THE DREADED J-WORD: JOURNALISM

Melissa Harris-Perry models tampon earrings.  Really.

It was a very embarrassing -one might say “humiliating”- week for journalism. One reporter wore tampons as earrings, live on air. Another tweeted a photo of himself almost nude, and a third reporter asked a highly respected scholarly researcher how he, a Muslim, could justify writing a book about Jesus.

Could it get any worse for the broadcasting business? Well, yes it could. In addition to all of the above, which I’ll detail in a moment, there was beleaguered, way-past-his-expiration-date Rush Limbaugh who said this of Huma Abedin, wife of serial sexter Anthony Weiner: "It's relevant to point out here by the way ... Huma is a Muslim. In that regard, Weiner ought to be able to get away with anything.

“Muslim women don’t have any power, right?” he continued. “Muslim women are beheaded, stoned, whatever, if they drive, have affairs. In certain countries, Muslim women, if they’re raped, are killed -- it’s their fault."

Hmmm..did you know we behead Muslim women in America? I did not know that. Oh, and did someone forget to tell Rush that Huma Abedin was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan?

Meanwhile, none other than anti-journalist Glenn Beck rented a series of rooms in a downtown Salt Lake City hotel to display his collection of Nazi memorabilia, including hooded KKK cape, a swastika banner that was used at Nuremberg, a copy of Mein Kampf signed by Adolf Hitler, the love letters of Hermann Göring, a satin handkerchief with Hitler’s blood.

Oy.

If you’re already starting to hyperventilate at all of the above, calm yourself and read on. First, about those earlier-mentioned earrings. Melissa Harris-Perry, a relative newcomer to the cable news circus, hosts a Sunday round table talk show on MSNBC. After state troopers confiscated tampons, maxi pads and other potential projectile items from those entering the Texas state capitol building recently, Perry made light of the civic debacle this way:
                       

Upon seeing Harris-Perry don tampons on her lobes, satirist and cultural commentator Dennis Miller tweeted, “David Brinkley turning over so rapidly in his grave you could make chicken shawarma in it.”

"70 is the new 50"...Not

Oh and about that above-referenced journalist who tweeted an almost-naked shot of himself: That would be Geraldo Rivera, 70, of Fox News. Rivera, whose checkered career spans five decades, tweeted the selfie with the tag line, “70 is the new 50.” No Geraldo, based on what we see in the photo,
70 is 70, and my unsolicited advice goes like this: Get dressed.

Compounding the tasteless episode were Rivera’s own words of attempted justification. He began by explaining he had had a long day at work, and he had a couple of drinks before breaking out the camera. Then he said, "And I never do tequila when I'm alone, but I had this new bottle that someone had given me. That second my fate was sealed. I said, 'Dammit, I like that picture.' I had learned how to use Twitter a couple of weeks ago and there I was."

Yes, Geraldo, there you were, but what about us? Do we really need to know that when you’re alone you like to do tequila shots and take naked self pics?

Then there is the case of Lauren Green, also of Fox News, who conducted an on-air interview with religious scholar Reza Aslan. Aslan, author of Zealot: The Life &; Times of Jesus of Nazareth, thought he was to be interviewed about the research he did and the content of the book. But Green inexplicably decided to interview him about how odd she found it that he, a Muslim would write about Jesus. Watch:
The Twitterverse exploded following Green’s disastrous interview. Tweeted one viewer: “Me: ‘I’m an oceanographer.’ Green: ‘But you live on land.’”

It bears mentioning that all of the broadcasters mentioned herein are experienced adults who were most likely hired in part based of their editorial judgment (except perhaps Harris-Perry, who has no background in media, according to her own bio). Of course one can also be fired for editorial judgment issues – does the name Don Imus ring a bell? Why then, would any of these professionals say or do what I have described here?

In part, this can be explained by a lack of oversight on the part of news directors and the editorial brass. The game today is all about attracting and retaining viewers or listeners. Watch cable news networks often and long enough and you will see a plethora of incidents just as tasteless and unprofessional as the ones I have described here.

You are observing the pioneer days of the 24-hour news cycle. It may not seem that way, but consider that even the granddaddy of all round-the clock news, CNN is only 33 years old. Others, like Fox and MSNBC didn’t arrive on the screen until 1996. By then, the average household in America was either wired for cable or just about to be, which meant the American viewer was on the threshold of remote control roulette. After decades of having just three or four stations from which to choose, suddenly we were in the TV driver’s seat with up to 200 channels. Heady stuff.

From there, cable news stations went into what we could term a “cultural decline.” And now, this many years later, a host is wearing tampon earrings, another is naked on Twitter and a third evidently hasn’t read her interviewee’s book, so she decided to try to discredit the author instead of discussing his work. Ugh.

According the a new Gallup poll, Americans’ confidence in TV news is down to 23 percent of those who responded. That matches our lack of confidence in newspapers. To give you an idea of how bad the numbers look, in 1996 our confidence in TV news was at 46 percent. In 1980 our confidence in newspapers was at 51 percent. (These figures area based on responses when asked if consumers have “a great deal or quite a lot of confidence” in these entities.)

Jon Stewart -- The New Cronkite?

If that doesn’t disturb you, you should also know that among young people, high profile news broadcasters are not trustworthy. Who will ever forget the TIME Magazine poll in 2009 that found Jon Stewart of The Daily Show the most trusted newscaster in America. Huh?

Therein is the danger of cable news networks putting people like Harris-Perry, Rivera and Green front and center. As if the journalism profession were not sullied enough by its own historical missteps, by promoting individuals who value entertainment over substantive content, the viewing public comes to equate their broadcasts with any other white noise that comes from our increasingly technologically- sophisticated televisions. The technology is at an all-time high while the content of what it projects is in the gutter.

I remember about a zillion years ago when I was in journalism school, NBC anchorman John Chancellor came to speak to us. He said, “You are about to enter the most noble profession there is. Keeping the citizenry informed about the issues that directly touch their lives is as important as any job can be. It’s a big responsibility that carries with it a rich history to which you will now contribute.”

Those were some wise words. Compare that with a quote from Geraldo Rivera: “I’m old, but I’m still cute and strong…and very butch.”

Fellow TV viewers..we’re doomed.

THE LONG, SLOW SUICIDE OF THE AMERICAN NEWSPAPER

Did Brenda Starr get fired Saturday? As inconceivable as it may seem, the hip, sexy comic strip reporter who first entered the American consciousness in 1940 was canned this weekend by her tough, old bird editor, Bottomline. Never mind that in human years Starr would probably be way beyond retirement age by now. And let’s not get picky about Bottomline chomping on a cigar, even though there’s not a newsroom in America today that permits smoking. Right here we get to see the exact moment when the comics intersected in the most distressing way with real life:

Is it sheer coincidence that Starr got the ax the same week the Christian Science Monitor published its last print edition? This was also the week that the New York Times revealed it will roll all salaries back by five percent. It gets worse: The Washington Post offered employees a second buyout package this week – more than 100 staffers took the bait last year and voluntarily left before they got the Brenda Starr treatment. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution cut its news staff by 30 percent, just as the Houston Chronicle announced a 12% reduction in its own staff. Just weeks ago the Rocky Mountain News published its last edition after 149 years in print, followed closely by the demise of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, after 146 years. The Tucson Citizen is reportedly being published on a day-to-day basis until it can be determined if it is financially possible to continue publication. The San Francisco Chronicle is hanging on by a fiscal thread, while … well, you get the dismal picture by now, right? The newspaper business is at the least, in transition, and at the extreme, obsolescent.

I attended one of the best journalism schools in the country, the University of Missouri School of Journalism. That was more than 30 years ago, when we used newsprint in manual typewriters to produce our stories in triplicate, using carbon paper. Yes, carbon paper. At the copydesk we edited stories by hand, some that ran upwards of 1500 words. Fast forward to 2009, when I do not often even read a newspaper, because I get my news online. When I produce a story for a print publication these days, the max word count is usually about 700 words. No more typewriters, carbon paper or newsprint, and some would say that within a couple of years there will be no more newspapers. I do not agree with that prediction, but I feel certain that the age of newspapers as a primary source of news and information is now over.

Industry observers will point squarely to the rise of new technology as the reason for the demise of newspapers. I think otherwise – I believe newspaper professionals were so determined to preserve their product in its traditional form that they quietly overlooked the digital age. When they finally did concede to the existence of the online world, instead of innovating and creating something dynamic and compelling, many of them simply took the traditional product and duplicated it online. Instead of researching the market, conducting focus groups and studying new media possibilities, they kept churning out the same product that worked during the Civil War, hoping the public would eventually come back into the fold—or above the fold, as it were. It was a classic case of burying their stubborn, corporate heads in the sand. It was commercial suicide. It still is.

So, here's the result: Since 2,000, daily newspaper circulation has dropped from 55 million to 50 million. Just in the past two years, ad revenue has dropped 28%, more than $11 billion. Classified ads are suffering bigtime, largely due to online resources like Craigslist. Every day, more people are migrating online for their news, partly because it's free. No one has yet figured out how to properly monetize online news. Don't get too comfortable with that. In the very near future you will likely begin to pay nominal subscription fees for online publications, and possibly a fee per story for aggregate news (e.g. Drudgereport.com, Huffington Post) site postings.

Why were other American industries, such as retailing, banking and travel, so much further ahead of the digital curve than newspapers? Once the newspaper industry recognized the mass communicative power of the Internet, why did it not aggressively mount new business models to take advantage of it? And above all, why did an unwavering commitment to traditionalism trump the obvious coming of digital innovation? Digital communication did not creep up on us overnight. Watch this 1981 report about the San Francisco Examiner’s experimental computer version of its newspaper:

I seem to be one of the few journalists of my generation who are truly embracing the evolution of online news and information. I don’t get it. Wouldn’t you think that an industry that is dedicated to conveying information would fully support any vehicle that would allow them to update this information constantly, around the clock? Further, the people who work in the newspaper industry do so because they believe in contributing to the mix of ideas. So, why are so many of them rallying against bloggers and citizen journalists? Wouldn’t you expect them to respect the technological opportunity for men and women on the street to have a voice in world events?

The evolution I have been fortunate enough to witness, from manual typewriters to digital communication is stunning. It has altered the culture in ways almost as monumental as advances in medical science, space exploration and the election of a black man as President of the United States. Note to all the middle-aged white guys who still call the shots in the news business: Get on board with it, or perish. We are in the midst of the most fascinating moment our business has seen – ever. You can fight it, and ultimately drop out of it, or you can dive in and have the adventure of your lifetime. It’s your call.