Why journalists don’t ask difficult questions

 Journalism is not an academic scholarship. It does, nonetheless, share at least two things with academic scholarships.

One is the range of ways in which the subject, event, or state of affairs is approached. The other is the absolute quest to get as close to the truth as possible – and defend it.

Both are shaped by the questions that are asked and of course, how these questions are framed.

A recent opinion piece by Eric Loo, “Why aren’t journalists asking hard questions?” raised the issue of questioning.

I should say, at this early point, that I don’t take a personal political position here. I don’t know enough about Malaysian politics and society to say anything with confidence.

I have always been a guest or a visitor in the country, and cannot find it in me to whip up antagonisms or exploit the goodwill that is always shared with me.

I will simply reflect on a decades-long career in the media (reporter, national political correspondent, foreign correspondent, photojournalist, now a columnist and essayist in and out of academia), with a specific focus on the way journalists ask questions and their social and institutional environment.

Allow me then to start on somewhat of a philosophical note. The questions we ask tend to be shaped by family, community, and society. More specifically, by the ideas and intellectual boundaries that are allowed within the family, community, and society.

Also, because of their power, their role in building awareness, and the place they occupy in corporations, journalists, as public intellectuals, ask questions for any among a range of reasons.

One of the most important lessons we have learned since the turn of the century was the way that “patriotic journalism” dominated in the United States, and much less so in Europe.

Types of journalism and question framing

There emerged, by the end of the past century, a range of “types” of journalism, some of which have been around for decades. There is, now, “peace journalism,” “business journalism”, “war journalism”, “literary journalism”… these are the ones, anyway, that come to mind.

The one type I have always had difficulty with is “patriotic journalism”. It lends itself too easily to that old American aphorism, “love America or leave it”.

Senses of pride can be constructive and progressive, with the caveat that some of the worst despots in the world have placed loyalty to “the nation” above considerations of peace, justice, and social harmony.

Patriotic journalism peaked in the weeks and months after the attacks on New York City and Washington in September 2001, Washington’s war on the people of Iraq and Afghanistan.

It was, “a great moment for American journalism”, the veteran journalist, Dan Rather, told the Columbia Journalism Review in October in 2001. Tom Goldstein, who was Dean of the Columbia University School of Journalism at the time, said: “I think the press has risen to the occasion in an extraordinary fashion.”

Those attacks, horrifying as they were, produced a news media that was a functional actor in establishing and maintaining hyper-patriotism and the wars that followed. We can leave that there and let it stew.

And so, when you buy into that hyper-patriotism, and your journalism represents a symbol of national pride, in a manner of speaking, the questions you ask of a head of state, the CEO of a corporation, the woman whose house had been destroyed by a fire, or the man who sleeps on the street, are framed in a particular way.

Asleep on the pavement. Depending on her sensibilities, the journalist can decide to blame the individual for his plight, or look at the lack of social safety nets for the indigent. The newsmedia frames things to suit vested interests, and journalists often fall in line.

Personal and institutional safety

Journalists ask questions for many reasons. Most prominent among these would be for personal safety.

I should not generalise on personal experience, but once you have received threats on your person and life, you approach populist politicians carefully or avoid them completely.

There are also institutional safety concerns. It is not inconceivable that the people you upset, as a news organisation or individual journalists, may retaliate.

People who pay attention to these things may recall Nato’s bombing of the Radio Television of Serbia Headquarters in April 1999. At least 16 people were killed in that attack.

Things are rarely straightforward, but the media is often a casualty of war.

Power relations

Journalists may also be hesitant to ask questions, especially of political and corporate leaders, to avoid losing access to “contacts” and “sources”.

The relationship between journalists and “sources” cannot be dismissed. The surest way to lose access, and risk your competitors “getting the news first,” is to write something, anything, scathing about the offices that these sources hold.

Journalists, therefore, for better or for worse, try their hardest to preserve access. It becomes terribly important in a competitive environment.

Vested interests

A generally acknowledged source of tension is the way vested interests influence news media and by extension frame the questions journalists ask.

If, for instance, a newspaper, or any news media, is owned by a particular corporation or group, or positions itself as protector of exclusive groups based on race, religion, or ethnicity, it’s futile to imagine journalists asking questions that challenge the power, influence, or authority of vested interests.

The influences that may not sit well with everyone, conceptually, and which I think are probably most significant, are social and political orders that shape the work of newspapers and journalists without any direct involvement.

When I entered academia after more than a decade as a journalist, I focused quite extensively on this.

The best example I can think of was the way, during Weimar Germany, that newspaper publishers, editors, and journalists simply fell in line with Nazi orthodoxy.

If they wanted to stay in business, publishers, editors, and journalists had to avoid challenging the regime. (Arthur Koestler explained this in one of his two-volume autobiography).

I worked as a journalist and photojournalist during the darkest days of apartheid, when media regulations were a cornerstone of successive national states of emergencies, we worked against great odds and often had heated discussions with our lawyers about what we may or may not publish.

Imagine, if you will, a state formed on the basis of a single religious belief, and effectively worked to remove people who do not share these beliefs, and how difficult it is to write anything critical of that state.

So, journalists can, and often do ask difficult questions (and some of us were jailed and/or beaten by the state security apparatus).

Among a range of outcomes of purposefully avoiding some questions is self-censorship, at worst the truth never sees daylight.

On this basis, the comments section of online news and information sources can be useful (when they are not vulgar and offensive) in that they can help journalists fill in the omissions, or add pressure on news media and individual journalists.

I should make two points in conclusion.

First, never mind the constraints and difficulties. There should never be a time when we avoid the truth for the sake of our own personal gain or corporate survival.

Second, every reader and commentator has opinions; if there are a thousand readers there are probably a thousand opinions.

As public intellectuals, we have to start with humility and accept that we may not get everything right all the time. That is no reason to stop working at it. - Mkini

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ISMAIL LAGARDIEN is a visiting professor at Multimedia University. He was the executive dean of business and economics sciences at Nelson Mandela University and served briefly in the Mandela administration between a career as a journalist and academic.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.