When I picture what the perfect journalist would look like I see someone with a disheveled appearance likely due to lack of sleep because they have been working on a story all night or researching other news stories that are possible leads. I’m not sure if I say this because this is the way Hollywood portrays journalists however even so this is how I picture a dedicated journalist.
When thinking about skills missing in journalists today it is a difficult question to answer. I say this because there are so many different types of journalists out there all over the world with so many different opinions and outlooks on stories. Maybe that is the skill missing- lack of communication between journalist. I can read the same story in 5 different newspapers and finish with not only 5 different opinions but 5 versions of the same story. I am then left with wondering which one is closest to the truth.
When I think of topics that might be under reporting the first word that comes to mind is truth. Can we really blame journalists for this though? As we know the news organizations are being run by large corporations and add campaign companies that are telling the paper what they can and cannot print thus it leads to the news organizations to tell their journalist just how much truth they are allowed to reveal.
So I ask myself the question - What is it that sometimes prevents journalists from being journalists? To answer that question in regards to myself and what is preventing me to choose that career path I will give you these three reasons.
1. The ability to write freely is taken from you as soon as you begin to work for news organizations. As I mentioned above journalists are constantly being told what they can and cannot write in regards to truth.
2. Journalism isn’t what it was say even 50 years ago. With the internet and personal blogging there is a great change from when someone would go down the corner store and pick up a newspaper. I would not go so far as to say journalism is a dying profession, I would simply say it just isn’t what it used to be.
3. Finally going back to how I began this blog with my vision of what a journalist should look and then trying to relate that to myself… That is not what I want. I’ve talked to others in the profession and it seems to me that it takes a great deal of commitment and time, which includes time away from the office. Personally I just feel it would be an extremely stressful environment and unless you’re extremely committed it would be a difficult job indeed. If you are this type of person that can be so committed to the news and allowing the public to be informed (to a certain degree) then I have a great deal of respect for you. After all someone has to do it and if it’s you then all I have left to say is go for it.
To you then, what ideally would a journalist look like? In your perfect world. I agree with the restrictions you laid out, but how would you propose to change those things? Do you think it's possible for ownership to not interfere with journalism? How could that even be resolved?
ReplyDeleteI hope you dont mind if I jump into this conversation.... The only way ownership wouldn't interfere with journalism is if the owners didn't mind taking a massive hit to their revenues and started to expose corporate and government corruption....., and that's pretty much NEVER going to happen! These corperations have too much money and are too powerful to be stopped now. We would need a massive world wide revolution to stop the spread of these conglomerates at this point. And that's not exactly on the horizon either..... I really hope that I'm just a jaded pessimist about this stuff because I've noticed that my blog postings tend to show my general lack of confidence in the human race. But I really don't see a solution to complex problems like the one raised in this blog. I think there's just too many people overcrowding this little planet who all want the same thing....MONEY! And im sorry to say, that includes me. I don't necessarilly want to be rich, but I think we can all agree that we would like to live comfortably. Next time one of us gets a really good deal at a clothing store,maybe we should stop and think about why we got such cheap clothes from a name brand outlet. ....It seems that once corperations take something over, that's it, it's gone forever. At least the part of it that matters anyways. And thats what is happening to investigative journalism, it's on it's death bed at the hands of corporations.
ReplyDeleteDun-dun-dun. Mr. Negativity! I agree, I have no idea what could actually be done to solve the problem of ownership, but that doesn't mean I don't want to be a journalist. Maybe I'm just an eternal optimist! I don't think I can change journalism, but I don't want to give up on it either. Maybe that's why I'm interested in entertainment journalism, as opposed to "serious" journalism. I agree that money makes the world go around, but it's difficult for me to completely give up on the idea that nothing will ever change and journalism is "on it's death bed"!
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