Blog Post #10: Journalism and Faith (Group 10)
I think the parallels that can be found between journalism and religion are really interesting. The handout we were given highlights a few of them, and I’d like to discuss two:
· “Both religion and journalism are disciplines that purport to seek truth, albeit often in different realms.”
o People seek spiritual and eternal truth through their religion. As members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we seek the Lord’s truth through the words in our scriptures, from our prophets, and through the promptings of the Holy Ghost. We seek the truths of our spirits, of Heavenly Father’s plan for us, and of the scriptures so that we might know for ourselves the truth.
o As journalists, we seek the truth of events in the world. We want to find out whether things people have said or done are true. We want to do our research behind a story so that we can tell the truth to our readers. I will argue that finding journalistic truth is not as satisfying as religious truth, but we can feel more confident in ourselves, our stories, and our profession as we discover the truth.
· Many people about whom journalists write are inspired by their faith and use their faith in dealing with the challenges and tragedies they face.
o As journalists, when we report on someone who is driven by their religious beliefs, I think we should cover that, if it contributes to our story. Religion is so controversial and taboo to the media, but I don’t think it should be that way. When finding the whole story, if a person we’re covering says they were driven by their beliefs, we should write that. We should report the truth according to who we’re covering, and we should cover all sides of an issue, and then let our audience form their own decisions. If religion is involved, we should let people make their own opinions on it.
On Faith, Journalism, and Having Faith in Journalism:
Think Again: “Faith-Based” Journalism:
Journalism: A Faith in Decline?
Blog Post #11: Comprehensive and Proportional Journalism (Group 11)
Demographics. That word carries a lot of weight. You have men and women, upper, middle, and lower class, teenagers, 18-25 year olds, people in retirement, Caucasians, African Americans, Asians, Mormons, Jews, Atheists, educated, non-educated, urban, rural…I could go on and on. I’ve always wondered about demographics, and how a news station decides who or what they want to target. Does the owner of the station choose? I’m sure they make their decision based on who other stations are targeting, but to what extent? In class, this group had all of the girls raise their hands, and all the students who were 18 or 19 raise their hands, and they got candy. The boys 20 years old and older didn’t get anything. I had never thought of people in other demographics being “left out” when they are not being targeted by a TV channel, newspaper, or news station, but this little example in class opened up my mind a little bit. I suppose that if a news channel is targeted towards people between the age of 18 and 25, then many people under 18 or over 25 could feel like they don’t relate or care about the topics covered. If this was the case, that person would probably go elsewhere to find there news. The 18-25 news station would lose those viewers or readers – but I guess that’s the gamble you make when you choose to target one demographic. If you tried to cover everything, people of all ages would not find interest in all of it, so they may all turn off the TV or put down the newspaper. When a station focuses on one group, they can get their full attention and loyalty.
As journalists, we are supposed to report the news proportionally and comprehensively, which sounds great. But when we work at a station or paper that is aimed towards adults between 30 and 55 years old, your editor and your boss don’t want to see stories that are for audiences of all ages; they want to see stories that people between the ages of 30 and 55 would be interested in. So, what can we do? Within our targeted age group, we could cover a wide range of topics. As journalists, we can’t be responsible to every single citizen by writing stories that will please everyone; instead, we have to do the best we can within our demographic to present the news as proportionally as possible.
Who is Reading: A Question of Demographics
Newsmagazine Demographics: A Graying Market
Newspaper Websites Reach Key Demographics with High Quality Journalism
Blog Post #12: Engagement and Relevance in Journalism (Group 12)
Should journalists give people what they need or what they want? We had a good discussion in class about this. People will pay and go out of their way to see information they want to know about – that’s why entertainment news and sports news make millions of dollars a year. And who are we, as journalists, to decide what citizens need to hear? Because we know more than others about the world? Because we’re smarter? Whose responsibility is it to point out exactly what people need to hear in order to be better citizens of this county? We might agree that American citizens should be informed about our country’s involvement in Libya, but there are probably thousands of 21-year-old Americans girls that would do nothing with that knowledge. Instead, they would rather go out and buy a hair product that Kim Kardashian tweeted about, or something like that. I’m totally playing the devil’s advocate here – I think there is information that people need to hear, and I think we come across that information in our research and work as journalists. As one student in class so eloquently put it, we must give people what they need in the way they want it.
As we discussed in class, our purpose is to provide people with the information they need to live their lives. This brings up two challenges: first, how do we find the information that people need to live their lives, and second, how can we make it meaningful, relevant, and engaging for everyone? I think we, as budding journalists, can look to professionals who have been doing this for 30 years. They’ve seen how audiences respond to information we present. We can learn from their experience to know if a story or topic is really beneficial and necessary for people to hear, or if it’s just a topic we are personally passionate about and just think everyone needs to know about it. Kovach and Rosenstiel said, “Journalists must make the significant interesting and relevant,” (Elements of Journalism, pg. 187). To be a successful and good journalist, we must learn how to make “boring” but important topics interesting to our audience. We must learn to tie in big events or topics to things people care about. Again, I think we will learn and grow in our own experience to do these things and relate to our readers.
Relevant Journalism in the Digital Age:
How public-service journalism can be viable, relevant and accountable in an age of disruptive technology:
