Focusing on accuracy
Welcome back to part two of our series on journalistic integrity. Last week we focused on our first building block of the process: doing research. This week we’ll tackle step two: focusing on accuracy. Got your drink? Have some popcorn? You may find you’ll want some while you read through this one.
Accuracy goes hand-in-hand with doing thorough research, but we believe that it is a separate topic that needs to be addressed on its own. For our purposes, accuracy is a combination of several concepts, including transparency, thoroughness, and objectivity.
Let’s dive into objectivity first. “Objectivity” is a term that is often thrown around when talking about journalism or the media, but what does it actually mean? If you ask most people what “objectivity” means in the world of journalism, they’ll probably tell you that it means that journalists are supposed to be completely unbiased. However, we all know that nothing’s ever that simple.
According to Kovach and Rosenstiel, when the term “objectivity” first appeared on the scene in the 1920s, it was actually asking journalists
“to develop a consistent method of testing information - a transparent approach to evidence - precisely so that personal and cultural biases would not undermine the accuracy of
their work.”
This more accurately means that journalists should acknowledge their biases and make an effort to work past them. Biases are unavoidable; as humans, we’ll have them. That doesn’t mean we should allow those biases to stand in the way of doing the job right.
Biases are, regrettably, easy to find in modern media. Articles covering multiple topics from multiple sources across multiple platforms display biases, from political to cultural. Sometimes biases are stated plainly, which is actually not a bad thing; this is an element of journalistic transparency - being open with the public about your methods as a writer. This transparency allows readers to make an informed decision about the info they’re being presented. Take the Huffington Post as an example: it’s written with a known liberal political bias, so anyone reading an article from them can take that into account.
However, there are other times where biases are not stated, which presents a problem. These sources have a veneer of being “objective” when in reality, they are presenting opinions as facts.
One recent example is Rolling Stone’s review of “Map of the Soul: Persona.” Now, don’t get us wrong - we aren’t saying that Rolling Stone is an unreliable source on the whole. On the contrary, Rolling Stone is typically a reliable source. Which makes this article disappointing on two levels (yes, we said it): one, it is always disappointing when a reliable publication whiffs it; and two, it displays a fairly obvious bias.
How, you might ask, does it display a bias? In this particular case, it’s not so much bias against BTS as it is a bias against K-pop as a genre. Underlying the very cursory analysis of the album (for comparison: this review of “Persona” is five very terse paragraphs, while an article by the same author about Taylor Swift’s new album is seven healthy paragraphs and is a glowing review), there is a lack of knowledge about K-pop as a whole.
The article accuses “Persona” of being one of the group’s “droopier” releases without providing an explanation of what that means or providing any supporting info to back up this claim. It also states that BTS “flit” (sic) from style to style in a “checklist” fashion, when in actuality K-pop itself is a mixture of genres, so it’s not uncommon for artists to switch up their style.
Oops.
Adding insult to injury, the article also states that the only “convincing” piece is “Make It Right,” which is “surprisingly” co-written by Ed Sheeran (their words). The implication here is that the only “convincing” piece was co-written by a Western artist. By extension, this also means that the pieces written by BTS (non-Western artists) cannot be as convincing as those written by their Western counterparts. Instead of focusing on how remarkable it is to have these two musical powerhouses working together, the author carefully engineers a put-down.
The article also doesn’t mention anything about the intense psychological theories that inspired the album or the deeper meanings behind the lyrics with the backdrop of Jungian theory, and it also doesn’t mention how some of the songs will have a special meaning to ARMY in particular. All of these things are incredibly significant, but the article doesn’t acknowledge them at all, which once again displays a lack of knowledge and also a lack of research. Knowing about the psychological theory could have enhanced the author’s understanding of the album, provided great context, and caused the author to rethink his “droopy” designation.
Biases exist. Unless a journalist lives in a plain room devoid of internet access, furniture, or any method of entertainment (which, if you think about it, would make him or her pretty ineffective as a journalist), the journalist is going to have likes, dislikes, opinions, and beliefs, all of which make him or her human. That’s a fact of life. However, having a bias doesn’t mean that you can get away with not doing your homework and ignoring facts that don’t suit your purpose. Acknowledging a bias and then doing the legwork to make sure you’ve done the subject justice by exploring all sides of the story should be a common practice,
not a novelty.
This week was a pretty intense one - and to tell you the truth, we could probably write a thesis paper (or five) on media bias. But for this week, the big takeaway is that it’s something you can work with and still produce quality, reliable content. If research is the foundation for a good article, doing your job right is the walls. Want to see what makes the roof on this house? Check back next week for the third and final part of this series: providing a forum for discussion.
DISCLAIMER: I do not own any audio & visual content in this video except for the editing. ALL RIGHTS BELONG TO THE RIGHTFUL OWNERS. No copyright infringement intended.
Written By: Anna
Edited By: Caitlin