What is Journalism?

Because forms of online media have opened up so many doors in the past few years, any person who wants to research and write a story can do it. You don’t have to be a journalist to practice journalism. If a person is going to work as a journalist and call themselves by that name, they must be completely honest in their work. Something that I’ve really learned this semester is that journalism is about morality. If you are a writer at a popular newspaper, you can try to write whatever you want, whether it’s slanderous, untrue, or plagiarized, but your editor probably won’t let your article be printed. If you research issues on your own and do your own reporting, and then post what you write on a blog, Facebook, or Twitter, no one is there to stop you. People can say absolutely anything they want on the Internet – and people will. I’ve learned this semester how much journalism is evolving and progressing to new levels online, and if you practice your own journalism, there is no editor to stop you from saying whatever you think or want to say. Journalism is about morality because we as journalists must be true to ourselves and our values. We have to watch ourselves and write the truth, even if, and especially when, no one is watching us from behind our backs. We’ve discussed truth, loyalty, forms of journalism, verification, independence, watchdog journalism, ideology, ethics, diversity, public forum, faith, and proportional and relevant journalism this semester in class. Each one of those topics applies to our profession, and as we’ve discussed each of them, I’ve learned how vital it is that we as journalists let our conscience dictate the method we use to go about practicing journalism.

If I do go into journalism, I’ve always known that I would do my best to be honest and fair in my work because of the religious and moral values I have. As I’ve focused more on that this semester, I’ve learned that not only Mormon reporters should be honest in their work; as a profession, all journalists must do honorable work. The public trust us – what we write, who we quote, and how we check sources and carry out our investigation on any given topic. No journalists can take advantage of that trust by misleading our readers. We would lose our credibility, reputation, and our readers if that were to happen. It would be better to be an honest journalist with no job than to be a journalist doing work that was untruthful and corrupt.