Let's talk about “objectivity.”
I’m Charlie Warzel. I'm a writer here in Opinion covering technology, media and politics, which means I spend a lot of time obsessing over my own industry. Over the past five years, I’ve developed a mantra: We’re not ready for the trolls. |
By we, I mean the press and media institutions. Our unreadiness comes in many forms: a lack of understanding around the role of the internet and the dynamics of social media platforms, and the inability of some leaders to distinguish trolls from good-faith critics, to name a few. |
But discussions on the topic frequently boil down to a journalism-school debate over “objectivity.” In recent weeks, that debate has become a full-on reckoning, one led by black journalists who are publicly airing their frustrations at an industry that has shown indifference and hostility to their experiences and demands. |
Wesley Lowery, a reporter and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, has helped lead this reckoning, which he describes in an Op-Ed today. Wesley’s argument is refreshingly simple: Seek out and tell the hard truths without being afraid of accusations of bias. Specifically he calls for the industry “to abandon the appearance of objectivity as the aspirational journalistic standard, and for reporters instead to focus on being fair and telling the truth, as best as one can, based on the given context and available facts.” |
What undergirds Wesley’s argument is a deep understanding of, among other things, the internet. On a basic level, he notes the shift taking place as the editors of the country’s most esteemed outlets “no longer hold a monopoly on publishing power.” But I sensed there was something more to it. So I DM’d Wesley on Twitter. It went like this: |
| CW: You (and many of your colleagues calling for a paradigm shift in the industry) have a fundamental understanding of the press’s responsibility in the larger information ecosystem. A key part of that is our role as amplifiers. Not just what we amplify but also its second order effects — how it destroys credibility when you give over your platform to somebody who wants to undermine you. How much does that notion factor into the way you do your job but also advocate for change in the industry? |
| WL: I think that for too long many of us in the press have avoided tough questions about the outcomes of our coverage — if we’ve always done something a certain way, it is assumed to be the just and right and responsible way to do it. But we need to be smarter and more introspective than that. For example, people trot out the cliché “sunlight is the best disinfectant” to defend things like soft profiles of white supremacists, when in fact the research suggests that providing such a platform to such people only enhances the reach of their views. |
| The thing about putting someone on a stage and under a spotlight is that everyone can see them — and they may be attracted to what they see. This is where the subjective decision-making comes in. White editors and reporters are more likely prone to thinking the best of their white readers when it comes to issues of prejudice and bigotry, while minority reporters are less likely to romanticize white Americans in such a way. |
For Wesley and others, these debates over objectivity aren’t hypothetical or academic. They are very real with high stakes. “The failures of neutral objective journalism across several beats in the news media are countless,” he writes. “All the while, black and brown lives and livelihoods remain imperiled.” |
After decades of pleas falling on deaf ears, Wesley and others are speaking up publicly. Many of us are listening. As he suggests, “the leaders of America’s newsrooms could consider truly listening to them.” |
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