If you’re a crime reporter for long enough, you start seeing the world through a distorted lens. Everything is evil. People are always manipulating you. The world is a terrible place. People aren’t trustworthy and you have a true lack of faith.
I’d always argue, using my cynical brain, against the words that people said, because I lived inside the police reports that the general public wasn’t reading. The murders and brutal crimes against women and children. The autopsies and crime scene photos. It was a brutal world to swim around in. It made sense why so many police detectives drank and smoked. Criminals and even the general public tend to lie or play some angle to benefit their own lives or to just stay out of trouble, or even jail.
It took time to climb out of my cynical way of thinking; at least, the deeper, darker side of cynicism started to fade after I left that beat. But then, as a political reporter, it all came back. No murders. But so much distrust. Political self-interests began to bury the ledes of the stories and that turned into our audiences not gaining any factual information to help their lives. It was verging on TMZ territory.
All of that experience that began 25 years ago (chasing down leads about scandalous behavior by politicians, backdoor deals to get judges confirmed, and secret meetings at a dive bar where local and state officials bought their cocaine) didn’t help the lives of our audiences – but man was it juicy stuff.
Somewhere along the line, “ah-ha” or “got-you” journalism lost its impact. News consumers don’t appear to care about the facts being entirely correct, but more so they seem to care about the end game of the story. Because everyone lies, and we seem resigned to or even cynical about that so-called fact.
The LA Times posted its “fact checking” story about House Speaker Paul Ryan’s recent town hall meeting and reporters counted the number of lies he told. So what? The Huffington Post is even reporting how “The Truth Isn’t Trending Well” in politics. And?
Facts exist. But are they worth chasing to prove someone wrong? To make one side feel better over the other? Or should we take the facts to chase the story of personal impact? Meaning, how do those facts, right or wrong, positively or negatively impact people? Because we’re all working on the assumption that everyone is lying. In the political sense, this type of lying is called paltering, which roughly means misleading by telling the truth. Politicians and lawyers use this tactic very well.
Rumors and false claims have become news, and social media isn’t helping change that. As a journalist, you think about who’s saying it, or in today’s world, tweeting it – NAFCU, CUNA, the NCUA, Meryl Streep, Donald Trump. They all have something to say. Right or wrong. They have the right to be heard. So, how does a journalist judge whose statements to quote and facts to fact check anymore? Not everything can be news. Not everything can be top priority. Even if it’s your top priority. But, news can be found inside the statements of fact, fiction, lies and even cynicism.
As a news consumer, you think about impact and outrage concerning a newsworthy issue in your life and career.
It’s time to rethink the approach of news. Because information is slamming all of us on all sides all day. Press releases, quotes on an issue, images of large checks. We’re all doing our jobs as best as we can with the time we have in a day.
And Trump has redefined news coverage to the extreme. President Trump is like the internet. Meaning, if you try to follow every word, every tweet of truth or lies, it turns into a rabbit hole where you start off fact checking and then end up watching “Funny Or Die” videos four hours later. By the time you’ve figured out that you’ve entered a gigantic time suck, the administration and story itself has moved on or changed. It’s impossible to keep up.
Our elected officials have started to figure out this reality TV approach to facts. For an example, look back on the promos of MTV’s “Jersey Shore” and you’ll begin to understand what journalists are up against. Repetitive and scandalous-sounding quotes aren’t fully true – but they make great TV (a.k.a. The Situation appears to be angry at Snooki. Then you watch the full episode and The Situation is mad, but not at Snooki. He’s ticked that dogs in the house pooped in his room). So, by the time journalists have figured out they’ve been following a story that just leads to poop in a room, it’s too late and the public becomes less or misinformed on the facts that could impact their lives.
Go ahead and yell at me, the publication and our staff. Threaten us if you’d like. I don’t enjoy it, but it’s your right as a reader. Just like the national news journalists’ lives have been flipped by the new administration, as far as how this new world should be covered, the game has also changed in our small industry. Not everything is news anymore. But if it’s news for credit unions, you’ll read about it. And I promise, I’m keeping my cynicism out of it. It’s just not healthy.
Michael Ogden is executive editor for CU Times. He can be reached at mogden@cutimes.com.
