In The Elements of Journalism, Kovach and Rosenstiel write about objectivity and its role in contemporary journalism. More specifically, the authors note that objectivity has lost its meaning in journalism and needs to be replaced by other ways of thinking about reporting.
Questions: Based on your reading of Elements of Journalism, write a commentary that addresses the following questions. What is the problem with objectivity? Why and how did objectivity lose its meaning in journalism? What do the authors propose as a replacement for objectivity? Will this replacement work? If so, how well?
As always, write a paragraph or two that addresses these questions in a thoughtful and specific way. Remember to sign your posting.
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11 comments:
The problem with objectivity is that over the last century its concept has become misunderstood and generally lost. In the original idea the focus was placed on the objectivity of a journalist's method rather than on the objectivity of the journalist himself. However, today most people think of objectivity in journalism as an aim, not as a method. In order to remedy this lost understanding the authors suggest several methods. First, journalism should focus on verification rather than assertion by: never adding to a story, never misleading the audience, presenting the truth, doing their own work and being humble about their own skills. Second, they should always edit with skepticism, keep an accuracy checklist, assume nothing, double-check their facts, be weary of anonymous sources and remain loyal to truth and citizens above all.
Unfortunately, many journalists today are businesspeople before they are reporters of the truth. Corporate incentive programs have marked a major shift in newsroom reporting and this shift in emphasis has created a lot of confusion among journalists and citizens alike. The methods suggested above would be relatively easy to implement, but very difficult to upkeep, because ” the problem is that tying a journalist's income to his organization's financial performance in effect changes the journalist's allegiance” (62) The allegiance to the citizen or the company that is, and if that is questioned we have to question the journalists' objectivity as well.
S.Johnson
Objectivity is not meant to be a lack of bias, but rather a reliable manner of testing information so that personal opinions would not obscure accuracy (81-82). For example, a journalist should avoid selecting a source who expresses his own viewpoint and thus advocate his personal opinions under the guise of neutrality. This definition of objectivity as a method rather than an aim has been misunderstood and largely lost within the past several decades.
One suggestion has been to make reporting a science, rather than an art, presumably. An objective method would not necessarily entail fairness or balance where such a quality does not exist, but rather transparency of motives and refusal to deceive or embellish (89). The idea is solid, but only as successful as its practitioners. It does not solve the omnipresent problem of journalism: the divided interest between the money and the citizens. With or without this mental approach to objectivity, the field needs ethically strong journalists committed to the public interest.
M Kadin
I obviously agree with both of the comments before me. Objectivity was conceptualized in a scientific manner--journalists were objective if they applied a standardized method to each of their stories to adequately seek and uncover the truth. Journalists were not "objective" if they ignored personal biases or pretended that their stories were absent of any particular point of references, like a political viewpoint. Rather, the objective method could help to curtail these biases and make for better stories, instead of asking journalists to abstractly ignore them.
The authors' answer to this skew of objectivity is a new set of criteria for the "science of reporting," listed on page 89. Since it would be both overkill and leave little room for others to discuss, I'll only mention one: rely on your own original reporting. The authors go to great lengths to describe how stories can get distorted because journalists rely on others' flawed reporting (the Gore/"Love Canal" story). By not doing original reporting, the integrity of the story suffered. This is only furthered by the multiplicity of information available in the current day. Journalists face the problem of sorting the wheat from the chaff--or figuring what information is really news. If they just take those stories as fact, however, they might end up publishing something erroneous in haste.
Soren
In my opinion the problem with objectivity is that journalists do not agree on the definition. Thus there is no universal way for journalists to agree or disagree to use objectivity in their writing. The author writes that the original idea of objectivity was presented by Walter Lippman…he thought that journalists should be objective in their method of collecting the information for their stories. If they collected the information unbiasedly and as scientifically as possible, then the truth would inherently come out in the story. However, Lippman’s idea of objectivity got lost through history, and journalists instead thought that objectivity had to do with the actual journalist. That the journalist should write their story objectively, however this they believe was idealistic, because humans have bias’. The authors believe we should leave this idealistic “journalistic aim” notion behind, and return instead to Lippman’s idea of “objective method”. This includes: “never adding anything that was not there, never deceive the audience, be as transparent as possible about your methods and motives, rely on your original reporting, and exercise humility” (89).
Courtney Chadney
There is some dispute about whether objectivity can really exist. How do we know the truth? Well, I’m not a relativist on the subject. I think there is truth out there and that objectivity is like virtue; it's the thing you always fall short of, but the thing you always strive toward. Objectivity is just misunderstood, the journalist's "first obligation is to the truth" and "its first loyalty is to citizens." Journalists "must monitor power"; not give powerful people a platform. Too bad that the public, through no fault of its own, is having a hard time understanding the role of journalist in a free society.
by donald
The concept of objectivity in journalism has changed over time due to disagreements on its true meaning. Journalists still commonly dispute objectivity’s meaning today, in part because it is often thought of as an impossible ideal – can one be truly objective? Can one omit all biases when covering a story?
Kovach and Rosenstiel suggest that “the journalist is not objective, but his method can be” (83). So while journalists find, as all humans due, it is almost impossible to be completely unbiased, there are steps in compiling a piece that can assist a journalists in producing an accurate story: never add anything that was not there, never deceive the audience, be as transparent as possible, rely on your own original reporting, exercise humility.
I will first say that it should really be up to the everyday folk to demand that what they are reading or listening to is being portrayed in an objective manner. After that, it is really up to the editors and the journalists to make sure what they are reporting on is fact and not opinion. I found it quite interesting in the readings that forty years ago when political candidates were running for office, they were often quoted for nearly a minutes worth of words, whereas now it is just a few seconds and then it is straight to several minutes of opinionated commentary.
This, as well as the loss of objectivity, can be partially attributed to the conversion of many journalists into businesspeople.
Some of the bias, as is suggested by the book, could be mitigated if the journalist/reporter exercised more humility and edited with skepticism.
-BZ
When the concept of objectivity was first intoduced into journalism, it was not the idea that journalists should try and be free of bias, it was actually quite the contrary. The idea for objectivity was oriinal to be based on the methods for which journalists could test the informtion that they gathered. The 20th century idea of objectivity has many different parts one is the idea of impartial voice which has been implemented by so many newspapers is not a fundamental part of journalism. The second idea is that this neutral voice is almost seen as a "veneer" there is no possible way for a journalist to be truly objective and if one tries to be that way then it is almost seen as deceptive. This can damage the credibility of the journalist and the news source. On pg. 89 there is a list of 5 basic principles in the science of reporting, never add to a story, never deceive, be transparent, rely on own reporting, and excercise humiltity. These all play a major role in helping journalists keep honest and remain objective in their stories.
R. Why
The difficulties that the modern journalist encounters regarding objectivity can largely be accredited to journalism changing from a public service to a business based solely on the profit motive and also the fact that journalists themselves have become more detached and less interested in the stories they cover. Rather than remaining true to the immediate interests of one's company, they must recognize their "social obligation" (53) that overrides the importance of making money or advancing in the journalistic hierarchy. Another problem that has arisen in modern times is that journalists have move past independence from their company to isolation from it as well as the community as a result of not being able to identify ones self with the general population he/she serves in the community and often times only having the local position as a means to a more significant, higher paying job in the long run. Furthermore, if the interests of a small group of wealthy viewers is the target, then the vast majority of the public interest is being ignored when reporting the news. So objectivity is largely hampered by the profit and growth motive of every modern news company and until they are able to recognize that they must stand apart from the rest of the corporate world and work for the public, it will be difficult to represent every facet of a story if journalists have ulterior motives at work. To encourage objectivity journalists must be held strictly accountable for what they write, they must not endorse particular interests over others, they must detach themselves from corporate interests, and they must realize that their first duty lies with the greater public interest.
Patrick K.
Can we as human beings truly be 'objective?' Some argue that it is impossible to keep our own personal and cultural biases at bay when reporting.
Remaining steadily objective in one's journalistic lifetime would probably not be an issue if all a journalist had to do was serve the citizenry. It is safe to say that, these days, journalists are pressured to serve other masters.
Journalistic allegiance is torn between the public it serves, and the firm for which it works. Private interests often drive reporting away from objectivity.
This is not to say that all journalists succumb to the coercions of their superior's private interests. In fact, "the ferocity and boldness of the reactions in the newsrooms, and their public nature, reveal how deeply and widely held the code of loyalty to the public is among those who work in this profession" (54).
Dan Gilmore writes that we should drop the word 'objectivity' and replace it with "thoroughness, accuracy, fairness, and transparency" (81).
So long as journalists remain loyal to their citizens first, there is hope for objectivity in the industry.
Jacob Niebergall
The issue or problem with objectivity is that aim of target has shifted through the years and more and more so is losing meaning. It's losing meaning because this shift is not testing the truth through the method of verification that it once has by going back and forth on reports from different reporters. It was known in the past to try to strive for the truth by verification as the news is being reported but unfortunately as time has gone by, people's values and morals have changed. The repercussion of this results in different standards news writers go by and, in return, became more business related rather than an industry in total dedication in finding out the raw or real news. A better perspective to look at this would be comparing a journalist's income to his organization's financial performance in effect changes the journalist's allegiance (62). From this we can see how the attitudes of the journalist can change from other outside factors.
James Reed
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