Over the last two years, I have come to realize that “journalism” and “journalists” seem to have changed in some fundamental way. I used to believe that there were standards and bedrock ethics which all journalists working for major publications ascribed to.
I guess I had thought that the stereotype of the intrepid journalist toiling away in a brave and unending quest for truth was the norm (think “All the President’s Men”). But no longer. Now I feel so naive for ever believing that. What I have personally experienced, again and again, is something very different.
Allow me three general examples to illustrate the point-
First example. Many years ago, when I was working for the “Aeras Global Tuberculosis Vaccine Foundation” (one of the early Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation non-profit vaccine companies), the CEO hired a media consulting firm which mainly consisted of a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and a marketing manager. To insure that favorable stories about the organization and its mission were printed, the “journalist” and the marketing specialist would consult with their clients (in this case “Aeras”), and learn what story the organization wanted to be told in a major print publication.
An article pushing the story would then be crafted, all of the necessary background assembled to meet whatever editorial review standards were likely to be encountered, and this pre-baked work product would be fed to some “journalist” working for the targeted publication.
Free work product, no labor required, what’s not to like? My first “you are not in Kansas any more” moment concerning modern journalism was when I saw this process used to “place” an article into “The Economist”, which I had naively believed operated as an independent arbiter of truth.
Silly me.
https://rwmalonemd.substack.com/p/advocacy-journalism-is-propaganda