As the democratic world reeled over the Supreme Court-driven loss of abortion rights in the US, old media stumbled. Keep your head down, they instructed their reporters — we’re going to both-sides our way through this.
More evidence, if it was needed, that traditional media lacks the confidence to confront the crisis of democracy and human rights in Australia and the US driven by increasingly assertive, hard-nosed conservatives.
Coming so soon after Australia’s media failings in the recent election, it’s a reminder that the journalism emergency is global — or at least Anglosphere wide.
What happened in the US last week has been a reluctance to recognise that human rights are not just another blue between political players (like, say, Australia’s entertaining weekend spat over allocation of staff resources). What, after all, is the point of journalism in a liberal democracy if the media fail to focus the practices and ethics of the craft to defend human rights when power overreaches?
At the weekend, America’s largest commercial publisher, Gannett, started with a mealy-mouthed “respect all views to reproductive rights” before ordering its journalists: “You cannot use social media to take a political position … or express personal opinions about an outcome or ruling.” And more: see any colleague “posting inappropriate comments”? Dob ’em in!
The New York Times emailed some staff with a chin-stroking justification: “If our journalists are perceived as biased or if they engage in editorialising on social media, that can undercut the credibility of the entire newsroom.”
Rely on the social media platforms to take it all a step further, with a Meta internal memo on Friday directing staff not to discuss abortion or the Supreme Court decision on internal workplace channels due to a “heightened risk of creating a hostile work environment”.
And trust anti-union capital to main-chance it, with Starbucks promising to support staff members wanting an abortion — as long as they weren’t union.
Journalists pushed back. Former host of National Public Radio’s “It’s Been a Minute”, Sam Sanders, tweeted to his 200,000 followers: “The avoidance of the ‘perception’ of ‘bias’ ultimately means the only reporters to be trusted are those whose lives haven’t been directly touched by the issues and struggles they’re covering …
“It’s a default towards the most privileged in a newsroom. It’s a default to the men, to the straight people, to the white people, to the well-off.”
There’s already a real-life example of how that works in US media with The Washington Post directing reporter Felicia Sonmez not to write about sexual assault. As an assault survivor herself, it said, she couldn’t be trusted to be objective.
Wesley Lowery (who won the Pulitzer prize for his Black Lives Matter reporting) asked: “What if we premised our journalism and relationship with readers on the value that all humans deserve equal rights and thus an individual newsroom member tweeting in response to 50% of the population potentially losing bodily autonomy could never be said to undermine that trust”?
The call for a cool both-sides media is not demand driven. It’s what senior journalists think focus groups are telling them is the answer to the crisis of “trust” in journalism. The soon-to-be launched new global news start-up Semafor said last week it would “take the black box of the news article … and open it up on every axis” by splitting it up between “factual information, analysis from the reporter and a range of perspectives on the news”. (It also intends to make the writer’s name the same size as the headline, the one idea most journalists can get behind.)
The “say nothing so no one knows what you think” doesn’t come from the audience. It’s driven by risk-averse corporate suits. It’s what ABC insiders have long called “the pre-emptive buckle”, long the play-safe default of big media.
The answer is to be open about how the practices and ethics of journalism deliver the best possible approximation of “truth” available right now — turning complexity into an engaging simplicity without losing nuance. As Lowery said, it demands an objectivity of process, not a professed objectivity of thought.
Not all human rights get both-sided, of course. Freedom of expression? Or, rather, freedom of the press? Old media are happy for staff to be vocal about that. But by stripping that one right out of the broader human rights framework, corporate media turn this one point from a key democratic principle into a self-interested plaint.
Bringing “both sides” to a fight over individual rights delivers more than bad journalism. It legitimates the attackers, and aligns the media with the powerful.
That’s not what journalism was — or should be — built for.
Well said. And it’s not like the Right-identifying media feel any sense of obligation to pose the moderate view; far from it.
It’s difficult to see what balance could mean on issues that are heavily value-dependent, because generally the disagreement between positions is intractable. There’s gonna be no facts that settle the abortion question because the anti-abortion and pro-abortion positions rest on very different moral foundations, complicated by issues of tribalism and circumstance.
To even call something a right (remember that the anti-abortion crowd talk about a “right to life” for the foetus) is convention, backed by sociopolitical norms, but convention none the less. We’re always revising where discussion goes beyond the pale because as a society what we hold sacred changes. The line on abortion and autonomy is no different.
From my perspective, what the media could do better on this issue is to find the best articulations of the various positions and air them. Otherwise we won’t understand why it is others think so differently from us on what are supposed to be issues of grave importance. By taking one side, the media is editorialising for us what’s views are worth knowing about and what aren’t. The fact that this is contentious makes giving the issues a fair hearing (even if one side is garbage) an imperative in an open society. Otherwise we’re doomed to misunderstand each other with the media complicit in that outcome.
Thought prevoking article, more like this please.
However I think its largely wrong and symptomatic of what is actually wrong with anglosphereic(?) activist journalism and Crikey/Fox in particular. Journalists need to be seen as impartial agents if the masthead is to have credibility. If they arent happy with this, then start their own mast head.
Journalists are not meant to be cheer leaders for a political side. Which ever way you cut it, we shouldnt know the loyalties of the publication, if not the journalist. Sure, write opinion pieces on topics, but then balance them with other opinion pieces. Today’s twin articles on Qantas is a great example. First I’ve seen here at Crikey for a very long time and no one here or at Fox is interested in establishing this as the norm. Too many rusted on readers and too much deliberate bias by the owners. Cant we be trusted to decide for ourselves???
When you mention human rights being exempt from balance, how does that work in practice? Is there another side to Chinas behavior in south China sea, wrt the Urgars or Russia in Ukraine, or US in Iraq? Who gets to make this call for society? In the abortion issue, there is a large percentage of Americans against abortion. I dont agree, but their rationale needs to be heard in a balanced way. Cheerleading society to an opinion without giving both sides is a damn slippery slope.
Buggered if I’m going to outsource my right to think to a journalist!
The ‘rationale’ of the minority of Americans who are against against abortion is well known, as is the grounding from which it stems. The ‘rationale’ is that, human life begins at conception and that basically, no-one but god can give or take life at any stage. That leads onto and includes the anti-contraception and and anti sex education prevalent in especially the less-educated, poorer, mostly rural, Republican
gerry-mandered, religiously indoctrinated states.
The position of the pro-choice majority is also well-known – that the imposition of religion-driven ignorance and state intervention produces high rates of harm, death and poverty in those unable because of state intervention to access sex information and health care.
The two will always be irreconcilable because they are completely opposed – one driven by religious beliefs and the other by the need to a pragmatic solution to an age-old and never ending problem.
The position of the antis is that any means to achieve their objective; lying, violence, murder. stacking of the political and judicial systems, gerrymandering everything in sight, public shaming, withholding of medical aid and in the most immoral, unethical, divisive manner, to threaten the very existence of the USA because of their illegitimate capture of the judicial system.
The position of the pros is that they are and always have been involved with the welfare of the needy and are willing to use legal means to achieve their ends.
To claim that the views of the again, minority of US citizens who are anti-abortion etc are not being heard is to ignore the truth. We have heard, and dismiss them as not relevant and destructive; in the end anti-humanistic.
By the way. I still believe that destruction of a fetus, except in the usual exceptions is murder. That does not give me the right to dictate the behaviour of those desperate to choose their own life free from externally imposed sanctions.
We all have different definitions of how long before birth should be deemed murder. First month, first trimester, day before birth, day after birth, choosing to use contraceptives….
At some point society needs to draw a line and enforce externally imposed sanctions.
If it truly is the majority they will vote in Politicians that support abortion and have the laws supporting abortion passed.
Until then it is difficult to judge what the. Majority want.
Naive reply, or is it deliberate and therefore lying?
The majority of states that are or have banned abortion are those which are under the thrall of the minority Republicans, who have gerrymandered their way into power and are using that disgraceful bastardisation of the electoral system to force their wills on the majority.
Instead of claiming that it is difficult to know the will of the majority, GOOGLE it; the facts are laid out that some 67% of Americans are pro-abortion.
Journalism, especially in the US, has always been political. The first amendment guarantees it. It’s the sam in the rest of the Anglosphere – he who pays the piper calls the tune. Hence the political views of the publication have always been evident – in the UK, working class never would read The Times or Punch etc, while the readers of those publications would never read the penny dreadfulls or the run-of-the-mill tabloids.
I do agree with your plea for a presentation of both sides, but not with the implied suggestion of equivalence.
If you want to make up your own mind, then call for facts, not opinion, because opinion has always a tendency to be selective in it’s use of facts.
No-one can take away your right to think and form your own conclusions, but they can and do try to influence your thinking with ‘alternative “facts”‘.
I typed that in a breakfast hurry. I agree fully with your thoughts.
Thank you. We all need to find a meeting of minds, even if sometimes expressed differently.
Nothing more is required than to enforce the MEAA Journalist Code of Ethics:
MEAA members engaged in journalism commit themselves to:Honesty Fairness Independence Respect for the rights of othersJournalists will educate themselves about ethics and apply the following standards:1. Report and interpret honestly, striving for accuracy, fairness and disclosure of all essential facts. Do not suppress relevant available facts, or give distorting emphasis. Do your utmost to give a fair opportunity for reply.
2. Do not place unnecessary emphasis on personal characteristics, including race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, age, sexual orientation, family relationships, religious belief, or physical or intellectual disability.
3. Aim to attribute information to its source. Where a source seeks anonymity, do not agree without first considering the source’s motives and any alternative attributable source. Where confidences are accepted, respect them in all circumstances.
4. Do not allow personal interest, or any belief, commitment, payment, gift or benefit, to undermine your accuracy, fairness or independence.
5. Disclose conflicts of interest that affect, or could be seen to affect, the accuracy, fairness or independence of your journalism. Do not improperly use a journalistic position for personal gain.
6. Do not allow advertising or other commercial considerations to undermine accuracy, fairness or independence.
7. Do your utmost to ensure disclosure of any direct or indirect payment made for interviews, pictures, information or stories.
8. Use fair, responsible and honest means to obtain material. Identify yourself and your employer before obtaining any interview for publication or broadcast. Never exploit a person’s vulnerability or ignorance of media practice.
9. Present pictures and sound which are true and accurate. Any manipulation likely to mislead should be disclosed.
10. Do not plagiarise.
11. Respect private grief and personal privacy. Journalists have the right to resist compulsion to intrude.
12. Do your utmost to achieve fair correction of errors.
In the case of Russia vs Ukraine for example, both sides need to be fairly and accurately reported not just “Russia bad, Ukraine good” (which is all we get). Let the reader make up their own minds.
The key question is whether you believe it’s only the right wing media that is failing in these ways. Crikey is full of people (both journalists and subscribers) quick to point finger at Murdoch, but overlook the same behavior on their own team.
So what is your justification for the very existence of Murdoch?…………
His continued presence in the world serves no useful purpose and causes immense damage.
For all their fake Christianity, if Jesus came back today the Americans would have him nailed to a tree by tomorrow.
More likely hanged from a tree next to a burning cross.
Proof ? Just remember, assertions made without evidence may be dismissed without evidence.
I believe that all sides fail the test and the standards required to accurately and responsibly report on events.
“In the case of Russia vs Ukraine for example, both sides need to be fairly and accurately reported not just “Russia bad, Ukraine good” (which is all we get). Let the reader make up their own minds.’
Hear we go with the deniers’ false equivalence and obfuscation again.
Russia’s case is well known – a powerful, authoritarian, if not fascisistic dictatorship neighbour invades a less powerful democratic one in order to seize territory; bombs the bejesus out of it and rapes and murders its’ citizens over a number of years and conflicts.
Ukraine’s case is that it was a sovereign democratic nation recognised by the the rest of the world. except for Russia.
It made no excursions into recognised Russian territory, but did the best it could to defend itself. Which it has done admirably to date, much to the chagrin of the aggressor.
To seek to see it any other way is to employ the moral equivalence of the Hitler appeasers, and we all know how that ended up, don’t we ?
And US invasion of Iraq ‘to defend’ Kuwait?
It was the massive deployment in Saudi of US troops known as Desert Shield, including – shock horror – females who drove truck, which was the final straw for erstwhile US catspaw, ally and agent, Osama bin Liner.
Always top of his wishlist thereafter was their removal from the holy sands.
Deniers? False equivalence? Hardly. Just sick of on sided views on everything.
Like all Western aggression denialists and apologists, you forgot to mention “the Wests” absolute failure to even remotely consider Russia’s security issues with NATO eh Sport? Whether NATO considers itself not to be a threat is irrelevant. It’s up to the nation concerned (in this case Russia) as to whether it feels threatened not the military block threatening (BTW. Russia has maintained this stance since 2008). NATO lost any semblance of being a defensive alliance after it invaded Serbia in the 90’s.
I don’t agree with what has happened to Ukraine but if the West had actually considered Russia’s position instead of taking its usual arrogant “we are the West and know best” position then this may never have occurred. We will never know because “the West” is always right aren’t they? Just ask them.
Tell that to the dog knows how many killed, raped, tortured and murdered in Iraq, Afghanistan and dog knows how many other invasions the West has committed without legitimate cause. But that’s OK, they weren’t White European countries were they?
Journalism is about accurate reporting and analysis of the situation to enable reasoned discussion not the BS PR pieces that we receive “Ukraine good, Russia bad”.
Journalism is about reporting facts not opinions be they personal, political or military. Otherwise, it’s just a fictional story.
BTW, “Democratic” is not a reason to defend a nation. There are no actual definitions of Democracy. Ukraine is an outlier Democracy (at best) with massive levels of corruption. The Comedian wasted no time in removing all his Opposition so it is now a Dictatorship.
As to Ukraine not being aggressive, the people of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions would disagree but you never hear about that do you Sport?
Who knew that Afghanistan was in the North Atlantic?
NATO took the lead of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan on 11 August 2003.
https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/topics_69366.htm
ISAF was supposed to be a UN Peacekeeping force. Nothing to do with the Nasty American Terrorist Organisation.
On what grounds do you accuse me of being a denier of Western aggression and an apologist for same ? There is no indication of those proclivities in anything I’ve said; in fact I have been, since I first became aware of it ( Vietnam War ) a trenchant critic of the the USA’s belligerence and war-mongering.
NATO was formed as a check on Russia’s imperial ambitions after they occupied most of eastern Europe and nearly half of Germany as well as making satellites of the Stans and the Baltic States.
Sure, Russia sees NATO as a threat, but to what ? The reality is that it is a threat to Russia’s expansionism, not to Russia itself.
Can you name one incident apart from Hitler’s attempts, of ANY country or grouping of nations to threaten Russia itself ?
That Russia is and and always has been paranoid about foreign powers is not the fault of others – it is a self-imposed problem.
To bring up the atrocities committed by ‘Western powers’ and omit the at least equal atrocities committed by Russia in the exact places you mention as well as others is to try to obfuscate the fact that ALL great powers are equally guilty of those and similar crimes.
Yet you seek to condemn others while seeking to excuse Russia’s own crimes.
Those fallacies in your arguments are however, irrelevant to the present question – did Russia act responsibly and in good faith in invading Ukraine ?
You try to justify it by posing Donetsk, etc as being Ukraine’s fault, but in fact, those eastern regions as well as Crimes have been part of Ukraine since the fall of the iron curtain.
By the way, your use of the term “sport’ in trying to denigrate me personally merely shows your inability to cope with mature discussion, as does the rest of your post.
On what grounds do I accuse you of being a denier of Western aggression amongst other things?
“Hear we go with the deniers’ false equivalence and obfuscation again”.
Anyone with a different perspective to you is a denialist quite clearly.
“Russia’s case is well known – a powerful, authoritarian, if not fascisistic dictatorship neighbour invades a less powerful democratic one…”
The usual “Russia bad, Ukraine good” with no acceptance that the West has any responsibility to curb its own behaviours (which they have resoundingly demonstrated their aggression over and over again on Sovereign natiins” with zero outcry from the “moral” crew. BTW. Russia is a Democracy whether you like it or not. Authoritarian is used in Western Media anywhere they like to denigrate that country in the minds of its readers. The Ukraine Azov Battalion is a documented Nazi unit.
“Yet you seek to condemn others while seeking to excuse Russia’s own crimes”
I put it to you that you seek to condemn Russia for doing exactly what “the West” has been doing for centuries with no acknowledgement of the atrocities committed by the West. The West has undertaken far more illegal invasions than Russia with no measure of contrition shown (Iraq, Afghanistan etc etc).
“You try to justify it by posing Donetsk, etc as being Ukraine’s fault, but in fact, those eastern regions as well as Crimes have been part of Ukraine since the fall of the iron curtain”
Newsflash for you LBJ. Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea were a part of Russia for far longer than they have been part of Ukraine and Ukraine HAS been shelling civilian populations there and committing other atrocities. The inhabitants of those regions are ethnic Russians not Polish Ukrainians.
If you want to make aggressive posts and claims in reply to my posts and call me a denialist, expect it back in spades. If you don’t, then simply don’t reply to my posts Sport.
“Here we go with the deniers’ false equivalence and obfuscation again”.
he false equivalence is that you are inserting the crimes of the West in general to try to equivalise Ukraine’s behaviour with Russia’s in this conflict.
The question is about Russia’s and Ukraine’s behaviour, not about the fact that the West has also committed similar atrocities in the past.
“The usual “Russia bad, Ukraine good” with no acceptance that the West has any responsibility to curb its own behaviours”
But I have neither implied nor stated that. In fact, I stated ” in fact I have been, since I first became aware of it ( Vietnam War ) a trenchant critic of the the USA’s belligerence and war-mongering.” As to your
“their aggression over and over again on Sovereign natiins”’ name them.
“I put it to you that you seek to condemn Russia for doing exactly what “the West” has been doing for centuries with no acknowledgement of the atrocities committed by the
West”.
Again. I put to you, for the third time, “In fact, I stated ” in fact I have been, since I first became aware of it ( Vietnam War ) a trenchant critic of the the USA’s belligerence and war-mongering.”
“1. Russia Gifts Crimea to UkraineCrimea had been part of Russia for 200 years until 1954, when it was gifted to the Soviet Republic of the Ukraine by the then Russian Premier, Nikita Khrushchev.”
So Ukraine, by act of the Soviet Union was made independent in 1954……
Crimea has a 2 million population, of which about 60 percent speak Russian and consider themselves Russian. This is the only region in Ukraine where Russians are in the majority and has the highest number of Russian speakers.”
So there goes your excuses for Russia’s invasions.
As to Lubanst and Donestk, they were part of the Republic of Ukraine when it was granted separation by Krushchev.
As to their present status, I refer you to the Al Jazeerx article – Donetsk and Luhansk: What you should know about the ‘republics’So anyone who criticises your openly published opinions in a comments section is “aggressive’ ?
All I’ve done is point out the fallacies as well as your poor grasp of the facts because of your own cherry-picking need to justify your opinions.
And once again, your trying to denigrate me by using the patronising label “sport’ shows your lack of the ability to rationally and maturely discuss.
You really are “Lost in Space” aren’t you?
Here we go with the Western aggression denialists refusal to even consider any other perspective than their own.
My position is well known in this Group. The White West are a bunch of screaming hypocrites as they “condemn” any Non-Western Country that does exactly the same things as “the West” has done to myriad non-white countries. I will not resile from this position.
Have a look at some educated perspectives that align with my own:
https://johnmenadue.com/the-west-is-white/
https://johnmenadue.com/with-our-dismal-history-of-bombings-in-iraqaustralia-cannot-take-the-high-moral-ground-on-ukraine/
You attempt to take a high moral ground and get on your high horse over being called “Sport” after you denigrated me by calling me a Denialist in the very first paragraph of your initial reply as well as denigrating another Subscriber, Martin 1966, over his views by calling him a liar.
You have zero perspective around your own actions, Sport combined with an inability or desire to understand others positions.
This is auseful read thanks CK , Crikey . It is how big media cover their role in removing rights and choices simply by controlling information outlets,{and has no substantive opposition} that impacts Australia the most in terms of setting and controlling agenda.