Tired of the News
pt. VII of the Honesty Series
This might sound odd coming from authors of a website that offer political commentary for the majority of their site's content, but I'm just about fed up with the crisis/entertainment-nature of the television news coverage. Not a day goes by where there isn't something in the news that is an absolute crisis that can't be ignored or a story that can't be missed. And they're all guilty of it: CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC & FOX.
The news isn't even the news anymore, especially on the national scene. The news used to consist of reporters going out to the scene where an event is occurring or had just occurred. They interviewed witnesses or the major players and reported to the viewer what had just transpired. Not anymore. Today, the news largely consists of reporters being informed by public relations companies what is happening with people, businesses or events, the reporters read the press releases, elaborate a little, and then tell the viewer what to think (see Andrea Mitchell, Kelly O’Donnell, Tim Russert, Terry Moran, etc.).
Even today's investigative reporting is sloppy. Sure, local stations have their investigative reporter that exposes corruption at a local supermarket or town hall. This is what's supposed to be done: dig where others don't want to dig, get the scoop, and provide the viewer with the information. Investigative reporting on the national level has become an agenda-driven, ratings-grabber, not a scoop-provider.
Let me provide a few examples:
- Internet predators. This was a huge story a while back, and although the ratings aren't quite as high as they used to be, it still gets its own primetime special here and there. This is an example of a story that probably needed to be covered (it was news), however, the nature of the coverage it has since received has moved the story from news status to entertainment status.
The consequence of sensationalized news is that time for the real investigative reporting is pushed off to the side. - Barbara Walters, period. What once was ABC's greatest interviewer has become televisions version of TMZ or People Magazine, and she still does her work under the guise of "hard journalism." Personal opinion: interviewing Tom Cruise, Britney Spears, and the like is not news, but rather is entertainment. Providing news is not the priority for newscasters anymore, as evidenced by the following quote from a Walters-adoring website: "Barbara Walters has become a television superstar through her [state] of the art form of questioning of celebrities and journalistic instinct. She achieved this status the hard way as she broke through 'the man's world of television journalism.'" In today's media, the media is the story, not the story.
- The Don Imus incident was a classic example of the media making a story where there wasn't really a story. The flap about Imus didn't occur until days after his moronic statement. He was paid to be a moron, he was a moron, it should have been left at that. But he hurt some peoples' feelings, and the media turned on him. Then to compound the problem, the media actually gave a microphone to Al Sharpton on evening- and cable-news broadcasts all over the country. Why? Because racism sells. The initial story was news. Everything from Day Two on was marketing manufactured by the suits in New York.
Other examples worth mentioning, but to add comment would take up too much of your day: the media's convicting the Duke Lacrosse players before the evidence was gathered, the ongoing saga of the perfectly legal firing of the U.S. attorneys, and anything having to do with Harry Reid and a camera.
The news media is no longer interested in providing real news: the happenings of the day. Instead, they're interested in ratings. Before you say, "No kidding," let me point out that prior to the Vietnam War and other events of the '70's, news rooms covered the real news, even if it cost them acquiring prime sponsorship. Sometimes the news divisions of the networks lost money, but because they provided the news with integrity, this was acceptable. (The networks also knew they'd make up the revenue with their real entertainment divisions.) The producers realized that their job was to investigate, cover, and report the news of the day. Once news producers determined that they could pass off entertainment as news, suck in the public with previews of the news to get larger ratings (I'm still trying to figure out how the public hasn't figured this out yet), and sell advertising time based on those ratings, the news industry changed for the worse.
Further evidence that the news media is not interested in stories but ratings, is the fact they we almost never see any follow-up stories.
- What's going on with the recovering minor from the Sago Mine tragedy?
- How about telling us about the hundreds of church youth groups that have volunteered their Spring Break and Summer Vacation time to help the New Orleans residents clean up their property and begin rebuilding their homes?
- Why aren't we hearing anything about any of the recovering victims from the VaTech massacre?
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And we haven't even discussed the 24-Hour News Cycle yet. Because these 24-hour cable news channels need ratings, they have to get viewers and keep them. So now car chases in Southern California are shown from the local affiliate’s helicopter live for as long as the ordeal goes on. A stand-off in a Louisville, Kentucky, mall gets live coverage, even though it means watching a one-tenth-full parking lot for 20 minutes. Riveting television, let me tell you. The list could go on, and you could probably provide your own examples.
What's ironic is that what fills the gaps between programming schedules on the 24-hour networks is often the real news. But the networks cut into this real news to squeeze in their commercial breaks, or to interview someone to tell us what to think about the real news. Even when they get it right, they get it wrong.
Ultimately, the consequence of sensationalized news is that time for the real investigative reporting is pushed off to the side, if it is pursued at all.
- Is there evidence supporting a global warming crisis? Is there evidence contradicting a global warming crisis?
- Are extremism a minority of Islam? Are Imams, Mosques and Islamic nations teaching their youth to hate?
- Is the rise in out-of-wedlock birthrate, especially among the black population, affecting public education, public health and/or the crime rate? If so, how?
- Where does the Lottery money that was intended to fund public schools really go?
- Are good teachers leaving the inner-city public school system, and if so, why? (Maybe the teachers could be interviewed rather than the union representatives.)
- Why are pension funds really failing?
Again, the list could go on and on. These are stories that the American public would do well to have addressed, but to do so would tread on politically-incorrect ground. Asking such questions and pursuing the answers to such questions may offend some of the viewers (as well as require the reporter to step out of their intellectual comfort zone), and we can't have that. The news is geared toward getting eyes in front of the televisions and keeping them there. The media can talk about the death in Iraq, the internet predator two states away, the racists & bigots, corporate corruption, etc., etc. . .just don't say anything that may possibly offend the viewer, even if it's true. Telling the viewer something that may actually affect his/her life may hurt their feelings, causing them to turn off the television. The horror.
To summarize, it must be made clear that much of what passes as news these days is nothing more than entertainment. The real news is pushed off to the side in favor of sensation and agenda. Ignorance is the result, and America is not benefiting from the current trend.
5/12/2007
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