On his national lecture tour, New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner ’76 made a stop at Wesleyan on Wednesday night to offer his perspective on the Middle East conflict. While discussing various facets of the issue, including the increasingly militant slant of Israeli diplomatic policy to the difficulty he experienced procuring a Syrian visa, Mr. Bronner emphasized the challenges journalists face as they attempt to strike a middle ground on a polarizing conflict. In reference to the partition the Israeli government erected along the 1949 “Armistice Line” dividing Israel and the West Bank, Mr. Bonner said that even word choice can elicit debate; while Palestinian groups refer to the construct as a “wall,” Israeli sources prefer the more neighborly “fence.” In the end, the Times went with “barrier,” to neither side’s approval.
Linguistic squabbles aside, Mr. Bonner’s lecture also raised the issue of objective journalism and the difficulty an individual faces in determining the reliability of news sources. Although the twenty-first century has offered the public an unprecedented level of ease in media accessibility, it is increasingly difficult to separate balanced journalism from subjective, or even accurate, news sources. As a larger percentage of the public turns to blogs, on-the-ground tweets, chattering television personalities, and the like for news coverage in place of classic sources of media, objectivity is being muddled by the vast sea of “citizen journalism.” And while these may be well sourced and include a diverse range of viewpoints, dubious regulation allows for far more misrepresentation and even fabrication of fact.
The explosion of Internet media raises other questions: Does the journalist’s role as an intermediary between the government and the citizenry remain relevant in a world in which individuals increasingly seek out and obtain information directly from other individuals? Has subjectivity, which is said to characterize much of Internet journalism, already become so ingrained in the media-at-large that its qualities have become unrecognizable by the average citizen? Do we face any other option than stocking non-perishables and retiring to bomb-shelters to reread twentieth century Times headlines?
We at The Argus, having sufficiently exhausted ourselves debating these questions, turn them to you, the reader. After all, journalism is produced for an audience; your opinions matter just as much, if not more so, than those in the journalism industry. What is the value of striving for objectivity? What would you like to see from journalism? Feel free to respond.
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