Journalism: Too Much Pressure!

Needless to say, there are dozens of things a journalist needs to be wary of when writing an article. Bloggers are less beholden to many of these issues, both legal and ethical, but the closer they adhere to the same rules as a Sun reporter, the more seriously they'll be taken, and the less often they'll get sued.

Unless their name is Perez, in which case there is no reason to be taken seriously, and every lawsuit is another 20,000 hits.

I think the most important rule for any journalist, print or internet, is accuracy. If a journalist is inaccurate, people won't be interested in reading what they have to say, and sources will be less willing to talk to them for fear of being misquoted or misconstrued. A journalist who doesn't verify information is no better than a rumor-monger: they may get much of the story right, but God is in the details.

Further, if a journalist is thoroughly accurate, many other problems will fade into the background; even if he's biased or unfair, as long as his facts are facts, people will listen to him. And, he'll be harder to sue.

That being said, fairness and objectivity (which go somewhat hand in hand) are also hugely important for a writer. It's impossible to take an author seriously who takes a clear side on a not-so-clear issue. If you don't look at both sides of an issue, even if it's just a glance at the opposition's logic, then you're not writing a good article. No good assessment of a complicated matter is totally one-sided; if there was no merit to one side of an argument, it wouldn't be an argument at all. It belittles everyone involved.

The final issue I'll discuss if that of transparency. While many of the legal and ethical issues discussed in the book are important, maybe even more important than transparency, the idea has always been important to me.

Transparency brings with it a kind of automatic trust and respect. It shows a journalist respects the audience enough to tell them of any possible biases he might have, trusting the audience to use its discretion in taking that information as it is, without attributing any unfair subjectivity to it. No one can be totally unbiased, and for a journalist to tell the readers that he is would be ridiculous, and intelligent audiences would dismiss him out of hand. However, telling the audience, for example, "Yes, I vote Republican, but that doesn't mean that this report on Obama is untrue," shows that you respect their ability to distinguish between objectivity and subjectivity.

Even in everyday conversation, transparency brings trust. Phrases like, "I could be wrong, but...," make a speaker seem more trustworthy somehow. There's always the risk that people will think, "Oh, see, he's not 100% about it, he's making it up," and not believe you...but I'm not 100% about anything. And I don't trust people that are.