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Macrame Journalism

Posted by MICHAEL GRANT in Media.
May 2nd, 2008 | Comments

I was born in 1943, just in time to enjoy town squares, in the small rural towns. By the 1950s, and the arrival of better highways and more comfortable cars, residents of those towns had started to drive to larger regional cities to shop, eat, and see a movie. Around the town square, businesses closed, leaving darkened brick shells through which dry goods, sundries, hardware, groceries, movie stars and fountain Cokes had flowed.

In these empty storefront windows in the 1970s started to appear signs of business activity unrelated to the prosperity of the town. The most telling of these signs was this one: “Macrame.” It proclaimed, loudest of all, that the square, once the center of commercial and civic activity for a proud people, was dead, and the old, sad, deserted buildings were now hosting splinter arts and crafts groups learning to knot yarn in a certain way.

Journalism is on that same path today. Since the Zenger decision in 1734 established its purpose and power in America, journalism has served a proud people continuously for almost 300 years. Now it is being gutted, its professionals bought out or laid off, its buildings closing, its customers and its business fleeing on a new superspeed highway to a new region that no one yet understands.

Where journalism was, in the pre-Internet world, Americans now find macramé journalism, a hobby practiced by a huge number of Americans on the Internet and in the blogosphere. This new, fun way of knotting information has done what the founding Americans hoped could never be done. Macrame journalism has a loop around the feet of the First Amendment, which is struggling, as calves do against the ropes, but will soon go over on its side.

Journalism is not Cowboys and Indians in the back yard. The term “citizen journalist” is an oxymoron. Many citizens now publishing on the Internet write very well, and argue convincingly, but without working knowledge of journalism definitions, values, and principles, and commitment to those principles, they are not journalists. Do you realize that the rate of media illiteracy in America is 90 percent? Not their fault; all media, including journalism, is based on a set of definitions and values that are not taught to American schoolchildren. They should be, just like algebra, but they are not.

The First Amendment, as it applies to journalism: “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of the press.” Do you realize what an amazing statement that is? It tells us that the framers of the Constitution in 1787 knew that freedom of the press already existed, like one of the self-evident truths, or an unalienable right. That kind of power, practically absolute, created by the recognition of truth as a right to publish, deserved great respect in its handling. It is scary now, witnessing hordes of amateurs calling themselves citizen journalists, and taking their work seriously, and even scarier that traditional publishers go along with it. Scary not because of an abuse of press power, that the First Amendment has managed to protect for more than 200 years, but of a draining of it. Without that power, democracy starts to die, too.

This is not a defense of journalism; it is a definition of it. Journalism still exists, on and offline, and it is as instantly recognizable as macrame journalism. You macramé journalists, go ahead and keep writing. It is your First Amendment guarantee of free speech, and some of the commentary is very good. But to a journalist today, cruising the town square of journalism, it looks dead, and feels sad. It feels like the First Amendment is being looted.

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Fern

Many citizens now publishing on the Internet write very well, and argue convincingly, but without working knowledge of journalism definitions, values, and principles, and commitment to those principles, they are not journalists.

With all due respect (and I really mean that) the same could be said about most journalists today. Yes, the internet and blogs have contributed to the decline of journalism as a viable profession, but journalists themselves have done just as much damage to the credibility and viability of their craft as any other contributing factor.

Slamfu

Sounds like someone has a problem with kids these days and their blogs and rock'n'roll music and long hair. I am calling sour grapes for 2 reasons:

a) If mainstream journalism was doing their job politicians wouldn't get away with half the crap they do

b) There will always be a need for investigative reporting of the news and that doesn't change with the internet. Merely its delivery system. Whether I log onto CNN.com or flip the TV to CNN it is going to be the same, but frankly there is so much filler on 24 hours news that its better to get the info from the computer so you don't have to wade thru all the repetitive reporting and/or editorializing which is rampant on all 24 news channels now. Thanks FOX.

The major networks are going to have to rethink how they make a buck while delivering the news and that may change the landscape, but its still going to be there. Blogs and whatnot are just another tool for getting info these days, and if you read one and take it as gospel you are not going to be well informed. But if you read enough you are going to get a better picture and almost definitely find out about issues you wouldn't just picking up news passively from traditional sources.

Basically, I have no sympathy for those stuck in the past and unwilling to see the benefits of the here and now when its staring them in the face.

thystro

Is "freedom of the press" a right given to a particular institution or is it a right given broadly to the people? By appropriating it to themselves, the corporate news media have limited that right for the rest of us. I would contend that "journalistic principles" of objectivity have always incorporated within them bias - either of their corporate owners or of the journalists themselves. The "citizen journalists" loose on the internet now are little different from the openly partisan pre-professional press of the 19th century, and perhaps more honest about their biases than the post-war supposedly professional press. To dismiss this as macrame journalism and equate it to "the First Amendment is being looted" is ridiculous and demeaning beyond words.

"Freedom of speech, or of the press" refers to an action (use of a printing press) that has always been appropriate to the people. Turning it into a noun ("the press") gives it a misleading reality as an entity that it need not have constitutionally. You're mourning an institution that has served the wealthy and powerful under the guise of serving the rest of us. Well now the rest of us have seized what is ours by constitutional right. Don't demean that with contemptuous labels. If journalism had lived up to its lofty ideals this overthrow by the unwashed amateurs you sneer at would hardly have been necessary.

runasim

"You're mourning an institution that has served the wealthy and powerful under the guise of serving the rest of us. Well now the rest of us have seized what is ours by constitutional right. "
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Unfortunately, large segments of 'the rest of us' are not qualified to judge or are well informed about many topics they write about. Because there are so many of the 'rest of us' it would be a full time research job to figure out which Internet voices are trustworthy and which are just gas bags. There are no standards which to measure against, and so consumers, too often, just stop by where the writing soothes them, or where they can unload their pent up venom.

With traditional journalism , at least there is a PO box where to send your complaints and you know who to hold responsible. What is the address of the Tower of Babel that is the 'rest of us'?

That traditional journalism is flawed is no reason to assume that 'the rest of us are any better. That's the kind of swinging pendulum thinking that keeps us going from one extreme to another, without stopping to consider where we're going or with what we're replacing the discredited traditional.

Ironic how Slamfu argues against traditional journlaism by logging on to CNN and the like. This points out, however, that the new is not ready to replace the old.
Who is to finance investigative reoorting for the Tower of Babel? Won't that involve the same sponsors and corporate interests often linked with the government. that have made traditional media what it is?

In the best of all possible worlds, 'the rest of us' would honestly think about things like standards , credibility, expertise, financing and all the other issues that come with responsibility, you know, the grownups' stuff. I wouldn't kick the traditional out before the'rest of us' are grown up enough to take over the responsibility.

thystro

Oh, the traditional media isn't being kicked out. There is definitely a place for that kind of well-financed top-down media. When there's a will to do actual investigative reporting and to distribute it in a mass way, it's unreplaceable.

But now we have other options that will provide actual competition within the heavily corporate consolidated media market. The traditional media is going to have to do its job better to compete with the investigations of those millions of amateurs, when the useful nuggets they turn up can go viral and be plastered across the internet within hours. Competing top-down and bottom-up news and opinion sources are more truly opposed than competing corporate sources when they're all owned by 13 or so media conglomerates. Dismissing the potential there as macrame journalism is short-sighted. Standards, credibility, expertise, financing are all things to consider, for sure. Where this posting goes wrong is in dismissing the possibilities inherent in this evolution or rather devolution of publishing power.

To say this is ridiculous:

It is scary now, witnessing hordes of amateurs calling themselves citizen journalists, and taking their work seriously, and even scarier that traditional publishers go along with it. Scary not because of an abuse of press power, that the First Amendment has managed to protect for more than 200 years, but of a draining of it. Without that power, democracy starts to die, too.

There's nothing in that that keeps traditional journalists from upholding the standards of journalism. The fact that they haven't upheld them is what gave rise to the amateur version. But let the professional press get back to upholding those standards. Let them win back readers with their expertise and integrity and standards if they can.

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