A Current

The US media has seemingly set its news stories into a constant cycle of reporting on the civil war in Libya, the budget crisis, Charlie Sheen, and even a bunch of Christians proclaiming the end of the world is near; what I would like to focus on is journalistic integrity.
Journalistic integrity, as I see it, is the duty of every professional journalist to report a story objectively and without inserting their own bias; if there must be an opinion in a story, then there also must be a valid counter-opinion to balance the substance of the story. This definition immediately negates the Sean Hannitys and the Glenn Becks of the world, as they have been known to present arguments with both no basis in fact or logic.
Journalism and journalism media in general has been regarded as the fourth branch of the government, in that journalism media is supposed to provide another check on the government by making it accountable to the populace. Ideally, all (or most) people would read or hear the news, make a valid judgment and vote/contact their representatives based on that judgment in order to better participate in the democratic process.
Everyone and their mother knows that this is far from the truth. Unfortunately, news media is a product owned by corporations (with the exception of public news such as NPR), and is made to be sold. If a story, such as Charlie Sheen's antics, is selling, you focus more on Charlie Sheen then, say, the most conservative members of congress desiring to cut large percentages of planned parenthood and education from the budget. Thus, viewership/readership goes up, and due to that, increased revenue from advertisers desiring to display their product to the average consumer.
Regardless of this desire to increase revenue, journalists should still look to present stories in, as Fox News purports to do, a fair and balanced manner. Unfortunately, there is no Hippocratic oath of journalism for me to call upon when demanding that all journalists remain loyal to the distribution of truth rather than truth as they see it. There is only the integrity of the field and the tradition of journalists such as Edward R. Murrow to guide every prodigal journalist along the journey; unfortunately, this does not count for much anymore. For example, Dan Rather, one of the more respected journalists today, did not report on the fallacy of the buildup to the Iraq War; instead, he touted his American pride by continually reporting on American firepower and the resoluteness of soldiers to fight. As a journalist, he failed the American people.
Increasingly, journalists are being replaced by pundits for creating opinions in people, and the result is disheartening, to say the least. A pundit's opinion, however skewered and factually incorrect, is accepted willingly simply because the pundit's beliefs coincide with the viewer's.
Is the field salvageable? Of course; nothing is ever completely lost. As of right now, though, it will take a lot of work to recover.

That's all for now,
Das Flüg

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EDIT------

Apparently, there is a journalistic code of ethics. Just goes to show that I should take a journalism class in college. Even so, that makes it that much sadder.

(Almost) Labor Day Lunacy

Every Sunday, I make the long and perilous 15 minute drive from college to my house in order to do my laundry, work out a bit, and contemplate life.


(Pictured: Bad humor.)

My dad, the Argentine immigrant that he is, decided to ingratiate himself into American culture by doing what a lot of other people do over Labor Day weekend: have a barbecue. His friends came, all of them over the age of 40, leaving me only to hope that I don't look that old when I reach 50. Anyway, skipping past my title of grill master and subsequently stinking of charcoal, after the meal was done I decided to do my usual routine of exercising. I was startled by the sound of my dad yelling at a rather irate and intransigent codger about immigration.

Upon hearing their debate, one facet of the conversation I realized, possibly the most important, was that the old codger was using arguments and almost emulating verbatim the rhetoric of those on Fox News. I had never actually encountered anyone who had so fervently spouted the absolute horse crap that Fox News flaunted as "fair and balanced"; I was amazed. My father (hopefully) soon realized that arguing with that curmudgeon was akin to eating a pinecone; sure, it would give you good fiber, but you don't like the feeling.

It is something that reinforces a personal credo of mine: You can't win an argument with an idiot. Idiot, in this case, is not someone who simply disagrees with me; it is someone who does not have an informed opinion with which to sustain a logical and coherent argument. Essentially, it is the very definition of the word: someone lacking knowledge.

I could go on about how denigrating it is for America to have so many people like that curmudgeon, or how personal opinions have been supplanted by pundit opinions, but, I just feel like I'd be exhuming a dead horse, beating it, burying it again, and then repeating the process simply because I could.

That's all for now,
Das Flüg

Thought Experiment

Imagine this: an Atheist runs for president and has a viable chance of being elected. Assume that he or she is a Democrat, as an Atheist in the Republican party is about as likely as Glenn Beck passing a math test. (An Atheist being nominated for president for the Democratic party is unlikely as well, since the party as a whole hopes to gain votes from moderates.) What would happen?
Firstly, the morals of the Atheist nominee would be challenged; the common belief is that morals are grounded in religion, and those without religion are immoral, rabid sexual monsters (cough*catholicpriests*cough) who would destroy all civilization because of a preference for mass anarchy.
It's more than likely that religious groups would protest fervently, heckle, send death threats, etc.

Why should belief in a deity factor into politics, a seemingly non-theocratic institution, especially in the United States, which was built on religious tolerance? I suppose that's my question of the week to you, my single reader. Feel free to comment if you like.

That's all for now,
Das Flüg