One source for so much of the Daily's shoddy journalism is their inability to seek the truth, and report it. Like much of American journalism, they are too preoccupied with getting "both sides" of every story to realize their primary job is to figure out what is really going on first, and report what other people think is going on second. In addition, they aren't always particularly good at getting both sides, leading to a paper whose articles swing from one perspective to another, vulnerable to legitimate attacks from every side.
For me, a defining moment for my time at the Michigan Daily came shortly after a fellow U-M student had been the victim of a vicious smear campaign. The student, Fadi Kiblawi, had been active in planning a controversial conference on Palestine that was to feature Sami El-Arian, the embattled and controversial University of Florida professor, as its keynote speaker. An email designed to look as if it was sent from his e-mail account was sent to over 1,000 faculty and staff at the University. Soon after Kiblawi began to receive responses to this email, he called university officials to determine the security of his email account. University administrators quickly sent follow-up emails to the campus, distancing themselves from the email (which had fraudulently alleged administrators had helped put together an email list), but not clearing Fadi from responsibility. (President Coleman: "The authorship and other related circumstances are under investigation, and the Provost's Office will handle the matter consistent with University procedures.") Suffice it to say the Daily dutifully reported the spoof email, the administration's dissembling (We don't believe it's anyone at U-M, basically) and Fadi's vehement denials he had anything to do with the emails.
Shortly after the incident above, which occurred on September 25, 2002, a strange man walked into the Michigan Daily newsroom. Excited, he said that he had been a former writer for the Daily, and was now employed by the University. He wanted to speak to the reporter investigating the spoof email because he thought he might have a theory about who sent them. The editor-in-chief at the time, Jon Schwartz, quickly replied something to the effect that the Daily didn't do investigations anymore. The man replied something like: "You don't do investigations any more? In my day, the Daily was investigating everything!" Overhearing this interaction, I introduced myself and offered to talk to the man. In short, what he basically had to say was that he had heard of Palestinian activists being foiled by sophisticated fraudulent emails, and suspected it was political conservatives either on campus or elsewhere. Intrigued, after the man left, I tried several times to contact professors who had replied to Fadi who had received the original emails to examine the header, which may or may not have contained technical information about the sender of the email - at least whether or not it originated within the U-M system. I was unsuccessful, and eventually the University announced that the email had been sent by somewhere outside Ann Arbor, tacitly clearing Fadi who was in a campus computer lab when the incident occurred. I ceased my inquiries - I had never been assigned to cover the story, and was conscious that my investigations where stepping on others' toes.
Throughout the entire episode, no other editor or reporter showed a serious interest in investigating for themselves who actually sent the email - which, to me, seemed like the real story. The few that did seem curious about who caused what had became a campus controversy seemed to regard it as idle newsroom chit-chat, not something worth investigating. The Daily reported what Fadi said, and what the University said, and what a number of other people said, but never once attempted to ask the question before every intelligent observer: who sent the email, and why?
I was thunderstruck. I had learned and firmly believed that a sacred principal underlying modern journalism was a dedication to the truth - a class I was taking at the time, taught by a former CNN correspondent, we learned on day one four principals of journalism that were commonly used in ethics policies: seek the truth and report it, minimize harm, act independently, and be accountable.
Yet here, at the Michigan Daily, was a group of journalists for whom the truth seemed a distraction from their primary goal - which, although difficult to discern, seemed for most to pad their resume, make the Daily their social life, and also "put out a newspaper," which even the most dim-witted knew they should rightfully celebrate. I knew, however, that anyone could put out a bad newspaper, especially if they spent as much time at it as the people at the Michigan Daily. What was hard, and what I thought worth striving for, was putting out a good newspaper. Perhaps I expected too much.
Later in the semester, Kiblawi became involved
with the boycott of the newspaper let by a coalition of progressive and
student of color organizations. Editors at the Daily were mystified
about why he would have any reason to criticize the newspaper, one going
so far as sending him an angry email attacking him for his
participation. After all, they had always thoroughly reported what he
said!
A note on objectivity
I firmly believe that "objective" journalists
are not objective at all - they instead favor the status quo. Any
student of journalism history should read David Mindich's book "Just
the Facts: How "Objectivity" Came to Define Amerrican Journalism",
which describes the convoluted history of an idea. As an example,
during reconstruction, the New York Times covered lynching of innocent
blacks in the south, dutifully reporting both sides: Yes, the blacks
deserved to be lynched, and no, the blacks didn't deserve to be
lynched. However, they were missing the third, true, point of view: the
victims in almost every case were innocent. The Times was assuming they
were guilty of crimes they never committed.
I also believe that all great investigative journalism contains an agenda: perhaps only the belief that the world can be made better and more just, or one more specific: human beings have basic rights, human slavery is wrong, or horrible pollution is wrong, as examples. Insisting journalism has no point of view loses sight of the fact that everyone has a point of view, and objectivity isn't something you do, it's instead goal, something to strive for. Should an extremely out-of-the ordinary thing happen: whether Canada elects a fascist leader who invades the U.S., or Bush dissolves the legislative branch of government, I would certainly hope the media would take sides for democracy and against the Canadians. When an overtly racist KKK grand dragon ran for governor in Louisiana in the late 1990s, the largest newspaper in New Orleans made it the conscious editorial policy to scrutinize his candidacy more than his opponent. Was this decision justified? I would say yes. Was it "objective"? No.
In the late 1980s, there was something referred to as the "Daily Civil War" at the Michigan Daily. On one side were the "professional" journalists, who believed the newspaper should be run like a business and always strive for objectivity. On the other were some who believed journalism was a tool to make the world a better place, and the journalists should investigate injustice and sometimes take sides. While I don't know the whole story, the "objective" journalists won out, and they adopted an apparently quickly drafted set of bylaws that enshrines the Daily's authoritarian power structure - the same bylaws the have today. And the rest is history: by the time the Daily's website starts around 1995, the articles read like the sometimes do today: as if they were written by a freshman who had received little help from anyone, and probably would quit in less than a year because they were being told what to do all the time. That is, of course, because that's probably exactly who wrote them.
While I don't know exactly how the Daily should be organized, I think that both sides have something to contribute: sometimes journalism does have a point of view, but in many cases good journalism reports both sides and strives for "objectivity".
I'm optimistic about the future, however. There's
another campus organization that is similarly divided between two
equally partisan camps: some who believe they should stay out of any
controversy and take no point of view, and another who thinks they exist
to crusade for truth, justice, and student rights. Yes, I'm referring to
the Michigan Student Assembly. While it might be vogue to mock the MSA
at the Daily, going so far as to not even completely publishing their
election results in recent years, (Hence this website picking up the
slack) they have something the Daily doesn't: at least a superficially
democratic organization. Decisions regarding the entire organization
are discussed and voted on, and there is room for people with many
different visions for the organization to coexist.
Although many editors at the Daily suffer from a
superiority complex, and believe that publishing a newspaper is far
superior to lobbying the administration and helping organizing things
like MSA Airbus, it's not clear to me either one "better" or "more
important." Maybe MSA could provide the Daily with a better way of
organizing their internal affairs. After all, the rules governing MSA
are already on their website, and are actually utilized: their "code"
and constitution. The Daily's bylaws? Nearly secret, and only referred
to in order to justify an editor's decision. In my case, when I pointed
out to Editor-in-chief Jon Schwartz that he technically couldn't fire me
because the Bylaws only allow each department head to fire staff
members, he pushed through a clause giving the editor-in-chief power to
fire anyone, and then after I was re-hired wrote
me an email telling me that was the only reason they re-hired me,
and that "I was doing my most important job which is protecting the flag
of this paper, and I will continue to do that whenever I must." But more
on my experiences tomorrrow.
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