Reading the stories coming out of Lafayette, Louisiana reminded me of an unfortunate aspect of agenda-driven private newspaper ownership. More specifically I'm talking about company-wide bias as related by Dominick Cross, “Moody would not let us write editorials, run local stories, AP copy or letters to the editor that in any shape or form had negative content about President Bush."
Tieing in to our discussions on the commenting features, I've seen commenters on both sides of the city violence debate accuse the D&C of being either too pro-city or too anti-city in their reporting. This is just one issue, but which is it? Are there other arenas in which the D&C shows glowingly overt bias? Is this also undermining their credibility going forward?
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As a follow up comment and a possible first discussion topic, is the D&C too soft on Superintendent Brizard? Is it even their place to make demands or report in any manner other than straight down the middle?
Here's an example of tough-but-fair reporting on Brizard:
http://www.13wham.com/content/news/political/story/Say-What/3VHvF0jI6k2N...
When I see something like that in the D&C, then they're tough enough.
I've seen that, too, and I think that question doesn't really get to the heart of what's wrong with the D&C's crime reporting. It's not pro-city/anti-city, it's news vs. feature.
When D&C crime coverage goes beyond the bare facts, it almost always focuses on the "human angle". We see the weeping parents or siblings, the candelight vigil, the flowers and teddy bears left at the site of the shooting. We see pictures of tears and profiles that paint the victim in the most positive light possible.
There is almost never any coverage of other, possibly related crime in the neighborhood, whether this homicide fits into a pattern with other homicides in the city, etc.
I suppose that's considered "pro-city" because the underlying causes of crime (e.g., drugs) are never discussed in-depth.
The "pro-city/anti-city" argument in the comment section has NOTHING to do with the D&C's bias or anything approaching that. Generally, "city" is a euphemism for "black people," used by people who don't have the decency to admit their racist. You could also use the word "city" to describe drug abuse, violence, crime, teen pregnancy, lousy parenting, poor people and everything else the jackals on the D&C's comment section choose to associate with black people and the city. And apart from the already-commented-upon lack of oversight in the comments section, I don't attribute any of that to the D&C at all.
As for the coverage, it's particularly sparse when it comes to seeking to educate people on the reasons *why* there are high crime rates. I agree with Rotten that they delve too much on the human interest, suffering angle.
My daughter lives in Pittsford and I always ask her to be careful when she tells me she is going into the city. As many times as I've told her that I've never had one racial thought in my head.
And that relates to the comments section of the D&C how, exactly?
There's plenty of reason for you to be concerned about your kid going into the city that doesn't involve racism. No kiddin. I lived there. But don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about if you've ever read a word of what happens on the D&C comments section.
I understand what you are saying, and I very rarely read the D&C comment section but I would think (hope) that every remark about the "city" is no racially motivated.
You're right that she should be careful. People have a lot of car accidents driving in and out, especially this time of year.
The credibility of the comments section is pretty well established. Are there any perceived major biases on other issues or has the Gannett influence made our local paper too corporate to care enough to institutionally promote any one slant?
I think the general problem with any Gannett paper is not a bias, but rather an approach to gathering news that assumes stupidity and superficiality on the part of the target audience. Gannett's view of what a newspaper should be is reflected in USAToday, or "McPaper".
The goal is short, breezy articles, mainly about happy topics. Reporter time is spent on features, not investigations. And a huge emphasis is placed on the graphical appearance of the newspaper rather than the content.
I agree with you that the focus of the paper has shifted. Certainly, with perhaps the exception of the coverage of thew city school district, there hasn't been much actual substance to the paper in a long time. Front page articles are happy and fun and unimportant. Actual news stories, foreign affairs, and anything that might be a bit unpleasent is pushed back further and further.
On the other hand, I really don't blame the D&C for this. We live in an era of short attention spans, 30 second sound bytes, and audiences who are too impatient to even sit all the way through a movie...much less a book. It's not a McPaper, it's a McLife. The newpaper industry is struggling to survive, and so they must change their focus to an all new type of reporting. That new type of reporting is what you see reflected in the D&C. They must compete with television sit-coms, so they are becoming television sit-coms.
It's sad, really, but I think this isn't a problem isolated to Rochester or to Gannett. You can see it everywhere.
With respect, Padraigh, "blame society" is something of a cop-out. After all, the fact that alternative media exists and flourishes proves that people do indeed appreciate and even crave substance.
No, its the same false sense of lowest-common-denominator marketing that predominates the other things you mentioned like sitcoms that dilutes newspaper content in kind, not one from the next. Its the same false sense of marketing that drives them to do silly things like create Twitter profiles or comments sections or RSS feeds without any actual plan to use them effectively. It's like monkeys pushing buttons: if they get anything right, it's probably not their fault.
Padraigh, it might be true that the D&C was justified in dumbing down their paper. The McPaper strategy was minted around 1980, when there was one newspaper for everyone. It was not feasible to segment the market into those who were interested in more information, and those with a shorter attention span. Gannett decided there was more money to be had by dumbing down their paper -- so be it.
My question is why they continue with this strategy 15 years after the dawn of the web. The Internet D&C is pretty much a reproduction of the paper D&C, and Gannett's other Internet/paper products (Insider, RocMoms, RocMen, etc.) are all lowest-common denominator items.
Even with shorter attention spans, there's got to be a market for more in-depth reporting on the Internet. Why doesn't the D&C do what 13-WHAM does, which is to keep its superficial product but expand the coverage on their website? WHAM has a fraction of the reporters of the D&C, yet their school/city beat reporter (Rachel Barnhardt) adds more detail on her blog than the D&C carries in their published stories.
Interesting column on commenting using newspaper web sites:
http://ashvegas.squarespace.com/journal/2009/1/14/former-citizen-times-o...
Sorry if this was said above, but in addition to the dumbing down you discuss, does anyone else feel that the boards and comments at D&C are simply vicious? Where does that come from? Is there big anger in our city or are people just rude when online - forgetting there are real people at the other end?
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