Where Have All the Journalists Gone?
Whatever happened to America’s free press? More importantly, whatever happened to all those wonderfully annoying, cynical, adversarial, probing, demanding journalists who spent their every waking hour searching for the evil lurking behind the face of government? Where did they all go?
Our founding fathers understood the danger of a government not answerable to its citizenry or the all-important exposure to daylight. They were sufficiently petrified of the corruptible nature of government that they wrote dramatically specific protections into our Constitution. Moreover, they went even further to insure that ‘we the people’ would have the compelling power of a free press to question those in government while we went about our daily lives building a more perfect union.
Over the last century, those nettlesome investigators, in their unrelenting search of violators of the public trust, have been replaced by partisan agents and apologists of two political extremes — each in its way, intent on removing our freedoms under the guise of securing those same freedoms. I like to call them “news monkeys” who reflexively read someone else’s agenda from a teleprompter. The most destructive effect of replacing factual news with biased opinions presented as fact has made us blind to our ultimate power as citizens. While the communication medium has been modernized, digitized, globalized, and ‘ubiquitized,’ its practitioners, carefully disguised as journalists, have been bribed or mesmerized by the narcotic lure of celebrity and power.
Today, we are left with giant media conglomerates that carefully repackage news into a version spun to fit their management’s ideology. The founding fathers rightly included the requirement of a ‘free press’ to check the darker side of our humanity, especially of those in government. As a media outlet, the paper you publish or the video you broadcast is licensed to present news, interviews, and credible opinions in a civil and factually researched manner- which is not what we have now.
This is not nearly acceptable in the fulfillment of your singularly crucial role. I, for one, desire a cynical, adversarial, probing, demanding journalist over what we have. After all, that was the whole idea behind a free press. A journalist’s role in our democratic republic is to be the colorectal surgeon of our government systems, seeking and removing those elected and unelected cancerous masses.
For those of us who cannot find sufficient hours in the day to fulfill our responsibilities as working parents, we must depend upon our free press to inspire a robust, informed public opinion so that we may perform our primary duty as citizens—to root out the cancer of arrogance, corruption, and greed. Those who are literate still possess some remnant of common sense, albeit now more accurately, uncommon sense.
Obviously, as idealistic students of journalism, you could not see your metamorphosis occurring— or you would have written this article yourselves. Instead, what Plato first recognized and attempted to warn us of 2,400 years ago has been tucked away in university archives. His discussion of the five devolving phases of government in an ideal republic predicted that the democratic phase of government necessarily erodes to ‘tyranny.’ The notion of democratic freedom is a potent potion that can elevate humanity to the sanctity of the divine. But as Plato might have prophesied, the fly in the ointment is ‘us.’
So why am I laying blame at the feet of journalists and their enablers? Because they were supposed to be our best and brightest. They were the chosen ones who were supposed to expose those to whom we assigned our power and who had succumbed to the dark side. Their annoying tenacity, wit, and ability to mercilessly castigate our representatives’ failings were the qualities that were meant to strike fear into the hearts of corruptible bureaucrats at the prospect of being exposed. Democracy does not devolve into tyranny on its own. Human weakness is what ensures tyranny.
It was your job to use those annoying traits you were blessed with to save us from ourselves. Your “job” was the relentless pursuit of our government so politicians and bureaucrats would not begin to believe in their bull roar. You failed miserably! It was not your job to ‘give a pass’ to those who shared your delusion of what was best for us. It was your job to police our leaders and savage them with the truth so that once exposed, they would be driven into obscurity— which is worse than hell to a politician.
Your arrogance prevents you from seeing that the end of our democratic republic will be your end as well. Tyranny employs its own form of journalism, and you are not part of that future. And you academics— you sold your soul as well. Emboldened by the narcotic known as tenure, you soiled those young, annoying minds at the altar of celebrity and the fantasy of a ruling class. And for what? A reserved parking space and a fancy curriculum vitae to mask their insecurities? You continue to dismiss and diminish those who make up the “unbathed” masses. We are the working stiffs who are only called upon to vote occasionally to keep the game “rigged” against ourselves. We believe in foolish ideas like the golden rule and equal protection under the law. You were supposed to be our champions and prevent those arrogant narcissists from destroying our precious ‘shining city upon a hill.’ You chose, instead, to join them.
Perhaps we, the people, need to place a moratorium on equal justice under the law and vote you out of existence. There is no need for the fairness you keep squealing about. We should eliminate anyone who we find objectionable. You should know that the “unbathed” do not find a person’s color or race objectionable. Your elitist sense of entitlement may be enough to send you packing.
