Independence in Journalism

In my Comms 239 class we discussed the topic the Journalistic independence. I thought the group did a great job with their presentation.

A newspaper company is like a track team. They run their various events separately, but they still depend on each other to win the meet. The journalistic runners have to be careful about not taking sponsorships from outside companies and wearing the sponsor’s logo on their jersey. This detracts from the team, and diminishes the pure motive for running.

Journalists must stay independent from partisan affiliation to remain objective and fair to all sides. They should write for the love of writing and in sharing truth to the public, not for personal gain and extra benefits. Here is a video showing the many different sport teams General Motors has sponsored over the years. They interviewed people who were directly affected by the sponsorship and so of course they are going to speak very favorable about General Motors. http://vimeo.com/10763538

One concept the group talked about was independence from race, ethnicity, religion, and gender. These are all characteristics that help define who we are. It would be hard to obtain full independence from these.

It is hard to separate myself from religion. It would be difficult to do a positive or balanced story on something contrary to what I know is right. In professional journalism you have to be careful about taking sides, but in citizen journalism, we are free to write whatever we want. L. Tom Perry of the quorum of the twelve apostles talked about using social media to promote The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day saints. http://tinyurl.com/3qsbp6s

Diversity in the newsroom is important to ensure various perspectives on issues. People are also more likely to trust the organization’s objectivity. Here is a video where Soledad O’Brien talks about the growing diversity in the media. http://tinyurl.com/3ez2cwe