behind the news

Journalist: Transcriber or Illuminator?

December 27, 2004

Today, in a story about the new “Pentagon Channel,” the Washington Times lets it readers know exactly what it believes to be the role of the national media. Here’s the lede of the Times’ piece:

The Pentagon has created its own 24-hour television channel to cut out the middleman — the national media — in covering news events at the headquarters of the world’s most powerful military.

The national media, it seems, is “the middleman” — a phrase that implies its share of shadiness. The media’s role, in this characterization, is merely that of a profit-driven peddler who adds nothing of value to the goods he’s passing along. In other words, something we’d be better off without.

There are two possible explanations for the Times’ construction. The first is that the Times is consciously trying to marginalize the national media. After all, the Times was originally created as an antidote to the mainstream media by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, who believes himself to be “the savior and messiah of humanity.” Moon, along with numerous conservatives, fervently wishes for the relatively small Times to have greater influence, and by describing the mainstream media as a “middleman” who adds nothing to (and perhaps even detracts from) the national discourse, the Times offers up itself (and the Pentagon Channel) as an antidote.

But let’s assume that the Times isn’t quite so calculating. After all, the Times also qualifies as a middleman itself, albeit one that disdains its ostensible peers. If the middleman construction was simply tossed off — that is, if the notion that the media should be nothing more than a stenographic conduit has become conventional wisdom at the Times — then the paper may have even more serious problems than the above explanation suggests. “Journalist” is not synonymous with “conduit of officially sanctioned information.” Though it often falls short, when journalism is at its best it examines the information being offered up, explains its place in the scheme of things and illuminates its possible ramifications and effects — all in a rough attempt to bring news closer to the truth.

By equating Pentagon-approved programming with news, the Times has unwittingly condemned itself. Only a newspaper that doesn’t understand the essential role journalists play in contextualizing announcements and events could characterize the national media as mere information peddlers.

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–Brian Montopoli

Brian Montopoli is a writer at CJR Daily.