Print
EmailThere is proper alarm in the journalistic profession, and among consumers of journalism, at the ever-lowering standards within an industry undergoing rapid change. The old standbys of news, local daily newspapers and TV networks and their affiliates, are rapidly giving way to often-unreliable online sources and cable-news channels, which make no pretense of objectivity. The old standbys frequently have chosen to compete by dumbing down and thinning their news coverage.
In big-audience broadcasting, ignorant and politically biased cable-news talking heads such as Fox's Glenn Beck and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann have debased the medium once associated with Edward R. Murrow and, in the Northwest, the old KING Broadcasting.
A local guy, John Hamer, a former Seattle Times editorial writer, has come up with one idea to combat this trend. Hamer is president of the Washington News Council, a non-profit organization, which has tried over the past decade to maintain journalistic standards in the state. (Disclosure: I was a board member several years ago of the council).
As reported in the Columbia Journalism Review, Hamer three years ago led a discussion at a Journalism That Matters conference in Washington, D.C. on the double standard that often exists with journalism and the people and groups being covered. Too often, Hamer said at the conference, the transparency, accountability, and openness media demand of others were absent in media organizations themselves. After the formal meeting, discussion continued on ways and means of prompting these organizations to walk as they talked.
Hamer came up with a TAO of Journalism concept — TAO standing for transparency, accountability, and openness — to which he hoped journalistic organizations would subscribe. The equivalent of a Good Housekeeping seal would be given to both old- and new-media organizations signing on. Public complaints could be brought against any organization in violation of TAO standards.
Something similar is being done in Europe, CJR reports, in a project led by the non-profit Media and Society Foundation.
Moving the idea from concept to reality will not be easy. Washington state and Seattle media organizations often have bristled at being subjected to Washington News Council hearings prompted by citizen complaints about bias or lack of objectivity. Media are notoriously prickly about their own perogatives and for a do-as-we-say, not-as-we-do approach in their own operations.
The Gates Foundation has made a $100,000 challenge grant (matched by $100,000 Hamer has raised from other sources) to help the venture get started. A logo/seal for the fledgling venture has been created. Hamer actively has been selling his idea to media leaders and educators nationally.
Will the concept catch on? It is too early to tell. But a reduction in media hypocrisy, as represented by adherence to a TAO code, could help maintain public credibility. Recent surveys show media ranking low — down with the Congress and trial lawyers — in public trust. Hamer is trying to do something about it.
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Comments:
Posted Wed, Apr 14, 4:01 p.m. Inappropriate
Thanks for writing about the TAO of Journalism concept, Ted. Your piece was accurate, fair and thorough -- just the kind of journalism that the News Council has been promoting since we began in 1998!
A couple of updates: We now have a dozen people and organizations signed up to take the "TAO Pledge" and use the "TAO Seal," including some individual bloggers and sites such as Spot.Us and The Banyan Project. See www.taoofjournalism.org for the list of "TAOists" so far.
Another incentive to take the pledge and display the seal: Harvard Law School's new Online Media Legal Network (OMLN), part of the Citizen Media Law Project at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, is offering pro bono (free) or reduced-fee legal assistance to TAO Pledgers who qualify for help. As David Ardia, director of OMLN, wrote to me: "The TAO Pledge is an easy way to make it clear to others that you strive for excellence and that you follow some guiding principles in your work."
Finally, we're offering "TAO of Journalism" T-Shirts for those who take the pledge and make the requested annual donation of $25 for individuals or $50 for organizations. Donations are tax-deductible; the Washington News Council is a 501c3 non-profit group. See www.wanewscouncil.org for more about us.
There's no magic bullet to help restore media credibility and regain public trust, but this can help. Just TAO it!
Posted Thu, Apr 15, 8:19 a.m. Inappropriate
Great article, Mr. Van Dyke. It's so sad that the foundation of journalism, itself, has to be scrutinized, not from the source of the story, but the source of the OUTLET relaying it--and their biased slant/intention questioned and brought to light. Faux news is, as the Obama administration rightly claimed, not a legitimate news operation--but neither are so many that wear the mantle!
And now Opinion is spewed as fact and fact is fiction and that fiction has become the news.
Truly, it's a sad state in which we live. And yes, we need the TAO of journalism put into practice to bring credibility back to the press. And it's not only journalism that depends on it.
Posted Thu, Apr 15, 10:51 a.m. Inappropriate
Not to defend opinion masquerading as evidence or facts (I've criticized Mr. Van Dyk for just that), but let's not defend and celebrate the dysfunctional old model of journalistic "objectivity" either. That model led to the "fair and balanced" coverage promoting the existence of WMD in Iraq, justifying the U.S. invasion. That's stenography, not journalism. Listen to Pulitzer Prize winner Gene Weingarten on his Washington Post blog Tuesday:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2010/04/12/DI2010041203516.html
I am a leading proponent of stories dispassionately searching for the truth, and then passionately telling the truth. I have no patience for stories that are quote dumps, obscuring the truth with bogus moral equivalencies, giving equal weight to unequally valid opinions, and doing it all in the name of objectivity.
Posted Thu, Apr 15, 2:16 p.m. Inappropriate
Harris, I’ve read your critiques of Van Dyk’s work; some I agree with, some not. But I think your criticism of John Hamer’s TAO effort is misplaced. He seems to be trying to do something a bit different than simply validating ‘on the one hand/on the other hand’ journalism. If it works, better for us all. I have a little experience with the Washington News Council. A couple of years ago, they sponsored a reporting project by me, examining the ethics of the Spokane Spokesman-Review’s ten-year coverage of its owners’ home-town real estate development venture. It was an innovative undertaking that won the S-R a national prize for journalism ethics and may even have produced a little change for the better. If, as Van Dyk says, Hamer’s TAO project goes beyond a cute catchphrase and leads to less media hypocrisy, more power to it.
Bill Richards
Posted Thu, Apr 15, 2:52 p.m. Inappropriate
Bill, I wasn't commenting on the TAO effort. I was just cautioning about applying conventional "fair and balanced" standards to in-depth, evidence-based reporting which reaches conclusions. I certainly support transparency, accountability, and openness in journalism. But news organizations need to be held accountable for mindless he-said, she-said journalism that distorts the truth -- consistent with what Gene Weingarten said. I get concerned when someone like Mr. Van Dyk touts a project like this, because the kind of journalism he seems to like (David Broder, et al) is the embodiment of dysfunctional "objective" journalism.
Posted Fri, Apr 16, 9:08 a.m. Inappropriate
Ah, now you’ve gone and pushed one of my buttons. I am no apologist for Ted VD’s reporting, which sometimes seems to me to edge toward misty reminiscence over hard fact. But I think Broder is another kind of animal and has gotten an unfair shake in recent years. True, David has slowed down some, as have we all, but he pioneered a skeptical, shoe leather style of political reporting that should remain a model for all journalists, and bloggers too.
Every year, as election time approached, while most other political reporters were trying to seem wise by regurgitating the results of polls, some of dubious origin, or insider spin, or their own prejudices, David would spend weeks leading troops of WashPost reporters house-to-house in various key precincts around the U.S. to validate, or invalidate, the “common wisdom” of the electorate. He was crowdsourcing before crowdsourcing was in, except that his work wasn’t open to the perversions that sometimes can sway digital crowdsourcing today, like Astroturfing. It was hard, boring work, and probably more expensive and labor intensive than any news organization could afford today, but it usually meant David knew what he was talking about when he wrote news stories. And that's the point, isn't it? He’s a columnist now, and columnists are supposed to indulge their prejudices, but as a reporter he knew his stuff. Maybe Hamer’s effort will help preserve some of that quality.
Posted Fri, Apr 16, 3:50 p.m. Inappropriate
Good for Richards for remembering Dave Broder when he was younger and at his best. I remember listenting to him speak after he had spent four days in Tacoma! going door to door, and the insights he had that no reporter in the state--and perhaps the country--had gained. Yes, he presented both sides, but if you read his whole column, he always made sure you knew what is opinion was on the issue. He was the ultimate in good reporting, and later in opinion columns.
Posted Sat, Apr 17, 11:10 a.m. Inappropriate
Once again, Crosscut's comment thread is as engaging as the original article - if not more so! Since it's my "TAO of Journalism" concept that's being examined (kind of), I'll add some thoughts:
1. To "political" - It's not really so sad that the "biased/slant intention" of news sources needs to be questioned. In fact, it's healthy. It was the pretense of objectivity that most damaged the media's credibility over the years. Most readers/viewers could see through the veil, and turned away. Far better for journalists to be upfront about their biases, which is why we put the T in TAO. And governments, corporations, nonprofits, etc., should also be transparent, accountable and open. If they were, they'd be more trusted.
2. To Harris Meyer - Glad you endorse the TAO concept, and I agree with you that news organizations need to be held publicly accountable. That's what the Washington News Council has been doing for 12 years now, albeit imperfectly. We're looking for new ways to be more effective. Suggestions welcome.
3. To Bill Richards - You're too modest in citing "a little experience" with the WNC. Your/our report on the Spokesman-Review's coverage of River Park Square was unprecedented in the history of American journalism. It won the Ancil Payne Award for Media Ethics for the newspaper (we nominated them) in 2008. Steve Smith, the S-R editor who asked us to do the report, built perhaps the most transparent and accountable newsroom ever. However, he later left the paper and is now teaching media ethics at the University of Idaho. Finally, I agree with you and "mailwalt" about David Broder. He set a standard for solid reporting, and his columns are always fact-based rather than just spewing opinion. Today we get way too much bloviating and blogviating. But not us, right?