A lot has been said about the role our media has chosen to play in informing Americans. It seems that much of what we get on the news anymore is more focused on adding drama to our lives than it is on just doing what journalists are supposed to do: objectively report the news. Remember that concept? I think you all know what I am talking about.
What passes as news in the US today seems to be more about keeping Americans unduly inflamed than truly informed.
I attended journalism school in college and I can attest that a mere 30 years ago there was a high standard of journalism was being taught to prospective media makers. I don’t know what they are taught today, but I do know that the FCC no longer requires news stations to report all sides of every story.
Maybe some of you remember back about a quarter of a century ago when news segments were routinely aired that opened with something like, "Last Tuesday we reported about such-and-such public issue on this station. In the interest of equal time, we now offer the following opposing view."
News stations did that because the FCC required them to air an opposing view when asked to do so, in order to retain their broadcasting licenses. That requirement was thrown out during the Reagan administration.
In the 1990s there was an effort to reinstate this policy, referred to as "The Fairness Doctrine", but it was successfully blocked by Rush Limbaugh: The "Hush Rush" Hoax: Limbaugh on the Fairness Doctrine
NY Representative Louise Slaughter tried very hard to correct this about five years ago with legislation known as the FAB Act. In Nebraska and elsewhere I circulated many petitions in support of the FAB Act and forwarded them to her office. Sadly, the bill never even came to a vote.
One of the results of this little-known tragedy in journalistic professionalism is that you can call your local radio station to complain (as I once did about another AM radio blowhard named Michael Savage) that their so-called news program is biased, and they will unashamedly tell you that the program is not news, but entertainment! And they will go on to say that the entertainer they have engaged is a big money-maker for them precisely because he says crazy things, so they are not about to rein in their cash cow.
Wow. This really helps explain why we have so much vitriol in the so-called news today, doesn’t it? As we all know, drama sells, so if the news stations are now free to present what is going on in the world however they care to, why wouldn’t they want to make it as salacious as possible?
After all, people don’t want to believe their world is boring. In fact, apparently there is something in human nature that actually enjoys hearing that there are things to fear lurking around every corner.
So this is what I call the "war of terror". It is a war that the American media, either with or without the government’s help, is conducting on our minds, just because they can, and because they profit from doing so!
We are all victims of this war every single day, because our drama-laden news coverage now terrorizes us with constant fear-mongering. Your identity can be stolen! Your children can be snatched away from you! Your neighbors are all spies! Your government is full of communists (or Nazis or socialists or whatever)! Be afraid, be very, very afraid!
Well I am afraid. But not of all those things. I’m afraid that this situation has become so ubiquitous in our country that we have all forgotten how to think rationally anymore. Worse, we’ve all forgotten what fairness and justice looks like, and how to behave accordingly. Because we’re all too busy buying insurance, or guns, or duct tape to protect ourselves from all those big threats out there! It seems that we have all forgotten how to believe in the goodness of our fellow citizens, not because it’s no longer there, but because it is more stimulating, and yes, even more entertaining, to wallow in the bad.
So here’s an idea. How about resolving to become a balancing force for the media? Every time you hear someone begin to talk about this or that awful thing that has happened, or is happening, or might happen, try to come up with an opposing point of view. Bring up, for example, all the times we have feared something would go wrong, but it didn’t. Quote the good numbers, for instance. Or talk about a more likely positive scenario, instead of a less likely negative one.
Or maybe you could just relay a personal anecdote in which a stranger was kind to you. We’ve all got stories like that, and they matter. They matter because if we keep telling them and keep reminding ourselves that humans are not only capable of, but still practicing moral behavior in the world, maybe, just maybe, some positive attention to the good news will encourage others to keep it happening. I’m not saying that we should be naïve. I just want us to all calm each other down, and offer an opposing view to this stupid "war OF terror" we are all being relentlessly subjected to.
Some people don't like to speak up to others to counteract the fear-mongering in the news. They don't want to challenge what is reported perhaps because once it is allowed on our entertainment -- er news -- programs, it is considered conventional wisdom, not to be challenged.
But engaging in the public debate is important; in fact it's an obligation. Particularly now, when we know that the media has been, well let’s just say, not always a reliable source of fairness and balance.
To paraphrase Gandhi, we must BE THE MEDIA WE WANT TO SEE in the United States of America. So speak out; you owe it to your fellow Americans to enlighten them.