Final thoughts

Final Exam
#1-Objectivity
Firstly, I would like to say that objectivity is not only an element of journalism, but is essentially the element of journalism. Without objectivity what a newsperson does ceases to be journalism. This is not to say that the other principles of journalism are unimportant; nothing could be further from the truth. Without good fact checking or isn’t hard hitting enough that makes it very poor journalism, but it still can be defined as journalism, even though it is poorly done. Simply put, journalism without objectivity cannot really exist. When objectivity is taken out of journalism it becomes propaganda, or public relations, or advertising, or talk radio. These things are perfectly fine, and not inherently bad, but they are not journalism, and the one thing that separates these things from journalism is objectivity.
Of course, that is not the whole story. Objectivity means little without being put in context. When I first look at “objectivity”, the word objective jumps out at me. It seems to me that it should simply be the state of having an objective, i.e. a goal, something that you are striving for. And for those aspiring to be journalists, that objective must be the truth.
This leads me to my personal definition of what objectivity is, without having looked at any dictionary definition. (I think that my explanation would be more pure and sincere without being contaminated by the popularly held definition.) Objectivity in journalism is having a complete and undivided commitment to finding the truth. It means that any biases or preferences that the journalist may personally have to do not compromise his or her reporting. Things like political preferences, moral issues, traditional biases, or, perhaps more frequently, concerns over advertising revenue can all become objectives other than truth for the journalist.
One thing that I want to make clear though, is that complete neutrality in journalism, or balance, are not the same thing as objectivity and should be avoided. Balance and neutrality could be defined as practicing journalism which does not favor or benefit one group or ideal over another, but that is not objectivity, and is, in fact, opposed to it. The truth will rarely be neutral. In any story it is likely that the truths of that story will benefit or harm one side of an issue more than another. The truth quite frequently does take sides. Fore example, if a news organization shies away from certain stories, or modifies them, because those stories would harm one political party more than the other, and does so to avoid being criticized by that party, than that news organization has compromised their objectivity. The desire to appear balanced can become a competing objective with the commitment to truth.
Having objective journalism does not in anyway preclude a journalist from having strong opinions on the issues of the day. Anyone who does not have opinions on the really crucial issues of the day must be completely ignorant of those issues, and I doubt that anyone would want to have journalists that know absolutely nothing of what they are reporting on. It would be impossible for journalists not to have strong opinions on the important issues, and it would be undesirable to have that even if it was possible. Journalists must simply be very aware of their opinions and personal biases and remove these from their journalism. I said “simply”, but of course, this isn’t very simple at all. Doing this is not easy; it is, in fact, quite difficult. That is one of the major regions that we go to school to study journalism and why, in the end, people end up getting paid for it. Creating journalism unaffected by your own personal opinions is not easy, but it is very possible.

#2- Excellence in Journalism
Excellence in journalism depends greatly upon how well that journalism succeeds in embodying certain important journalistic traits. A few of these qualities that I would like to mention are fearlessness, quality, accuracy, and entertainment. There are other important journalistic traits and qualities, but I think that these four cover some of the major points.
In excellent journalism what I call fearlessness here corresponds with what is in the elements of journalism called public vigilance or is commonly referred to as being “hard-hitting”. It is the practice of journalists going after those stories which really matter. These are stories about political corruption, the criminal element, or corporate disregard for the masses. These stories are ones which are not easy to do and are often hidden and made secret. These are stories that could make powerful enemies of the journalistic organization. How an example of journalism goes after the stories which pertain to the powerful, but can really affect the public is an important part of excellence in journalism.
The quality I refer to above is quality of writing. Aside from the investigational side of journalism, or the part where journalists gather the information, the actual writing of the story is very important, and it is difficult to think of how any journalism would be considered excellent without having excellent writing. Even in radio or television journalism the importance of quality writing cannot be overemphasized.
It matters little how fearless or how well written your journalism may be if the facts it presents are fundamentally incorrect. Accuracy, or verification, is crucial for any type of journalism. Perhaps one of the greatest sins that journalism can commit is to get an important fact in a story wrong. We have all seen what happened to veteran newsman Dan Rather when he presented a news story which the organization had not properly verified beforehand. A good journalist needs to verify everything and not automatically trust the information that a source provides. Excellent journalism will certainly be identified by having a reputation for accurate reporting.
Journalism that is otherwise excellent has little effect if it no one sees it. Excellent journalism should be entertaining and interesting to many people. While this does not mean that it needs to be the next Harry Potter or the most watched show on journalism, it should be accessible and entertaining to the average person. A dry scientific study could very well be fearless, be well written, and completely accurate, but journalism needs something more. Part of the job of being a journalist is to entertain those that would view, listen to, or read the story, and that is not something bad. A journalist does not need to compromise the quality of the journalism to be entertaining and appeal to the audience. Excellent journalism will be fearless, have quality writing, be accurate, and will likely be popular.

#3- Journalistic Truth
Journalistic truth is by and large the simple truth. In reality, truth is viewed differently from a multitude of viewpoints and is incredibly complex and rarely simple. Absolute truths, like those of philosophy or religion are often deeply profound but often not particularly practical, and rarely agreed upon by the consensus opinion. Journalistic truth is one that deals mainly with those practical truths. It deals with the who, what, where, when, and why (but not too much why). Journalism generally deals with questions which can be answered with a few words, or at most a sentence or two. The journalistic view of truth takes a more pragmatic outlook than some others. Journalism must seek out that truth which is most helpful to the average person.
#4- Future of Journalism
Newspapers are failing at a startling rate and television organizations have begun downsizing as well. For those of us who are planning on going into journalism as a career. This is definitely some important information to consider. Due to our current financial crisis, it would be easy to blame much of the problems on the news industry on the recession, citing that basically every industry, with the exception of the repo-man perhaps, is feeling the economic downturn, but this would just be ignoring the problem. Problems for news organizations have been occurring for a long time. For many years the readership of newspapers has been steadily declining nationwide.
These facts do not necessarily mean that the demand for journalism has gone down, in fact, one could probably argue pretty well that the demand for news, and the amount of news taken in by the average American, has perhaps never been higher. The failing of newspapers is certainly due mainly to competition from the internet. Not only can a person quickly and easily find news information on the internet without buying a newspaper, but the internet is also taking away much of the most important advertising revenue that the newspapers rely on. Craigslist, for example, takes much of the business that would have once been put on the classified section of the newspaper.
While broadcast television news has yet to be so affected by these changes as newspapers have, they are far from immune. An ever more technologically savvy audience has already started to force television news to make changes and they will need to continue to do so even more if they are to avoid becoming less and less relevant. I do believe that television news has been able to adapt to changes somewhat more quickly than newspapers and that those of us who plan on going into broadcast news won’t face as many implications of this as those who are going into print. Five years from now I imagine that I would have a standard reporting job where the story for the newscast is considered to be by far the most important part of the job. I imagine that after finishing the story for broadcast I will need to write a text explanation of the story for the website include observations in a blog. Ten years from now I imagine that my job will require the creation of the story for television broadcast to go hand in hand. A short version will likely be made for the news program and perhaps a more involved version for the website. In all likelihood, the story will go on the website before it is broadcast, and may be more important for the organization than the television side of the equation.

#5- Personal Code
While writing the other sections of this paper, I believe that I have made apparent at least a part of what my personal code of conduct as a journalist is. I will try to avoid going over those same issues at length while sharing my opinion of how I should act as a journalist. Perhaps I should first say that I suppose that I am a bit of an idealist when it comes to my views on journalistic ethics. I truly believe that it is possible for journalism to be unbiased and objective even though the journalist may have extremely strong opinions. I think that although concerns over advertising revenue and money issues are matters that are unavoidable in the field of journalism a journalist should always strive to not let these matters affect his or her journalism and that if I start to view these issues as “just part of the job” I will be less of a journalist than I would otherwise be.
To put it clearly, I plan to not declare as fact on air or in print anything that hasn’t been fully verified. I commit to practicing journalism without any motivation greater than that of finding the truth or having any goal which would compromise an honest reporting of the truth. I will seek out those news stories which are untold and those stories that are truly important. In my reporting I will strive to be respectful of people’s privacy and emotion and balance this with the need for the public to know. Ideals are rarely fully realized in actual life, and I understand that it is unlikely that I will always be able to live up to my code of conduct, but I don’t believe that this takes away from the importance of having these ideals. By striving to fulfill this code of conduct I believe I will be a better journalist, and be able to achieve excellence in my own journalism.