Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Journalist blames consumers for noticing media bias

Roy Peter Clark is a Poynter Institute Senior Scholar. Wednesday he wrote an article in Poynter Online, complaining that the public is biased against the press. Clark says the public is biased against the media not because the media is biased, but only because of "unfair attacks on the media." Clark ends his piece by saying the problem doesn't lie with the media, the problem is the public. His concluding paragraph:


But nothing journalists do will reverse the dark tides of popular cynicism. The wrecking balls destroying the credibility of the press cannot be stopped until we focus more attention on the credibility of those who are pulling the levers, including a public that has been conditioned, like rats in a Skinnerian dystopia, to hate us.

Some quick reactions from bloggers:


NRO's Kevin D. Williamson: "Clark's article is a tour de force of sanctimony and buffoonery."

Ace: "The idiot concludes his article with a rousing call for the media to attack its critics."

Confederate Yankee: "Clark's real complaint is is the demise of the media's role as gatekeeper."

Roy Peter Clark (what is it with liberals with 3 names, by the way?) has no idea how self-defeating his cynicism is. So let him be. Media's future belongs to people who respect the consumer and work to earn the consumer's trust.