Digest 06/27/2022

Newsrooms helmed by cranky old white men issue social media guidelines in wake of Supreme Court ruling on abortion.

AUTHORITARIANISM ON THE RISE BUT DON’T TWEET ABOUT IT, LEGACY NEWSROOMS SAY

Last week, the majority far-right Supreme Court handed down rulings on cases affecting gun rights, Miranda rights, and most notably abortion, all but guaranteeing the United States is becoming a fascist hellhole. In a 5-4 ruling, the Court overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that protected the right to access abortion care, sending abortion rights back to the state level. Since the Friday ruling, 11 states have already enacted bans or severely restricted abortion access, as hundreds of clinics closed their doors for the last time. In the wise words of Danny DeVito, “Supreme Court my ass.” 

As everything continues to crumble around us, reporters are expected to pretend like they’re not also people affected by Supreme Court rulings, and asked to maintain some kind of neutrality — at least, that’s the stance mainstream newsrooms are taking. Following the Court’s ruling, Gannett, the largest newspaper publisher in the US, owner of 100 daily newspapers and nearly 1,000 weekly newspapers including USA TODAY, issued a reminder to its nearly 14,000 employees that they “cannot use social media to take a political position, criticize or attack a candidate, or express personal feelings about an outcome or ruling,” Nieman Lab staff writer Hanaa’ Tameez shared on Twitter. Employees were also encouraged to police their colleagues by reporting “inappropriate comments” made by their peers to a supervisor. 

Gannett was not the only media company to issue these guidelines. The Seattle Times reminded employees that while they should take time to process their feelings about their basic human rights being stripped, they should also refrain from doing so on social media. Axios insisted on similar terms, and argued that “public stands on political topics can undermine trust in our journalism.” Their memo — without ever stating the word “abortion” — added: “This topic tears apart friendships, families, workplaces, and states. We can’t allow it to rip at the culture of trust and respect we have built.”

Our favorite legacy paper, The New York Times also reminded some staff, “If our journalists are perceived as biased or if they engage in editorializing on social media, that can undercut the credibility of the entire newsroom.” 

Unsurprisingly, some newsrooms are still struggling with the idea that objectivity is dead, a belief that conservative and far-right rags have boldly weaponized for decades in service of this exact Christo-fascist outcome. Journalist Jamal Jordan pointedly noted, “There could be an asteroid headed for the planet and the first thing someone who runs a newsroom will do is email their employees about what they can and cannot tweet about the apocalypse.” Or, as Sam Sanders, the former host of NPR’s “It’s Been A Minute,” put it in a more polite tweet, these antiquated newsroom policies don’t actually do anything to protect the integrity of journalism. Instead, “The avoidance of the ‘perception’ of ‘bias’ ultimately means the only reporters to be trusted are those whose lives haven’t been directly touched by the issues and struggles they’re covering. And you [know] what that means.” Sanders went on, “It’s a default towards the most privileged in a newsroom. It’s a default to the men, to the straight people, to the white people, to the well-off.” 

Importantly, Sanders also commented on the ways newsrooms have advised young reporters to build their brands on social media in order to direct more traffic to their websites, while simultaneously policing their social profiles. “If you are not paying your journalists *extra* money, on top of their reporting salaries, to tweet, then maybe don’t tell them how to tweet,” he wrote. I’ve been on the receiving end of such archaic social media guidelines while working as a contractor. Back in 2019, a legacy newspaper killed one of my stories after CoreCivic, Inc., which owns and manages private prisons and detention centers, sent some of my tweets to an editor. If a newspaper is going to tell me what to tweet, they should be paying me more than $500 for a story. But I digress.  

None of this is all that surprising. Instead of actively fighting a descent into authoritarianism — particularly since reality TV star Donald Trump’s 2016 run for president — legacy papers have lent their platforms to white nationalists and the police while denouncing Black liberation organizers and rowdy protests, all in the name of remaining objective and neutral. “Our values and inclusivity ensure that we respect all views related to reproductive rights,” Gannett noted in its memo. But some views are simply not deserving of respect. 

Legacy media hasn’t learned its lesson since 2016 and I’m not holding my breath. But in this moment and in the years to come, the requirement to center those most affected by authoritarian, white nationalist policies and throw the other side out the window is as urgent as ever.

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COMINGS AND GOINGS

— Forbes acquired most of BuzzFeed’s tech desk, all but proving that everyone working in media is run through. 

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AND EVERYTHING ELSE

— Staff at The Washington Post lament being forced to return to the office.

— Unsatisfied with his war against women’s rights, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas signals interest in attacking media outlets by overturning the New York Times v. Sullivan decision, reports Axios. 

— The New York Times uses infighting at The Washington Post to rib its rival paper and its new executive editor, Sally Buzbee.

— Netflix lays off another 300 employees. The tech company said in a statement it was making employment cuts “so that our costs are growing in line with our slower revenue growth.” I guess “Stranger Things” can’t save Netflix, after all. 

— The Los Angeles Police Department once again received criticism for its treatment of journalists after a pair of officers hit journalist Tina-Desiree Berg and shoved her to the ground, reports The Los Angeles Times. 

— If you’re reporting on protests in response to the end of Roe, the IWW Freelance Journalists Union reminds you to be mindful of best practices for livestreaming in an effort to protect people mobilizing on the frontlines. You can also review the Study Hall anti-fascist media guide for photojournalism best practices.