The real problem, however, is that journalists are, by their nature, thieves of words. You can call it what you like; you can say “Possibly I am old-fashioned,” and talk about how “actual journalists are laboring at actual history, covering the fever of democracy in Arab capitals and the fever of austerity in American capitals” (Keller) or you can brag about the “148 full-time editors, writers, and reporters engaged in the serious, old-fashioned work of traditional journalism” (Huffington), but all this “old fashioned” stuff is just a way of covering over something really basic about what “actual” journalists “traditionally” do, all the time: write down what other people say. They can exercise editorial discretion in how they integrate and harmonize the various quotes they‘ve aggregated. They can confirm, they can contextualize, and they can (very rarely) manage to witness something with their own two eyes. They can produce collages out of stolen scraps. And they should do these things. But at the core of the journalistic process is the act, inescapably, of taking other people’s texts, weaving them together, and then placing them under your byline (with appropriate citation) and profiting from the activity.
The more you talk about piracy, it seems to me, the more you bump into the uncomfortable fact that journalism is only distinguishable from word-piracy because, and to the extent that, we arbitrarily decide that it is. We have social conventions that determine what is and isn’t okay to say and steal, and how to do so — institutional rules defining the difference between socially useful activities and socially un-useful activities — but while those conventions are under particular stress right now (file this under “the internet”) they were also never quite as stable as we might have liked to think they were. This is not to say that they aren’t necessary, useful, and worth retaining, of course. They just aren’t written in stone, nor were they received from on high; they are a contingent function of what it is that we expect “the press” to do as part of the social function they fulfill. Which is why, ultimately, the kind of society that we believe “good journalism” will serve will be the determinant of what standards we use in defining what is good in journalism.
That line of thinking, however, would take the conversation in a different direction than either Keller or Huffington want it to go. This is because they are not, a such, interested in the social function of “the press” — for which, see Jay Rosen’s manifesto — but rather, in the business of profiting from their activities. This should not surprise us, but neither should it escape our notice: their job is to make information commodities, to secure ownership of them, and then find some way to sell them. “Real Journalism” talk, in that context, is just market fetishizing, a way of mystifying the work of social production that makes “news” possible, so that it can appear to be the original creation of whoever is selling it to you. Never mind all the different people whose unpaid contributions made the production of the story possible (the original tipoff, unquoted sources, quoted subjects, the reference works consulted, etc); they will not be paid or credited for intellectual labor, because of the magic thing that happens when the story has been published: having become news, it will subsequently be considered the sole production of the New York Times or whoever. And if Arianna Huffington steals it, now, she becomes indistinguishable from a Somali pirate. Once we have decided where ownership of information begins — whose intellectual labor counts and whose does not — then we can proceed to sell it.
When you have an obligation to remain outside the arena, it is also tempting to feel above the partisans who are struggling within that arena. (But then where else are they going to struggle?) You learn the attractions of a view from nowhere. The daily gift of detachment keeps giving, until you’re almost “above” anyone who tries to get too political with you, or at least in the middle with the microphone between warring factions. There’s power in that; and where there’s power, there’s attraction. Jay Rosen ☀
Apparently, all of you people out there aren’t reading much that disagrees with positions you already hold. At least this is the conclusion reached by Eric Lawrence, John Sides, and Henry Farrell in the latest issue of Perspectives on Politics.
Are you just being lazy or did you try it for awhile and realize that reading something written from the opposite side of the political spectrum made you too angry every morning?
My Google Reader subscriptions tally to 1,769 feeds. While I cannot give an accurate calculation of the ratio of various political spectrums nor guarantee that’s an even 1:1:1:1 ratio, I can assure you that reflected in the contents are voices from all political persuasions. From radical Chomsky loving leftists to paleo-conservatives at the American Conservative. From adulatory Ludwig von Mises lovers at Lew Rockwell to up and coming hopeful conservatives at the Next Right. From liberal leanings by Ezra Klein and Paul Krugman to the crunchy Cons at Front Porch Republic. From the staunchly conservative neo-reformed Christian crowd to progressive people of the way.
About the only material I actively discriminate against is the Jay Rosen termed “church of the savvy” stylings of mainstream pundits like David Broder, Richard Cohen, George Will, etc.… Or the party propaganda orchestrated and espoused by loyal apparatchiks, on either side of the American party duopoly.
But, then, I’m such a political outcast that I find some level of agreement and disagreement in just about everything I read.
Before you can tear down an argument, you must be able to deconstruct it. And to deconstruct it, means you must learn and study it first. To see the perspective from an devoted, heartfelt advocate of such a plank.
Yesterday, Meet the Press hosted a panel discussion to debate two primary issues: (1) foreign policy — specifically, the war in Afghanistan, and (2) health care. The panel: Rudy Giuliani, Tom Friedman, Harold Ford, Jr., and Tom Brokaw (as Jay Rosen often notes, Meet the Press is doing a fantastic job of fulfilling its pledge to present “fresh voices” in its discussions). With regard to Afghanistan, there is a major debate currently taking place about whether we should stay in that country. A majority of Americans now opposes the war. But there was not a single participant there who shares that view. All of them believe that it is imperative we remain, and put on their little General hats to exchange deeply Serious analyses of how we need to adjust our strategy and tactics for greater mission success. Of course, all of three of those whose views were known about Iraq — Friedman, Ford and Giuliani — were vehement supporters of the invasion. As always, not only does support for that war not produce shame or even impair one’s credibility and Seriousness, but the opposite is true: having supported it is a prerequisite for being considered credible and Serious, which is why those are the only people — still — from whom we hear when it’s time to convene Serious discussions of foreign policy. What an odd filtering standard for The Liberal Media to use. Glenn Greenwald ☀
…if Amy Goodman came on “Meet the Press,” she would say all sorts of things that not only challenge the people on the program, but challenge what they have been saying over the years. Would go back, in a sense, discredit the narrative that’s been building up for a long time. And even though it’s maybe not wholly conscious, the idea that there’s a kind of building narrative that is more or less accurate, that we kind of tell you what’s going on in Washington, is a common assumption in the press. And people who would completely shatter that, don’t. Jay Rosen ☀
What happens when, in a competitive, two-party system, you have asymmetrical warfare conducted against the press by one — but not the other — of the two major parties? In asymmetrical warfare, they get to blast you and try to lower your negatives and turn as many people off to your reporting as they can reach with cultural resentment projected at the media, and even whip up the crowd against you at rallies and stuff, and you’re supposed to be (I’m guessing now, correct me if I am wrong…) stoic newsmen. Jay Rosen ☀
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