September 16, 2020
his statement from an influential conservative commentator terrifies me, and that’s not a comment on Glenn Beck’s political positions. It is to say that when journalism is under fire, we all are. A weakening of the Fourth Estate is dangerous to both sides of any political aisle, including mainstream parties, the center and the fringes.
The increasingly popular argument that the news media are the enemy of the people is antithetical to their function in a democratic society: to serve as the main source for informed decision making by the people, for the people. As a career public relations practitioner turned educator, I believe vehemently that this anti-media trend is dangerous and that it’s my profession’s duty, as well as that of journalists everywhere, to ensure the principles and practices of professional journalism are supported.
That will take hard work as digital and social media make any citizen a media outlet and provide the universal opportunity to broadcast a public voice, true or false, for good or for ill. At the same time, the digital revolution has strangled traditional media outlets’ revenue streams and driven many out of business or decimated their staffing. To uphold ethical and professional journalism is a formidable challenge in this environment, but the stakes are simply too high not to understand and address it.
Thomas Jefferson famously wrote, “were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter,” and he’s someone who had notably difficult relations with the media of his day. The Founding Fathers understood the imperative of a free press and free speech to democracy, a principle that’s always been complex and challenging to live up to and never more than in a technologically disrupted environment driven by bitter polarization.
To advance democracy, productive disagreement is required, undistracted by demeaning attacks and disregard for the truth. This is the beauty and challenge of the First Amendment: to enable enfettered expression by citizens and empower journalists to seek the truth, focus on facts, and hold governments, businesses and other institutions accountable. These freedoms entail critical responsibilities, including for all of us to not put others in imminent danger, and for the news media to make clear distinctions between facts and opinion.
Glenn Beck has also said, “The media has irresponsibly blurred journalism and opinion especially in their attacks against Trump.” One can find evidence to support that view, but which “media” is he referring to? The media are not monolithic; they are more diverse and heterogeneous than ever. Therefore, one can inevitably search for and select facts to support one’s opinion, and relentlessly share them with others who are biased toward that view. And you and I and everyone suffer to some degree from confirmation bias, which is nourished by algorithms that repeatedly drive messages we prefer to our screens.
So slanted or inaccurate news can and is produced, promoted, shared, cheered in some quarters, protested and denounced in others. Every minute, every day. Are we the smarter for it? Are we, as a people and nation, making progress? The annual Edelman Trust Barometer indicates instead that trust is dropping significantly in both government and the media. People feel increasingly suspicious and angry, not a formula for societal progress.
According to the Institute for Public Relations (IPR) 2020 Disinformation in Society Report, 61 percent of Americans are concerned about misinformation (false information regardless of intent to mislead) and 58 percent are concerned about disinformation (deliberately distributing misleading or biased information). These problems rank higher as concerns than illegal drug use (55 percent), crime (55 percent), gun violence (54 percent) and political partisanship (53 percent).
Despite concern over misinformation and disinformation, a growing number of people are not going to other sources to verify what they see and hear, according to the IPR report. Only 40 percent often or always go to other websites or media sources to validate information, down from 47 percent in 2019, while 20 percent rarely or never check alternative sources.
At the same time, 74 percent of IPR survey respondents report seeing “news or information that misrepresents reality at least once a week,” while 72 percent see disinformation as a threat to democracy, and 69 percent say it undermines the election process. Stunningly, 31 percent say they avoid the news due to the amount of disinformation—nearly one third! Yet 70 percent believe the top sources of disinformation are not the mainstream news; they instead cite Facebook and politicians.
The news media must navigate today’s VUCA operating environment: volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. I believe the difficult prescription required to improve the production, distribution and consumption of journalism so that it engenders trust and a functioning democracy is people must be willing to pay for it. In the July 16, 2020, issue of Fortune, writers Jennifer Hoewe and Brett Sherrick note that consumers are willing to pay for online media, as seen in Netflix subscriptions or Disney+ online services, but they’ve become “spoiled by news content that is available for free.”
The news media’s position in the information ecosystem has mutated, and they must figure out how to be adequately compensated within it. That’s our problem as well as theirs because what is lost without the marketplace’s support for journalism are the standards of truth and accuracy needed to create trust. Without trust, democracy inevitably suffers, and the IPR research findings demonstrate the depth of public concern over democracy’s decline.
Consider your own perceptions of the current state of our nation and its public discourse. Are you encouraged? There has always been and always will be nasty public battles over issues of the day and the media’s rendering of them, so a Pollyannaish desire for politeness isn’t the solution. The remedy is instead support and scrutiny of news media that will empower people to make decisions for themselves. The media cannot be enemies of the people, nor should they necessarily be our friends so much as they should be guided by fidelity to facts and by the ethic to distinguish between fact and opinion.
Don’t be waylaid by either those who characterize “the media” as working for political ends or media who discredit themselves by obfuscating fact and opinion. The First Amendment itself should guide all. See resources such as protectpressfreedom.org for guidance on how to support the news media, and nonpartisan fact-checking sites including the Annenberg Public Policy Center’s FactCheck.org, Politifact.com, Snopes.com or the Washington Post’s FactChecker to identify misinformation and disinformation.
The late Patrick Jackson, an esteemed public relations leader and social commentator, wrote, “The First Amendment is issue blind, states blind, color blind, interest blind. If, as usually portrayed, Justice is blindfolded, the First Amendment is that part of her eyes most tightly bandaged and blacked out. I support any and all who support the First Amendment whatever their stand on issues or politics.” That is an insight that can rally and uplift us in a divisive time.
Such optimism is needed now, and we’re capable of it only with freedom of speech and freedom of a healthy, functioning, independent press. In Make No Law, Anthony Lewis’s superb book about the seminal New York Times vs. Sullivan First Amendment case, the author describes a characteristic American optimism, quoting the French constitutional lawyer Roger Errera, who noted Americans’ “inveterate social and historical optimism.”
Lewis notes that, from James Madison’s hopeful belief that democracy would work in a fledging government “if only the people had ‘the right of freely examining public characters and measures,’” to Martin Luther King’s courageous hope that “speech, appealing to conscience, could undue generations of racial discrimination,” America has progressed despite horrible conflicts thanks to a Constitution, built through enduring optimism in the people’s capability and right to evaluate issues, think for themselves and participate in decisions that affect them.
We will forfeit that capability unless we’re willing to pay for journalism of the highest standards. Can our nation disagree with that and still be optimistic?
Anthony D’Angelo, APR, Fellow PRSA, joined Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications as a professor of practice in public relations in August 2015. In 2016 he was named Director of Newhouse’s Executive Master’s Program in Communications Management, and of a new academic offering called the Financial and Investor Communications Emphasis.
D’Angelo’s career has included public relations leadership roles in the corporate, agency and not-for-profit sectors, including ITT Corporation and St. Joseph’s Hospital Foundation. D’Angelo is co-chair of the Commission on Public Relations Education (CPRE), an alliance of 20 public relations education and professional associations dedicated to advancing research on professional standards and the curricula of undergraduate and graduate public relations programs globally. He was 2018 National Chair of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), serving approximately 22,000 professional members and 11,000 students.
Anthony D’Angelo, APR, Fellow PRSA, joined Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications as a professor of practice in public relations in August 2015. In 2016 he was named Director of Newhouse’s Executive Master’s Program in Communications Management, and of a new academic offering called the Financial and Investor Communications Emphasis.
D’Angelo’s career has included public relations leadership roles in the corporate, agency and not-for-profit sectors, including ITT Corporation and St. Joseph’s Hospital Foundation. D’Angelo is co-chair of the Commission on Public Relations Education (CPRE), an alliance of 20 public relations education and professional associations dedicated to advancing research on professional standards and the curricula of undergraduate and graduate public relations programs globally. He was 2018 National Chair of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), serving approximately 22,000 professional members and 11,000 students.