"Both Sides" Journalism and the Role of Media's Subservience To Government

I'm a little late on this, but I wanted to mention something about the study that came out of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government a couple weeks ago, regarding newspapers' use of the word torture. Specifically, I want to use it to put in context my assertion that unfortunately, the potentially bad results of government funding of journalism are already here, with none of the benefits.

The study documents a "significant and sudden shift in how newspapers characterized waterboarding." Basically, in the last 100 years, the newspapers discussed waterboarding occasionally and unequivocally called it torture, right up until the government began asserting that it was not torture.Glenn Greenwald sums up the implications well:

We don't need a state-run media because our media outlets volunteer for the task: once the U.S. Government decrees that a technique is no longer torture, U.S. media outlets dutifully cease using the term. That compliant behavior makes overtly state-controlled media unnecessary.

What it also does is make the bogeyman specter of government control irrelevant to the discussion because for better or worse (obviously worse) it's already here.

Adam Serwer said this:

As soon as Republicans started quibbling over the definition of torture, traditional media outlets felt compelled to treat the issue as a "controversial" matter, and in order to appear as though they weren't taking a side, media outlets treated the issue as unsettled, rather than confronting a blatant falsehood. To borrow John Holbo's formulation, the media, confronted with the group think of two sides of an argument, decided to eliminate the "think" part of the equation so they could be "fair" to both groups.

The New York Times came right out and admitted as much the same day:

However, the Times acknowledged that political circumstances did play a role in the paper's usage calls. "As the debate over interrogation of terror suspects grew post-9/11, defenders of the practice (including senior officials of the Bush administration) insisted that it did not constitute torture," a Times spokesman said in a statement. "When using a word amounts to taking sides in a political dispute, our general practice is to supply the readers with the information to decide for themselves. Thus we describe the practice vividly, and we point out that it is denounced by international covenants and in American tradition as a form of torture."

The Times spokesman added that outside of the news pages, editorials and columnists "regard waterboarding as torture and believe that it fits all of the moral and legal definitions of torture." He continued: "So that's what we call it, which is appropriate for the opinion pages."

This braindead "both sides" "journalism" is so typical of news today, and is clearly one of its biggest current faults. Certainly it's not new or unique to the outlets in the study, even on this topic! There was the whole controversy with NPR exactly a year before the study came out. This is NPR Ombudsman Alicia Shepard's post defending the use of the phrase "enhanced interrogation techniques" even after the controversy:

I'd like to succinctly restate what I, as a journalist with almost 30 years' experience, believe to be the most important point. I recognize that some will attack me as a shill for NPR.

I am not shilling for NPR. I don't agree with its use of bureaucratic euphemisms like "enhanced interrogation techniques."

But I am shilling for strong, credible journalism that is as objective as humanly possible. I am shilling for NPR to practice journalism based on putting out reliable information, to the best of its ability — without taking sides — so the public can make its own informed decisions.

My sense is that many of you instead want NPR to adopt the position you believe in because you think that position is the correct one. I respect your views. But I would ask you to respect that reasonable people can differ.

I believe that it is not the role of journalists to take sides or to characterize things.

What's obvious is that by not using the word torture, they're taking sides. I don't remember who said this, but it's the best analogy I've heard: Journalists should be neutral like umpires, but right now, instead of calling balls and strikes, they're saying that Democrats call it a ball and Republicans a strike, and they'll leave it to the audience to decide. That's not objectivity, it's abdication of their job. And it's exactly how the press today operates. Adam Serwer's next paragraph:

Of course, this attempt at "neutrality" was, in and of itself, taking a side, if inadvertently. It was taking the side of people who supported torture, opposed investigating it as a crime, and wanted to protect those who implemented the policy from any kind of legal accountability.

Absolutely true. Generally, objectivity is impossible, but whenever one side makes an established fact "controversial" (we called this torture for years and international and US law specifically define it as such), agreeing that there is a controversy is naturally taking a side.

So really, is the problem here media subservience to government, as Greenwald thinks, or is Serwer right? ("Greenwald says this proves the media's "servitude to government," but I think it's actually the conventions of journalism that are at fault here.) I think it's pretty clear both problems are manifesting and combining here. Clearly, the "both sides" journalism is broken, but there's plenty of other evidence of subservience too. For example, if I came out today and created a "controversy," any media attention I would get would be incredibly dismissive (though more likely I'd get none at all). It is exactly the fact that it is government making the claim that gives it credibility to our establishment media.

Here's another great example of media subservience from the Rolling Stone/Stanley McChrystal debacle.

Logan, who is CBS’s chief foreign correspondent, said that she wasn’t sure that she would have used the story Michael Hastings, the Rolling Stone writer, had in his hands after spending time with General Stanley McChrystal and his crew. “Well, it really depends on the circumstances,” Logan said. What circumstances? She doesn’t quite say.

...

Logan was saying, in her way, the same thing David Brooks did in his column last week. According to Brooks, people in power are always saying things that might get them in trouble when he’s around, but he understands why and won’t tell on them.

These are our watchdogs. The people who understand why people in power get themselves in trouble, but won't tell on them. We need help.