An open letter to journalists across the USA:
It seems a lot of you have either never known or have
forgotten what your job is.
Your job is not to continually tell us POTUS said this, and
then said that, and then blamed the media for getting it wrong. In those cases, my journalistic friends, you
are being played. While you’re busy
reporting and re-reporting the same stuff that frankly doesn’t matter in the
grand scheme of things, a lot is going on that you aren’t focusing on. It doesn’t really matter if there were 2
people or 2,000,000 at the inauguration.
Let me say again, it doesn’t matter.
It doesn’t matter if POTUS thinks Alec Baldwin is a no talent hack or
that Meryl Streep is overrated. Truly,
it doesn’t matter. Stop reporting and rehashing these stories. It doesn’t matter.
What matters is the things that affect those of us who live
in this country. What matters is what
our healthcare will look like, whether we’re safe in our own homes and
neighborhoods, whether we have a job so we can afford our mortgage and send our
kids to school where they have a chance to get a good education. What matters is life, liberty, and the pursuit
of happiness.
Your job, in case you missed this class in school, is to
report the facts. Not the facts with a
left spin, and not the facts with a right spin.
Just the facts. Let me be the
judge of what it means. That’s my
job. You tell me the who, what, when,
where, and how. That’s all. That’s your job! Your job is not… truly not… to copy and paste
Twitter tweets and call that a story. Frankly, that’s about the laziest thing I
have ever seen in the journalism world.
It’s time to get back to real journalism! Stop following
Twitter and do some real work. Don’t use
Facebook live as a way to be first, even though you have nothing to say. Stop using click bait headlines that have
nothing to do with the story… just misinformation at its worst. Find out what’s really in the various bills
and Executive Orders and then report it accurately. Slice it, dice it, find out what it means and
what the impact is, and then fill us in.
That is your job. Follow the
paper trails to uncover who really stands to win if certain laws and
regulations are repealed, overturned, or passed. That is your job. Dig, investigate, get the
real and complete story and then report.
That is your job. And, for the
love of all that is newsworthy, stop focusing on being first, with incomplete
facts, just to have a sound bite before another news outlet. That is your job. There is no prize for being first, only for
being the best. To be the best you have
to actually do your job!
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