While We're at It, Times Reporters Should Leave Out Facebook Preferences Too!
The Times' Craig Whitney has one more thing to say on the subject of reporters/editors flaunting their political preferences: It shouldn't be anywhere in their Facebook pages, either.
Here's another memo, just sent out:
Fellow newsroom hands:
I should have also mentioned avoiding some other potential political entanglements: Web sites, personal blogs, YouTube, Facebook, slogans and so on in e-mails and instant messaging systems. When Facebook asks what your political preferences are, don't answer, and don't say anything in a blog, video, radio or television program or any other medium that you couldn't say in the paper or on our Website -- about politics or anything else.This provision in Ethical Journalism is also worth keeping in mind:
"Staff members may not march or rally in support of public causes or movements, sign ads taking a position on public
issues, or lend their name to campaigns, benefit dinners or similar events if doing so might reasonably raise doubts about
their ability or The Times's ability to function as neutral observers in covering the news. Staff members must keep in
mind that neighbors and other observers commonly see them as representatives of The Times."Thanks again,
Craig Whitney
Kudos for Mr. Whitney, this should be the memo in more newspapers as many stories etc are turning into opinion pieces and not news.
As a journalist, I understand the need to show no BIAS, but that our un-bias is limited ONLY to our reporting.
I am a firm believer that:
1. Every person has a worldview, and every person's worldview influences them visible through their actions or behaviors (believe it or not, "every person" includes REPORTERS!!)
2. Every person is responsible for their actions and behaviors.
3. As a responsible journalist, we should be able to separate our beliefs from our professional duties to SEEK THE TRUTH and REPORT IT.
Outside of the professional realm (when we're not "on duty") we should have the same RIGHTS as every other American!! That means the right to campaign, to donate, to demonstrate, to be FREE CITIZENS of the U.S.A.
When a private company would seek to hinder those rights, they should be held liable under the U.S. Constitution. That means, the NYT should be sued if they inhibit any reporter from demonstrating a political preference (even though their preferences aren't not much of a secret anyway).
Kudos to Mr. Whitney for trying to close the barn door. Sadly the horses got loose about forty years ago.
Is the Times perhaps concerned that the bumper stickers would show a staff uniformly hostile to the Republican party? Memo to the Times: we already knew that!
Why wouldn't we want to know how a journalist votes? Wouldn't it make things much clearer? Then we could easily prove a bias (for instance, if they hire a staff in which 95% vote democrat) and make up our own minds, without all of these nonsensical arguments about "neutrality."
So The Times regulates what you can do on and off the clock? I hope the pay is worth that kind of micromanagement.
I agree with Cindy (the second one at least), and the first person who commented on this article.
This whole deal is a pathetic stunt. The NYT is an elitist, fashionably left wing paper. That's who they are and what they do. It's how they make la iving. If they came out and actually said that George W. Bush is perhaps not really the worst president in history they'd lose half their readership. This childish posturing and preening is masturbatory. They fool no one, not even themselves. So why bother?
Mr. Whitney missed something. He mentioned that neighbors of staff members look at them as representatives of the paper, so the prohibition should cover staff's conversation with friends and neighbors. When inviting your best friends over for dinner, staff should NEVER utter anything political, like for example saying "It's laughable that Bush claimed credit for himself and McCain for the new GI Bill -- the same bill both did everything in their power to scuttle (including a veto threat)." After all there is another side to this, right?
Heck, staff shouldn't be allowed to utter such clearly biased political statements even to their spouses and kids. After all, they are good Americans too, they read the Times, right?
Unreal.
Mr. Whitney missed something. He mentioned that neighbors of staff members look at them as representatives of the paper, so the prohibition should cover staff's conversation with friends and neighbors. When inviting your best friends over for dinner, staff should NEVER utter anything political, like for example saying "It's laughable that Bush claimed credit for himself and McCain for the new GI Bill -- the same bill both did everything in their power to scuttle (including a veto threat)." After all there is another side to this, right?
Heck, staff shouldn't be allowed to utter such clearly biased political statements even to their spouses and kids. After all, they are good Americans too, they read the Times, right?
Unreal.
I don't suppose we'll see the policy memo where the NYT should refrain from hiring flaming, lockstep leftists so devoid of ethics that they'd pervert objective journalism for political activism. This is probably a larger concern than the bumper stickers and Facebook.
Of course, not cramming a newsroom and its product full of liberal activists would take care of symptoms like bumper stickers, the Times just doesn't want to be so obvious that it lessens the amount of assistance it can provide to the DNC. That leftits have to disguise who they are and what they believe speaks volumes about the validity of the movement.
Walt said:
When inviting your best friends over for dinner, staff should NEVER utter anything political, like for example saying "It's laughable that Bush claimed credit for himself and McCain for the new GI Bill -- the same bill both did everything in their power to scuttle (including a veto threat)." After all there is another side to this, right?
Heck, staff shouldn't be allowed to utter such clearly biased political statements even to their spouses and kids. After all, they are good Americans too, they read the Times, right?
Unreal.
=========================================================
I wonder, Walt, if those same folks were talking about how "unreal" or "laughable" it was that Bill Clinton kept vetoing and trying to undermine and water down the welfare reform bills, until finally, after succeeding to do so as much as possible, he was still 'forced' to sign by poll-watching advisor Dick Morris, who said he'd lose re-election if he didn't sign the overwhelmingly popular bill.
Oddly, I don't hear much about this or similar instances from these folks, in print or otherwise.
I think the utterance you cite is a perfect example of what journalists indeed should not be saying, at any time. To take sides in such a biased way, with such scorn for the other side, is a mark of someone not cut out for hard news journalism. Why not just pass on the politics altogether at dinner parties? It's not that hard to do.
Good God - is the Times still in business? Heavens - they must force family and friends to subscribe to stay afloat. Best of luck - you irrelevant numbskulls
I disagree. It's your job to just write down what happened--that's the news. We have the right to think about current events without having your opinion crammed down our throats. We don't want to see you campaign either. Give it a rest.
Think what you want--privately. Vote like the rest of us. But don't use your heightened platform to spout your opinions which are probably no more informed and certainly no more well-thought out than those of the rest of us.
Yeah, you tell 'em, Whitney. Let's all keep chanting kumbayah right up until the NY Times itself endorses Obama. If Whitney tells staffers they shouldn't do all those things, how does he square that with the Times endorsing candidates every election year? Or are we supposed to forget about that for a moment and pat him on the back?
What a crock.
Bravo. And please, leave your testicles at the door.
As a journalist and newspaper editor, I believe, as all journalists claim to believe, that light is a great disinfectant. Now, what The Times is saying is that it's OK to have political opinions -- after all, The Times is willing to let its employees vote; how gracious! -- just so long as you keep those opinions in the dark.
Apparently, full disclosure is required only of those The Times reports on, not of The Times itself. I have always believed that media bias (both real and imagined) would be far less of an issue if reporters and editors were simply allowed to be up-front about their politics, religion, etc. Then readers would at least know where possible bias might sneak in and could account for it, and probably ending up thinking better of the media and trusting it more as a result. Plus, a reporter or editor whose views are in the open might go out of his or her way to be more fair.
So, does The Times' "Facebook rule" extend to what its employees might list as their favorite books? Because I know, in my case, a person can certainly guess my politics from the book titles I list as my favorites.
He didn't say you shouldn't be politically interested. The memo just says, "don't tell anyone." What ever happened to "full and honest disclosure"? (Oh, that's right, the only rule that applies to journalists is: don't get caught).
I find it interesting that an organization that so vehemently 'protects' the first amendment would seek to so trample on it with respect to their employees.
I have no problem with no bumper stickers or other political advertising on cars THAT WILL BE PARKED AT OR NEAR THE TIMES. When I worked as an IT Contractor at the Coke HQ in Atlanta I was told that my car could not have bumper stickers or advertising from any Pepsi product or restaurant (Taco Bell, KFC,...) and this included empty sacks or drink cups from there inside the car. OK - their parking lot and I'm taking their money. But there was no restriction on eating at any of these restaurants off hours or even for lunch - as long as nothing was brought back on campus.
Who I support AND donate MY money to is one of the rights I hold dear as an American and cannot imagine any company presuming to deny that right to an employee.
Are they worried they have a closet Republican on staff or something?
This is all true for any citizen of the United States, of course, but when we choose a profession we are also obliged to follow its particular code of ethics (just as we enjoy whatever benefits that come along with the territory). Reporters represent the publications they work for whether writing a story or standing in line at the grocery store; hence, any public display of affinity or opposition to a particular viewpoint could taint the publication's appearance of impartiality. Editorialists, bloggers, and talk-show hosts who subscribe to a particular viewpoint are a different standard; reporters need to play it down the middle every second of their lives - except when the curtain closes in the voting booth.
Sorry - I'm a graduate of journalism school (with a master's) and even the best paying reporting job doesn't pay enough to hand over my whole life to some facade of "neutrality." The best you can do is do your best to be fair and truthful, and put your opinions out in the open, so people can evaluate your bias and make informed decisions. This whole idea of papers being "neutral" is a fairly recent thing, created to convince the readers that corporate control over the media wouldn't really be that bad - we'd have one nice, neutral paper instead of 50 different partisan papers.
As a profession, old-school print reporters are going the way of dinosaurs anyway. Personally, I think this over-important, self-congratulatory type of policy is part of the reason why.
Cindy's response "as a journalist" is the most reasonable that I've read in regards to this matter. Reporting is a job, and if you do your job right, there's no need for worry. Report the truth. Report facts. Include feelings, emotions and opinions of people involved - but not your own to the best of your ability in keeping with journalistic integrity.
After you clock out, sign off air, or submit your story, you are entitled to your opinion. You are at liberty to express yourself, as long as you aren't doing so under the name of your employer. There are no - or should be no - rules governing censorship of privately held opinions on any subject. Trying to limit expression of employees is dangerous, and sets a bad precedent.
Shame on the New York Times - a newspaper being an important and necessary part of the American discourse on Liberty - for stomping on the very liberties it tries to serve and protect by bringing News to light.
-Robert Gandy
Let me see if I've got this straight: The Times Editorial Board can and does express opinions every day, but some schmuck staff member can't?
I'll remember that the next time I read one of Michael Gordon's articles about Iraq; Usually nothing more than a transcription of BushCo propaganda.
Hypocrisy thy name is NYT.
He's afraid somebody will do a little investigating and find out that Times reporters are 100% liberal Obama supporters. Someone should tell the dope that everybody already knows.
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