The objectivity argument I wrote about this month continues to simmer. In the interests of making this blog a continuing conversation about journalism issues, large and small, I’m posting a few of the most substantial pieces on this subject that I’ve seen in recent weeks.
Tom Kent, the standards editor for The Associated Press, wrote a strong defense of objectivity for the Ethical Journalism Network.
He wrote:
That everyone understands objectivity differently makes it a dangerously fuzzy concept, easy road kill in the rush to new journalistic techniques. We dismiss it at our peril.
At heart, objective journalism sets out to establish the facts about a situation, report fairly the range of opinion around it and take a first cut at what arguments are the most reasonable. To keep the presentation rigorous, journalists should have professional reporting and editing skills (be they staff or independent journalists, paid or unpaid). To show their commitment to balance, journalists should keep their personal opinions to themselves.
Jeff Greenfield, a longtime television reporter and analyst, now a commentator for Yahoo News, explained that in the interests of objectivity, he did not vote for many years.
Jay Rosen, a New York University professor, wrote a blog post in direct response to my column. He sees a new and better system emerging: “Accuracy and verification, fairness and intellectual honesty – traditional virtues for sure – join up with transparency, ‘show your work,’ the re-voicing of individual journalists, fact-checking …”
And the journalist Matthew Ingram, writing for PaidContent.org, wrote that it’s too late anyway to keep reporters “impartial” in the traditional sense – the horse has left the barn — and he notes, “In the long run, it’s worth asking what we can gain by allowing reporters to be human beings while they do their jobs, instead of only asking what we lose by doing so …”
And in a sense, I followed up on the column myself when I questioned the unusual first-person voice in a front-page story by the reporter Scott Shane about the former Central Intelligence Agency official John Kiriakou. It wasn’t in keeping with traditional ideas about objectivity, but its transparency with the reader about the reporter’s role fended off potential problems.
One of my favorite responses came from Damien Cave, The Times’s correspondent in Mexico, on Twitter, who brought up a crucial element that I had not addressed head-on: fairness.
Objectivity vs transparency at the NYT. Id add another virtue oft ignored: fairness (@Sulliview) //t.co/H8J5bnaD
In a swiftly changing journalism world, it’s a debate that’s worth continuing to explore. And I doubt that this is the last we’ll hear of it.