There was once a time from diners to kitchen tables the news was read line by line. Newspapers were perched under the arms of businessmen in bustling cities, sometimes more than one paper. Now as newsrooms and magazines shutter almost daily, it begs the question. Are witnessing the death of journalism?
From newsstands on the corners, to the kids on their bikes throwing newspapers like their favorite baseball idols, the news was delivered in a way anyone could read it. The words of journalists who spent years working on their craft filled each page. It didn’t matter if you were a political journalist or a sports journalist, you were there to tell the truth in your stories.
These days people get their news from social media personalities and from shows with news in their title but offer very little of the news, just their opinions based on their beliefs not facts.
And with the news it was ok to have differing opinions. You could agree to disagree as long as you could back up your claims with facts. Facts make up the truth and the news used to be about the facts and truth. Not like today where the mantra is if you’re not with us you’re against us when it comes to the truth in news.
I, for one, loved reading the newspaper from front to back. Folding a newspaper while eating your breakfast and having coffee at a diner was an art form. Every fold and bend was made intentionally. The folded newspaper origami was like watching a painting come to life on a blank canvas with each stroke of the brush. The sounds the paper made as it was creased and crinkled now give way to alerts for likes and endless scrolling. Kids would read the comics and laugh at Calvin and Hobbes. Now they just watched others play Minecraft and Fortnite like zombies.
Newspapers have evolved into news shows from similar looking people repeating the same punch lines over and over hoping to hypnotize their viewers with the illusion of intelligence all while they operate with the sincerity of a man who repeatedly commits adultery while his wife is pregnant with their child. And dare I say the same sincere man who has committed rape and even raped his wife. The same sincere man indicted 91 times and who incited an insurrection upon the very rules of law he swore to uphold. But I digress.
With the death of journalism things like that will be swept under the rug and the facade of everything is great, believe me will be the only “truth” to be told. No facts to back up the truth, just the I know better and more than you so believe me cavalier attitude that plagues “news shows” today.
Journalists pushed and exposed the truth from stories like the Watergate scandal to the Catholic priest abuse scandal and even to the local neighborhood cat in the tree story. Their intricately woven tapestry of words had the ability to shed light on the darkest corners in life. They were on the front lines fighting to bring the truth to the masses. They were the ones preaching from the pulpit to their editors, espousing their belief in the values of truth, integrity and allowing their readers to formulate their own opinions based on the facts presented.
Kids used to rush home from school for their weekly Sports Illustrated while mom and dad would intently peruse their Newsweek or National Geographic magazines. And even Playboy, in between the scintillating spreads of legs and pages, were words in articles that were more titillating than the perky breasts of the college freshman posing for tuition.
While the use of photos helped to capture the eye and the imagination of the reader it was the words that flowed ever so effortlessly line by line that captivated them. The way stories were written not as biased opinion pieces made solely for the purpose of sensationalism but by facts steeped in sources and research.
Now notepads are replaced by voice memos. Photos are falsely created and if not created, stolen under the pretext of “no copyright infringement inteded.” Journalists are replaced by AI bots that compile stories by scraping bits and pieces of data they find online and output them in such a manner fit for a computer to comprehend, not the intended reader.
Kids would play dress up with their parent’s hats and wrote the word “news” on a piece of paper that they stuck on the side of the hat as they eagerly press down the letters on a typewriter. Now they flash piece signs while making duck lips for the “Gram.”
Journalists once were schooled under the hardened tutelage of experienced mentors now gives way to hacks with a blog and a social media account sharing sensationalism for likes and clicks while shunning the truth. There is no longer a responsibility for people to write about the truth, instead it has been replaced with that each click is worth money so let’s create “stories” that get clicks.
It’s sad when the number of likes equates to the truth no longer the number of words that it took to bring the truth to people.
Private equity firms and corporate slumlords have gobbled up newspaper after newspaper and magazines by the stack load. They’re the ones that have been dismantling the very fabric of journalism newsroom by newsroom for one sole purpose; to make money. Their greedy intentions reek of inauthenticity as they “promise” to deliver the news but in a manner in which pads their pockets not enlightens and informs the minds of their audience. Their audacity to know what is best is bemusing as they sit perched high in their glass encased towers as they throw stones at journalists and photo journalists telling them their jobs are replaceable and not important in today’s evolving world of technological advances.
The goal of these equity firms and corporate owners is control; control of the minds of people. Making them not believe what is true, but what they want them to believe. Pushing their false narratives, stirring the visceral pot to bolster their bottom lines and to stroke the fears and insecurities of those weak minded who wander through life feeling it’s because of someone else that they got the short end of the stick in life and not by their own doing.
There is a reason why education and journalism is in decline in tandem. Teachers and journalists are underpaid and underappreciated compared to social media darlings who bob their head up and down not in agreement but to make them a rich reality star. The lust for materialistic possessions and fleeting internet fame has replaced the desire for the truth.
People don’t go into education or journalism with the sole purpose of becoming rich. They go to stimulate the minds of those they teach and those who read their work. Their profession is a needed on yet repeatedly put down because “it doesn’t make enough money.”
They used to teach English writing and composition in schools. They used to challenge students to read and write. Now those in charge of education, not just on a school level, but education as a whole, now just want them to pass arbitrary test scores for funding purposes. They would rather have kids recite what they tell them than to teach them like robots meant to be the backbone of labor for some greedy person’s wealth.
It’s easier to control the minds of people when they can’t read or write. They depend on people they deem “smarter” to them to tell them what is “true” or not.
They fall prey to the false beliefs that immigrants, the brown and black ones, are coming in droves to take their jobs and flood the systems of government. When in truth it was their ancestors who took a different route to illegally come to a country not of their own and flood “the systems.”
The borders of Mexico once were as high up as Utah and the vast amount of the country belonged to the indigenous tribes of Native Americans not to the people who believe that there were people who were named Peter, John and Paul who lived in a land inhabited by people with brown skin and have Arabic names.
Reading would have taught them the truth not just listening and believing an ornately dressed man who claims to speak the word of God but whose only relationship they’ve ever been in is with an invisible man. The same ornately dressed man who preaches that being gay is a sin.
I always thought if you were in a committed relationship with another man that implies that you’re gay, but semantics can be argued another day.
They are many, unfortunately, who believe that God and Christianity were the backbone, the foundation that the Founding Fathers intended for this country to be built upon. If they could read beyond a third-grade level, they would know this would not to be true. There is not one iota of truth that the United States was based on the God worshipped in Christianity. Instead, they rather believe the ignorant slander from a presumed escort turned Congresswoman whose hands weren’t made for typing, but for stimulation and not of the mind type.
While a good portion of the Founding Fathers were impeccable orators, they also frequently wrote their thoughts and opinions for all to read in newspapers. And you would know this if you watched Hamiliton as a play on Disney+. They didn’t just go on one “news network” that similar lack in values as them to share their thoughts.
Thomas Jefferson once wrote “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”
Even George Washington said, “If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.”
Guess who is being led to slaughter at the hands of political hacks and corporate greed? And in the great comedic words of Katt Williams, “Don’t worry, I’ll wait.”
The sheep rather believe diatribes from ranting buffoons because their false truths resonate more with them than the carefully crafted, articulated words from journalists who fear that the dictionary and thesaurus will be the next books to be banned. These same buffoons who openly tell you to hate people who are different than you. They tell you to hate transgendered people while they wear three-inch heels themselves to appear taller.
Who is the real drag queen?
History is written by the victors, but the truth is written by those who are unafraid to chase and seek it out. The facts of history can be challenged, the truth cannot.
This is what happens with the death of journalism. The truth ceases to exist, only the truth of those who want to push their “truth” upon the masses on the uneducated.
The truth is written in between the lines filled with words but if you don’t teach people to read, they’ll never understand what is being said. They would rather have someone tell them what it says instead of investigating the truth for themselves. It’s saves them time from learning the truth themselves because they can’t miss the newest episode of how to whore yourself on the Bachelor and Real Housewives of fake tv.
That is why you end up having people drinking bleach and taking horse medicine like ivermectin because some disease riddled, and intelligent challenged person told them to. They could have read what the side effects were and how the lies of a con man couldn’t cure Covid or their stupidity in the belief that a self-appointed god who acts and looks like a horse’s ass knew what was best for them.
Instead of quoting a line from their favorite journalists, people rather shout World Star as they bring their version of the “news” to the cesspool that encapsulates social media. Journalists like Bob Woodward, Carl Bernstein, Tom Brokaw, Jackie MacMullan and others would offer searing critiques, followed with facts presented to you in think pieces of the Sunday edition of newspapers. Now “journalists” today go on panels on tv and feign being grotesquely outraged by a tan suit or openly mock others with their false narratives of the truth.
The problem becomes the people who watch these de facto fake journalists believe it’s ok to incite violence and hate against people who don’t believe in what you believe. That it’s ok to openly mock and ridicule them and then proceed to educate them with unsubstantiated facts based on lies meant to indoctrinate the feeble minded.
There is a reason why a certain “news” network and their harem of pale minded journalists with all their integrity to truth and honor were forced to pay several hundred millions of dollars for telling their false version of the truth; I mean spreading lies about an election being stolen.
Words aren’t free and for those who use words thinking they’re not responsible for them let me remind you. There are consequences to words and don’t think free speech is just that; free. You may be free to say what you want, but that doesn’t mean you’re free from the repercussions from those said words. And some of you will likely find that out the hard way.
Words have power and those in power want to consolidate all that power for themselves. When you take the power of words and the truth away from journalists all you have left is what you’re told to believe. The pending death of journalism is just another domino to fall in the effort to control the masses.
In the immortal words of Fox Mulder, “The truth is out there.”
Photo by Bank Phrom on Unsplash
