democracy depends on freedom of the press. But freedom depends on fairness in the press. There has to be more than one point of view.”
Obviously shrill science bloggers are going to shriek 'false balance!' yet again based on the notion that there can be more than one point of view about their insistence that Fox News sucks, but that is why they are science bloggers ranting on the Internet instead of doing anything of value. There aren't many hard positions in science, that is why science achieves breakthroughs - anyone claiming such is promoting their cultural agenda and not science. And certainly not journalism.
