It Ain't About News Versus Opinion
Scanning his story archive, I see that New York Times reporter Brian Stelter has done a fair amount of writing about the news media. For that reason, it’s particularly surprising that his piece on the firing of Juan Williams is rife with confused analysis that is strangely common among newspaper journalists, but obviously wrong to most of us who’ve spent lots of time thinking these issues through.
Here are his opening paragraphs, where his questionable frame is introduced:
NPR’s decision on Wednesday to fire Juan Williams and Fox News Channel’s decision on Thursday to give him a new contract put into sharp relief the two forms of journalism that compete every day for Americans’ attention.
Mr. Williams’ NPR contract was terminated two days after he said on an opinionated segment on Fox News that he worried when he saw people in “Muslim garb” on an airplane. He later said that he was reflecting his fears after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks nine years ago.
After dismissing Mr. Williams, who was one of its senior news analysts, NPR argued that he had violated the organization’s belief in impartiality, a core tenet of modern American journalism. By renewing Mr. Williams’s contract, Fox News showed its preference for point-of-view — rather than the view-from-nowhere — polemics. And it gave Fox news anchors and commentators an opportunity to jab NPR, the public radio organization that had long been a target of conservatives for what they perceived to be a liberal bias.
Those competing views of journalism have been highlighted by the success of Fox and MSNBC and the popularity of opinion media that beckons some traditional journalists. That Mr. Williams was employed by both Fox and NPR had been a source of consternation in the past.
Note all the problems with this analysis. First off, there are a lot more than two forms of journalism competing for the attention of Americans. Second, the difference between NPR and Fox News isn’t that the former offers “the view from nowhere” while the latter prefers polemical points of view — and although I think that it’s impossible to actually find the view from nowhere in American media that isn’t even all I mean here. It would be one thing to say that the Associated Press of old, with its ideal of straight news reporting, represents one style of news coverage, whereas Fox News with its opinionated delivery represents another.
But NPR and Fox News are actually similar in some of the ways that Mr. Stetler says they’re different. Both media organizations broadcast a mix of coverage, some of which is labeled news and other coverage it labels opinion. At both places, the line between these two styles of broadcast are a lot muddier than management likes to acknowledge. The business models of both organizations depend on catering to the sensibilities of people with a certain world view. And I am not just talking about ideology when I say that.
Despite identifying as a right-leaning independent with conservative and libertarian sympathies, NPR is much more my style than is Fox News. Sometimes when I listen to the radio network, I’m attune to the ideologically liberal assumptions that inform its coverage. But more than a political ideology, I’d say NPR’s sensibility is informed by a sort of urban cosmopolitanism and a commitment to airing a diversity of viewpoints — a commitment that is certainly executed imperfectly at times, but that is nevertheless noticeable in the coverage that is presented. I also think there are people doing reporting at NPR who try their best to give facts without bias, and believe that’s what their superiors want them to do. There are times when I think NPR coverage doesn’t do justice to conservative insights, but there are other times when I think they’ve done their best to present strong arguments with which a majority of their audience will disagree.
Fox News is motivated not by a general preference for point of view polemics — it isn’t a network likely to hire Glenn Greenwald, an opinionated polemicist with a large fan base, to deliver analysis. Rather, its general preference is for news and opinion material that appeals to Red America. How is this different from NPR’s general preference for content that appeals to Blue America? Well it isn’t entirely different — like I said, it’s wrong to pretend that these media outlets neatly represent two competing styles of American journalism — but I think if you asked the average NPR listener if they want to hear and understand the strongest arguments contrary to the liberal consensus, they’d say yes (how they’d react if they were given that wish is another matter).
Whereas if you asked the average Fox News audience member if they want to hear and understand the strongest liberal arguments on that network, many would say, “We’re already awash in the opinions of the liberals of the mainstream media, which controls everything but Fox News and Rush. Why should we give liberals an outlet on the one network that is for us?” At its core Fox News is presented as an alternative to the MSM, a project that only makes sense operating in opposition to the cultural landscape that surrounds it. NPR is presented as a mainstream media organization that makes sense independent of the cultural landscape that surrounds it (even if that may actually be impossible).
Once you understand this, it’s easier to grasp why it wouldn’t be at all surprising to hear Will Wilkinson on NPR making a forceful, sophisticated argument for the free market… whereas it would be shocking if an intelligent liberal were given a commensurate shot at making a forceful argument on Fox News. The exception is someone like Christopher Hitchens, who might be put on a shout fest show and by sheer determination slip in a good lefty point, before reassuring the audience that he too is threatened by Islamic terrorism. But the typical liberal invited to appear on Fox is Alan Colmes, who for a long time served as the Washington Generals every night for Sean Hannity. If you have a network where Hannity regularly comes off as the more learned, persuasive interlocutor, you’re not trying very hard to give your audience an accurate view of the world.
Let’s return to the NY Times article, having skipped down a bit:
Like many other news organizations, NPR expects its journalists to avoid situations that might call its impartiality into question — an expectation written into the organization’s ethics code.
That expectation can erode under television lights and on Twitter. At outlets like NPR, some journalists have found it difficult to not share their opinions, especially when they are speaking in forums that lend themselves to commentary, like “The O’Reilly Factor.”
Kelly McBride, the ethics group leader for the Poynter Institute, a school for journalists, called the Williams case an “object lesson in how different news organizations have different values.” She said the ethics guidelines at many news organizations matched those at NPR.
“If you make some outlandish statement on your Facebook page or at a public event somewhere, you are still representing your newsroom,” she said. “So there are consequences to that.”
What bothers me about NPR and the way it’s handled this is the fiction that Juan Williams was fired merely because his impartiality was compromised — as if the higher ups there would’ve minded if he went on cable television to insist that the mosque and community center near Ground Zero would send a desirable signal of American tolerance to the Muslim world, for example. An NPR contributor can safely express lots of opinions without getting fired. I’d have a lot more respect for NPR if it said, “The NPR audience has certain values and sensitivities, and the particular viewpoints Juan Williams expressed transgressed upon those sensitivities. It therefore made it much more difficult for us to present him as a cohesive part of our brand, so we’re firing him.”
The problem is that NPR wants to preserve the illusion that open-mindedness and a diversity of viewpoints is its brand. Again, I think that NPR does this better than a lot of media organizations, and certainly better than Fox News. I can only laugh at Williams when he says…
This is an outrageous violation of journalistic standards and ethics by management that has no use for a diversity of opinion, ideas or a diversity of staff…
…and then proceeds to sign a 2 million dollar contract at a place where there is much less diversity of opinion. But if NPR were being honest, it would fess up that diversity of opinion is a competing value, and in its view a less important one than making sure it doesn’t transgress against the multicultural sensitivities of its staff and largely liberal audience.
Here’s the rest of Mr. Williams quote:
This is evidence of one-party rule and one-sided thinking at NPR that leads to enforced ideology, speech and writing. It leads to people, especially journalists, being sent to the gulag for raising the wrong questions and displaying independence of thought.
Let’s be honest: that kind of rhetoric is a much better fit at Fox than NPR, so in the end everything has worked out.
(I’ve written about other aspects of the Juan Williams controversy here and here.)
UPDATE: See James Fallows here for an eloquent defense of NPR as a whole that I’d like to associate myself with.
If you have a network where Hannity regularly comes off as the more learned, persuasive interlocutor
lol.
the rest of the analysis seems about right. one thing that irritates me about NPR presenters isn’t that they’re liberal, it’s that like many liberals they just aren’t too familiar with non-liberal viewpoints, and so asks weird and irrelevant questions.
— razib · Oct 23, 01:15 AM · #
An NPR contributor can safely express lots of opinions without getting fired.
Such as the opinion that Jesse Helms deserves to get AIDS.
But hey, maybe NPR’s opinion policies were different 15 years ago…
— Ethan C. · Oct 23, 03:25 AM · #
Welcome to [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/] emu boots [/url]store, we have many kinds of [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/] sheepskin ugg boots [/url] on sale. Christmas is coming, many kinds of [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/]Snow boots[/url] sale with lowest discount in our store, best service and fast shipping.Sheepskin boots contian [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/ugg-classic-metallic-boots-c-19.html] Ugg Classic Metallic Boots[/url], [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/ugg-classic-mini-boots-c-20.html] Ugg Classic mini Boots [/url]and so on.
Snow boots contian [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/ugg-classic-cardy-boots-c-16.html/]Ugg Classic Cardy Boots[/url], [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/ugg-classic-short-boots-c-23.html]Ugg Classic Short Boots[/url], [url=http://www.emu-boots.org/ugg-classic-tall-boots-c-24.html]Ugg Classic Tall Boots[/url] and so on. Welcome to our store, we are waiting for you!
— emu boots · Oct 23, 07:37 AM · #
TIgGRY <a href=“http://jsqsleecdliu.com/”>jsqsleecdliu</a>, [url=http://mlrndrabisnd.com/]mlrndrabisnd[/url], [link=http://epmdvdbymzqm.com/]epmdvdbymzqm[/link], http://ywoffjxykmld.com/
— jnkiykzpiin · Oct 23, 08:36 AM · #
I’ve been watching Fox for a long time, and although their opinion shows lean right, they present in 24 hours much more intellectual diversity than NPR. Hitchens and Colmes are just two examples you use, but there are many more which could be used — plus, time and again, when someone like Neil Cavuto has someone on to discuss a present controversy, as well as other Fox hosts, they say that so-and-so from the opposing view, usually a leftist view, refused to come on the show. On Glenn Beck’s show, he presents the left’s view in their own words, and most times he encourages the audience to decide which view they think makes more sense. So, liberal ideas are given a full hearing on Fox, whereas, despite such as Wilkinson’s liberaltarian airing, conservative and libertarian ideas are not as well-aired. Over and over on Fox, I see the leading Democrat senators and representatives giving the left view plus union and civil rights leaders, economists and political analysts. I agree with much of your post, but I think on the diversity issue, although Fox is definitely an alternative forum to the left, it presents more political diversity than NPR.
— mike farmer · Oct 23, 01:27 PM · #
What this larger conversation is in desperate need of is an acknowledgment that the idea of a liberal media bias is incredibly profitable for the right, and so whether or not liberal media bias actually exists is rendered irrelevant on two axes: one, it is irrelevant because the right will continue to claim liberal media bias no matter whether it actually exists or not, because the appearance of same is profitable and because you can’t actually get to the fact of the matter with bias. Second, it is irrelevant because if those on the right could wave a magic wand and erase liberal media bias forever, if that meant they would have to stop complaining about it, most wouldn’t; the complaint about liberal media bias is vastly more useful to conservatives than an actually level media playing field would be. Juan Williams is the perfect example. Conservatives don’t give a shit about Juan Williams or his right to express controversial opinions. Their crocodile tears for him serve a far greater political purpose than actually restoring him to his job at NPR would.
I see a lot of otherwise sophisticated conservatives who are far too credulous of the idea that the goal is actually to erase an existing bias, rather than to continue to use the concept as a generator for the politics of grievance. A guy like Dave Weigel has a kind of childish attitude that people complaining about something always want it to change.
— Freddie · Oct 23, 01:29 PM · #
Conservatives don’t give a shit about Juan Williams or his right to express controversial opinions.
Freddie, you really must resist the temptation to psychoanalyze your political opponents. a) it’s presumptuous, b) it’s often wrong, and c) it also makes every issue about your dislike of conservatives, and not about the issue at hand. From your comment above,for example I can’t tell: did you think the firing of Juan Williams was justified? You say conservatives don’t care. But in fact, I think it’s more likely you don’t care. About the man Juan Williams. About what good editorial policy. No you just care about the wickedness that ‘conservatives’ do.
For the record. You are wrong. As a moderate northeastern conservative type, I would kill for a press core that didn’t vote 10-1 for Obama. I would love a right-leaning NPR (cosmopolitan, but center right. Where the legal analysis is from Nina Tottenberg,e.g.) But that’s not the culture we have as a nation, so I’m not going to get it…
— Ben A · Oct 23, 01:45 PM · #
True or false: you were deeply committed to Juan Williams’s position at NPR before he was fired, and before his firing created a “wedge issue” for the right. Be honest.
— Freddie · Oct 23, 07:25 PM · #
Sorry, but what the fuck is it with Freddie? The quote Ben italicized is just dumb. But it’s standard Freddie. His response is both, too — nobody has to give a shit about Williams. He is a nowadays-mediocre journalist, whose firing was really stupid and probably reflective of a culture of revulsion-at-things-conservative at NPR, which culture is not unreasonable but repugnant in a publicly funded entity.
— Juan Williams · Oct 23, 08:48 PM · #
“If you have a network where Hannity regularly comes off as the more learned, persuasive interlocutor, you’re not trying very hard to give your audience an accurate view of the world.”
You also can make conservatives look dumber then liberals. This is a big change from when Buckley and Milton Friedman were the best known right wingers on TV.
“if NPR were being honest, it would fess up that diversity of opinion is a competing value, and in its view a less important one than making sure it doesn’t transgress against the multicultural sensitivities of its staff and largely liberal audience.”
Amen. I like NPR and C-SPAN a lot more then Fox but I know NPR will probably never have Robert Spencer talk about Islam or Steve Sailer talk about racial issues. C-SPAN is better at having a diversity of views then either NPR or Fox.
— Mercer · Oct 24, 12:00 AM · #
“I like NPR and C-SPAN a lot more then Fox but I know NPR will probably never have Robert Spencer talk about Islam or Steve Sailer talk about racial issues. C-SPAN is better at having a diversity of views then either NPR or Fox.”
Steve Sailer isn’t on NPR becasue he is insane. Same with Grover Norquist. Glenn Beck isn’t on NPR becasue he is a con man who is starting to believe his own con. Jim DeMint isn’t on becasue he’s going to tell you a bunch of crap that isn’ true.
There is diversity and there is DIVERSITY. NPR could have commentary form the psychotic guy from under the bridge but would that really be a good use of our time? Same with conservative wackos. THe point of NPR, the brand, is more or less reliable information. Becasue of who they are they may leave out some rational conservative perspective—thought I bet the do a better job on rational conservative perspectives than FOX—but they try to be ethical and inform. That means they are not going to put on people who are going to tell you something that is not true in a position of authority.
FOX on the other hand tries to stir up a certain segment of our population by inflaming their fears and predjudices with propoganda. And don’t forget, unlike NPR, FOX—like Limbaugh, Beck, Levin, GOldberg—sells this snake oil to make money. It’s one thing to spread untrue information becasue what you believe is untrue, it is another to lie for money.
So, Connor, I don’t agree with you that FOX and NPR are similar in any meaningful way. Their basic differneces are much more important than their similarities.
And about juan Williams. It supposed to be OK to fire people who are lame at their jobs. Isn’t that what conservatives are always saying about teachers? What JW said was stupid, especially for journalist with a national audience. It was just bad thinking. He shared his feelings, but his feeling were based in bad thinking. What journalists and commentarians have to sell is good thinking. He failed at his job.
— cw · Oct 24, 03:07 AM · #
What is up with Freddie is that he is not a boilerplate conservative with intellectual pretensions like most of the commenters here. I am also, unlike my dear Conor, more interested in comity than in telling the truth. Among the many ways that the blogosphere is functionally censorious is that many legitimate criticisms are preemptively dismissed because they, supposedly, impolite.
— Freddie · Oct 24, 04:33 AM · #
“That means they are not going to put on people who are going to tell you something that is not true in a position of authority.”
I’m going to critique my own post. I have some confidence in their ethics to the point where I believe they are try not to put on people who are INTENTIONALLY going to tell you something untrue.
— cw · Oct 24, 05:09 AM · #
“On Glenn Beck’s show, he presents the left’s view in their own words”
Just like Keith Olbermann presents Beck and other conservatives in their own words.
Mike
— MBunge · Oct 24, 03:52 PM · #
“I’ve been watching Fox for a long time, and although their opinion shows lean right, they present in 24 hours much more intellectual diversity than NPR.”
No one could actually believe this. I know you’ll keep saying it, but I still don’t think you believe it.
— Socrates · Oct 24, 07:15 PM · #
Actually, Norquist has been on NPR several times over the years – he made his “estate taxes equal the Holocaust” argument on “Fresh Air” back in the day. Hear Karl Rove bob and weave here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124597241 and remember he was given a platform on NPR to tout his erroneous predictions before the 2006 elections. Steve Sailer, not so much. NPR also avoids the FNC tactic of following up a lefty interview with several talking heads explaining why the person is wrong, a socialist, hates America, etc. etc.
— rieo · Oct 24, 11:04 PM · #
Yes, Socrates, I do believe it, when we are talking about diversity, pure and simple. NPR offers views from the right, but Fox is always presentng a mix of all views — they cover stories NPR will overlook, that give different perspectives NPR will avoid. Fox does a good job of giving the whole story, not just half of it — over and over the hosts are saying — In the interest of fairness here’s the view from the opposition, then they give an accounting of the opposite view.
— mike farmer · Oct 25, 12:44 AM · #
I mean, Fox has so many more viewers than the other news shows — they can’t all be brain-washed conservatives — people find the news to be more comprehensive on Fox, and their hosts more interesting — but I don’t think many of you watch it, obviously.
— mike farmer · Oct 25, 12:46 AM · #
rieo,
NPR has had Norquist and Rove but not Spencer and Sailer because Norquist and Rove do not challenge the multicultural dogma devoutly held by liberal elites.
mike farmer said:
“Fox is always presentng a mix of all views”
Fox viewers get to hear at length the views of Gingrich, Rove, Dick Morris, Palin and Huckabee. That is not much of a mix even when a token obscure liberal is given an occasional minute.
— Mercer · Oct 25, 02:01 AM · #
Becasue of this post I listend to NPR today with a critical ear. They had a republican congresswoman on who got about 5-8 minuets to talk about how the republicans were going to cut the deficit. She was asked questions by an interview who accepted her answers without challenge. She did a pretty good job and was reasonably forthright. I liked her. Then they had a woman from a non-partisan fiscal responsibility organization who praised the congresswoman for admiting that the budget wasn’t going to be balanced next year, that the defense budget was on the table, that it will take a bipartisan effort to reform SS and Medicare. Where she found fault with the congresswoman was the fact that she was talking about extending the Bush tax cuts, saying that you can’t cut taxes and lower the deficit. The fiscal responsibility champion then criticized the Obama administration for not letting all the Bush tax cuts expire.
In all it was very informative and, I have to say it, fair and balanced. I suggest critics of NPR take the time to listen critically as well, and then compare the experience to FOX (or any of the other cable channels).
— cw · Oct 25, 04:35 AM · #
FOX on the other hand tries to stir up a certain segment of our population by inflaming their fears and predjudices with propoganda. And don’t forget, unlike NPR, FOX—like Limbaugh, Beck, Levin, GOldberg—sells this snake oil to make money. It’s one thing to spread untrue information becasue what you believe is untrue, it is another to lie for money.
— Replica Swiss Watch · Oct 25, 07:23 AM · #
I don’t get Freddie’s point. I wasn’t “deeply committed” to Shirley Sherrod’s position at the Department of Ag before she got fired, but I thought it was deeply unfair once I heard the full quote. At least, I wasn’t if you mean that I had any position about her personally, because I had never heard about her.
Similarly, I wasn’t deeply committed to Juan Williams not being fired for revealing his opinions on Islam, because I had never thought about it. I was somewhat irritated by the rumored opinion that Williams and Liason should get off Fox, because NPR talking heads articulately expressing liberal opinions on Fox contributed to the popular perceptions that (1) NPR is liberal and (2) Fox allows competing points of view to be expressed, but I can’t say I felt strongly about it.
— J Mann · Oct 25, 01:34 PM · #
No, I don’t feel all that strongly about Juan Williams, though I’ve generally enjoyed his commentary bits on All Things Considered.
What I care strongly about is NPR. Like Connor, I much prefer NPR’s style to that of Fox. I want them to live up to their stated ideals of fairness and impartiality. I want All Things Considered to live up to its name.
I don’t want my favorite news format to devolve into a pure liberal-consensus echo chamber. I’m not deaf; I know the editors and executives come from the east coast liberal establishment class. I know that they’ve always leaned left in their editorial perspective. But I hope that they can be generous and imaginative enough to not let NPR become just another Fox or MSNBC.
Firing Juan Williams for going on O’Reilly and saying something as innocuous as what he said is a bad move for NPR. It makes their programming a little bit worse, it can have a chilling effect on their other commentators, and it makes the conservative criticisms of the network a little bit more true.
That’s why I care about it.
— Ethan C. · Oct 25, 05:10 PM · #
you were deeply committed to Juan Williams’s position at NPR before he was fired
Other people have covered this, but this Freddie asked me: no, not at all. MBunge’s Sherrod comparison struck me as well. I don’t have to have a prior commitment to someone to not want him fired for bogus reasons.
Again, Freddie, you are the person exhibiting ‘ideology trumps all’ thinking here. It’s not about comity vs. truth-telling, it’s about you, rather amusingly, embodying the criticism you are making of others in the very moment of making that criticism! You say: “conservatives don’t care about the firing of Juan Williams, they just want a stick to beat their ideological opponents” at the same time as you manifestly don’t care about the firing of Juan Williams except insofar as you want to deny conservatives that stick. But the guy was fired for what seems were fairly innocuous comments. Do you think it was OK to fire him? I still don’t know!
— Ben A · Oct 25, 08:08 PM · #
NPR does nuance. Fox does not. W implied that nuance is wussy. There’s your red-blue divide.
— dswift · Oct 29, 04:33 AM · #
I can’t tell you about Fox, but NPR does not do nuance. Buncha narrow-minded ideologues. I used to listen to CBC radio whenever I could. Some of their people are more airheaded than NPR ones. But there were also programs that did nuance. NPR does not do nuance. Christian Science Monitor’s shortwave broadcasts, back in the days when such things existed, were capable of nuance. But NPR does not do nuance. NPR does one-sided, leftist propaganda.
— The Reticulator · Oct 30, 04:38 AM · #