View Full Version : Should Journalistic Objectivity Apply in Trump's Case?
Look, I understand how the Left has painted pretty much every GOP presidential candidate as a potentially dangerous monster at least since they had Barry Goldwater nuking the little girl. That’s politics. But when the New York Times publishes a front page column questioning whether normal standards of objectivity should apply in the face of the existential threat presented by the current monster, you have to wonder if we have turned some kind of corner.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/08/business/balance-fairness-and-a-proudly-provocative-presidential-candidate.html?_r=0
“If you’re a working journalist and you believe that DonaldJ. Trump (http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/us/elections/donald-trump-on-the-issues.html?inline=nyt-per) is a demagogue playing to the nation’s worst racist and nationalistic tendencies,that he cozies up to anti-American dictators and that he would be dangerous with control of the United States nuclear codes, how the heck are you supposed to cover him?
Because if you believe all of those things, you have to throw out the textbook American journalism has been using for the better part of the past half-century, if not longer, and approach it in a way you’ve never approached anything in your career. If you view a Trump presidency as something that’s potentially dangerous, then your reporting is going to reflect that. You would move closer than you’ve ever been to being oppositional. That’s uncomfortable and uncharted territory for every mainstream, nonopinion journalist I’ve ever known, and by normal standards,untenable.”
I happen to agree that Trump is nearly as dangerously erratic as portrayed, but shouldn’t advocacy journalism be honestly labeled as such?
You used "New York Times" and "objectivity" in the same sentence!
Triple word score!
They should be objective, obviously. But their editorial section should let loose with a full magazine.
Didn't Trump just basically call for Clinton's assassination? Klassy. http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/08/trump_suggests_second_amendmen.html
They should be objective, obviously. But their editorial section should let loose with a full magazine.
Didn't Trump just basically call for Clinton's assassination? Klassy. http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/08/trump_suggests_second_amendmen.html
And that's what the opinion section is for. But when the NYT muses on the front page whether it's desirable or even possible to be objective in reporting on Trump V Clinton, doesn't that indicate a certain level of bias readers should adjust for?
Didn't Trump just basically call for Clinton's assassination? Klassy. http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/08/trump_suggests_second_amendmen.html
Sure, Trump's only "nearly" as dangerous as the Times (and just about every other paper) is portraying him.
After one of his deranged followers takes a shot at Hillary, he'll undoubtedly describe them as "very passionate." (http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/16/us/trump-supporters-immigrant-beating/)
It's not advocacy journalism. It's telling the truth, instead of the mealy-mouthed on-the-one-hand-on-the-other-hand phony equivalence that passes for journalism nowadays. It's that kind of spineless "objective" reporting that helped saddle us with Trump in the first place. If a few more reporters had started calling out Trump's lies sooner, we might not be in this mess.
iris lilies
8-9-16, 4:59pm
I see this article as an example of the ridiculous level of bias of the NYT now. They act as if they are not already biased. And now they seek a way to give themselves a blessing on even more bias? It boggles my mind.
ApatheticNoMore
8-9-16, 5:16pm
I don't believe their explanation of their motives. So I consider debating whether one should or should not be objective on Trump if one has pure as snow motives and only wants to stop Trump because they believe he is bad, to have possibly nothing to do with the reality of what is going on. So how much time should I waste debating theories, like angels on a pinhead, that have nothing to do with trying to understand reality.
You see I know this because they did the same darn thing to Bernie Sanders! Sanders who may have actually stood a better chance against Trump and who was none of those scary Trump things that Trump might be (Trump is indeed bigoted and impulsive and so on). So they have no credibility. Those who make political revolution impossible make Trump inevitable, or well if not this time probably some kind of Trump someday.
Didn't Trump just basically call for Clinton's assassination? Klassy.
I got the sense that in his incoherent bumbling way he was asking for the 2nd Amendment supporters to put the pressure on their elected representatives not to approve any Supreme Court nomination that doesn't pass the 2nd Amendment litmus test. And not asking them to come out guns blazing.
Fun though it is to chum the waters with such tales.
What ever happened, by the way, to the current vacant position on the court?
It's not advocacy journalism. It's telling the truth, instead of the mealy-mouthed on-the-one-hand-on-the-other-hand phony equivalence that passes for journalism nowadays. It's that kind of spineless "objective" reporting that helped saddle us with Trump in the first place. If a few more reporters had started calling out Trump's lies sooner, we might not be in this mess.
To me, it's advocacy journalism when the Times says "Donald Trump is the Prince of Darkness and here's why."
It's objective journalism when the Times says "Oldhat calls Donald Trump the Prince of Darkness. Beelzebub could not be reached for comment."
The one makes a value judgement, the other reports facts.
I don't believe their explanation of their motives. So I consider debating whether one should or should not be objective on Trump if one has pure as snow motives and only wants to stop Trump because they believe he is bad, to have possibly nothing to do with the reality of what is going on. So how much time should I waste debating theories, like angels on a pinhead, that have nothing to do with trying to understand reality.
You see I know this because they did the same darn thing to Bernie Sanders! Sanders who may have actually stood a better chance against Trump and who was none of those scary Trump things that Trump might be (Trump is indeed bigoted and impulsive and so on). So they have no credibility. Those who make political revolution impossible make Trump inevitable, or well if not this time probably some kind of Trump someday.
I like the way you think. And you're absolutely right about the media's treatment of Bernie. They had him on full ignore.
Regarding Trump's second amendment statement today it depends on whether he said 'it's the second amendment, people' or 'it's the second amendment people'. I'm (thankfully..) not inside trump's brain so who knows what he meant. Perhaps he meant one or the other. Perhaps he intended both.
Yes they all have bias, and the troubling thing is how little time has been spent on actually looking into what the candidates are saying, isn't it their job to at least attempt to see if it is true? Yes with their own bias, but it seems that there has been too much reporting what he said and little reporting if it is true or dangerous or the effect it is having.
As for Bernie, I found out so much about him through alternate media. I still don't think there is fair reporting of how many people were at his rallies or how his fundraising was amazing in small dollar donations. Disagree with him all you want, but that deserved a little air time.
Regarding Trump's second amendment statement today it depends on whether he said 'it's the second amendment, people' or 'it's the second amendment people'. I'm (thankfully..) not inside trump's brain so who knows what he meant. Perhaps he meant one or the other. Perhaps he intended both.
Now that I've actually seen the video for myself I'm definitely in the camp of him inciting an assassination. It sounded pretty clear to me that he said "although the second amendment, people, maybe there is." YMMV.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcxkkrNSv-4&feature=youtu.be
Trump seems to be a sort of human Rorschach test. People read different meanings into his vague ramblings. Some see him as a sort of vindicator of a put-upon middle class, others as a preserver of "oligarchy". Some see him as a racist or at least a race-baiter, others as a refreshing riposte to an increasingly nonsensical political correctness. Some as the alternative to the candidate who seems interested in interfering with constitutional rights, others as a fascist. Some see him as an inciter of violence, others see him as resisting mob rule by refusing to be shouted down. Some see him as willfully ignorant, others as a canny negotiator.
I see him as a self-involved opportunist who slipped past an overly smug and incompetent GOP establishment into the nomination. Is that better or worse than his opponent, who intimidated, cheated and schemed her way to the nomination of an equally obtuse party? I don't know.
I do think the Left in this country may have done itself something of a disservice over the years of hysterically branding so many of their opponents as villains or monsters. Having cried wolf so many times in the past, it has detracted some from their credibility when something approaching the genuine article arrives on the scene.
I do think the Left in this country may have done itself something of a disservice over the years of hysterically branding so many of their opponents as villains or monsters. Having cried wolf so many times in the past, it has detracted some from their credibility when something approaching the genuine article arrives on the scene.
I see it as having been a two-way street. That's politics. And I don't see the Left media as being the only biased ones--so do you think Fox News is REALLY "fair and balanced"?
But as to your question, I see very little true journalistic integrity at all. My way of getting information is generally to read the NYT or HuffPo, the WSJ, the BBC. and Aljazeera and strike an average. (I'm bummed that Aljazeera America was shut down).
Ultralight
8-10-16, 4:02pm
"Reality has a well-known liberal bias." - Stephen Colbert
"Reality has a well-known liberal bias." - Stephen Colbert
"I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting you really believe what you just said." - William F. Buckley, Jr.
To me, it's advocacy journalism when the Times says "Donald Trump is the Prince of Darkness and here's why."
It's objective journalism when the Times says "Oldhat calls Donald Trump the Prince of Darkness. Beelzebub could not be reached for comment."
The one makes a value judgement, the other reports facts.
That's funny, I can't recall that either I or the Times said that. So much for objectivity.
Your example isn't advocacy journalism, it's the exactly the kind of false equivalency I was talking about. Your argument is plain question-begging. Assuming Beelzebub could be reached for comment, there's little doubt about what he'd say.
However, when I say Donald Trump is a serial liar with a disgnosable personality disorder (http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/narcissistic-personality-disorder/basics/symptoms/con-20025568), those aren't opinions, those are facts. Unless you want to consult Beelzebub about the validity of the DSM-5.
That's funny, I can't recall that either I or the Times said that. So much for objectivity.
Your example isn't advocacy journalism, it's the exactly the kind of false equivalency I was talking about. Your argument is plain question-begging. Assuming Beelzebub could be reached for comment, there's little doubt about what he'd say.
However, when I say Donald Trump is a serial liar with a disgnosable personality disorder (http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/narcissistic-personality-disorder/basics/symptoms/con-20025568), those aren't opinions, those are facts. Unless you want to consult Beelzebub about the validity of the DSM-5.
In that case, the verifiable facts would be "Based on soundbite review, Oldhat diagnoses Trump with narcissistic personality disorder, calls him a 'serial liar'". Voters can draw their own conclusions based on the credibility of the source.
The value judgement an advocate journalist would make is "Trump is a crazed prevaricator unfit for office". Voters are being told what to believe.
Application of a a definition in the DSM-5 to any particular case, while it may lend an air of "truthiness", is not in itself truth.
I think there is a place for both opinion and objective journalism. I just think it's intellectually dishonest to attempt to blur the distinction.
In that care, the verifiable facts would be "Based on soundbite review, Oldhat diagnoses Trump with narcissistic personality disorder, calls him a 'serial liar'". Voters can draw their own conclusions based on the credibility of the source.
The value judgement an advocate journalist would make is "Trump is a crazed prevaricator unfit for office". Voters are being told what to believe.
Application of a a definition in the DSM-5 to any particular case, while it may lend an air of "truthiness", is not in itself truth.
I think there is a place for both opinion and objective journalism. I just think it's intellectually dishonest to attempt to blur the distinction.
Media is a business. "Objective Journalism" is like "Fresh!" or "Made from quality ingredients!" - it's just a tag to help sell a product (like "Fair and Balanced"). Unfortunately like unhealthy junk food disguised as something better, media sells better when it goes National Enquirer disguised as something better. People want to pretend that what they like to read and the viewpoints they agree with are "Objective Journalism". Real objectivity does not sell very well because reported accurately it's usually a very complicated collage of grays. And it's more expensive to produce as well. Opinion is cheap.
In that case, the verifiable facts would be "Based on soundbite review, Oldhat diagnoses Trump with narcissistic personality disorder, calls him a 'serial liar'". Voters can draw their own conclusions based on the credibility of the source.
The value judgement an advocate journalist would make is "Trump is a crazed prevaricator unfit for office". Voters are being told what to believe.
Application of a a definition in the DSM-5 to any particular case, while it may lend an air of "truthiness", is not in itself truth.
I think there is a place for both opinion and objective journalism. I just think it's intellectually dishonest to attempt to blur the distinction.
There's no such thing as journalism without some selectivity as to what you report. You seem to be suggesting that "objective" reporting must consist solely of an endless catalog of events from which a reader is compelled to draw his own conclusions. That might be fine in the abstract, but in the real world it's not very practical. To make a full list of Trump's lies, for example, would leave little room in the newspaper for anything else. (This is part of Trump's strategy--the blizzard of lies. He tells so many that nobody can possibly keep up.)
Thus, I repeat, when I say Trump is a serial liar, that is a fact. I can produce reams of documentation to that effect, but it would take me weeks if not months to assemble. I'm not a reporter (anymore).
Nevertheless, it's still true. An objective journalist has all the evidence and can evaluate it and draw the only possible conclusion. He can then report that conclusion -- that Trump is a liar -- without being biased.
As for Trump being a diagnosable case of narcissistic personal disorder, you can quibble about how reliable the psychiatric establishment's methodology is. But if you accept, as I do, that there are such things as psychiatric disorders and that the DSM represents the best effort of psychiatrists to catalog them, it is a fact that Trump meets every criterion for that disorder.
There's no such thing as journalism without some selectivity as to what you report. You seem to be suggesting that "objective" reporting must consist solely of an endless catalog of events from which a reader is compelled to draw his own conclusions. That might be fine in the abstract, but in the real world it's not very practical. To make a full list of Trump's lies, for example, would leave little room in the newspaper for anything else. (This is part of Trump's strategy--the blizzard of lies. He tells so many that nobody can possibly keep up.)
Thus, I repeat, when I say Trump is a serial liar, that is a fact. I can produce reams of documentation to that effect, but it would take me weeks if not months to assemble. I'm not a reporter (anymore).
Nevertheless, it's still true. An objective journalist has all the evidence and can evaluate it and draw the only possible conclusion. He can then report that conclusion -- that Trump is a liar -- without being biased.
As for Trump being a diagnosable case of narcissistic personal disorder, you can quibble about how reliable the psychiatric establishment's methodology is. But if you accept, as I do, that there are such things as psychiatric disorders and that the DSM represents the best effort of psychiatrists to catalog them, it is a fact that Trump meets every criterion for that disorder.
There is a difference between certitude and certainty. I'm not sure that the crooked timber of humanity lends itself well to providing "the only possible conclusion".
I don't need to dismiss the validity of psychiatric medicine to quibble with your qualifications to determine that Mr. Trump suffers from some disorder as defined in the literature. I might even quibble with the professional ethics of a genuine psychiatrist who made a diagnosis from speech transcripts.
We all need to make decisions under conditions of uncertainty. Is Trump a liar? If so, are his lies more or less disqualifying than those of Mrs. Clinton? Does either candidate have the type of character to be trusted with high office? I'm inclined to think Trump would be a terrible, if not a disastrous president; not because that can be determined with scientific accuracy, but because I have evaluated the various available information and made a judgement.
We all have our biases to some degree. But when the New York Times openly debates tossing out even the pretense of objectivity to crusade against the ogre of the hour, I think it probably detracts from their value as a source of information.
When someone tells hundreds of well-documented falsehoods, I think we can say he's a liar. With certainty, not certitude.
As for diagnosing Trump, is there a single symptom in the DSM list that he doesn't display? On what other basis could anyone, including a psychiatrist, make a diagnosis?
And this I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I argument that some Republicans keep trotting out--but Hillary does it too!--is kind of tiresome. Of course Hillary lies; she's a politician. But no one in the history of American politics has ever lied like Trump.
But no one in the history of American politics has ever lied like Trump.
That in itself is a value judgement. In a country with such a rich history of political prevarication, I think anyone who markets such a statement as indisputable fact needs to review the record.
"I have previously stated, and I repeat now, that the United States plans no military intervention in Cuba." - John F. Kennedy
"Do the people of the South really entertain fears that a Republican administration would, directly or indirectly, interfere with their slaves, or with them, about their slaves? If they do, I wish to assure you, as once a friend, and still, I hope, not an enemy, that there is no cause for such fears." Abraham Lincoln
"Your president says this country is not going to war." Franklin D. Roosevelt
Read my lips. No new taxes. George H.W. Bush
I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. William J. Clinton
I can say categorically that
no one in the White House staff, no one in this administration, presently employed, was involved in this very bizarre incident. Richard M. Nixon
If you like the [health care] plan you have, you can keep it. Barack H. Obama
From the earliest scurrilous accusations traded by Jefferson and Hamilton, to Polk's insistence that Mexico invaded Texas, to the sinking of the Maine to the Gulf of Tonkin incident, Our Republic has always entertained a lively estrangement from dull factuality, often with the enthusiastic cooperation of the press.
For the NYT to claim such a pipeline to the truth as to make even the pretense of objectivity irrelevant is as comical as that Soviet organ that assigned itself the title "Truth".
Miss Cellane
8-12-16, 4:24pm
There is no such thing as objective journalism. Way back in the 1970s, when I was in college taking journalism classes, this was one of the first things they taught us. Every media outlet has a bias. The key is knowing what the bias is, so that you can account for it.
That's why I check out the BBC news, and news sites from other countries that are in English, so as to get a non-US-centric view of what's happening. It's why I force myself to watch certain news channels, even though I disagree strongly with their bias--you have to know what the other side is saying, so as to present reasonable counterarguments.
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