How to Remain Un-opinionated and Ethical in Reporting
During John Eligon’s lecture Wednesday night, he spoke about why he loves being a journalist. He mentioned his true passion lies in talking to people and learning stories from different perspectives rather than just simply writing. Eligon said that, when talking to these different types of people, it is important to know the difference between having a voice verse an opinion. Another concept the New York Times writer mentioned was to tell it how it is or how it went, allowing no room for bias to creep in. He clearly thinks it is important for the readers to make their own judgments and understands that his job is to report what is going on in the world.
When Eligon spoke about voice verse opinion he gave many examples. Being a black reporter working on the race beat, he has been thrown in situations where he is clearly out of place. Instead of giving his opinion on the Nazis and white supremacists, which it is safe to assume are quite negative, he simply writes about what he sees. There is no need for him to voice any opinion. According to Michael Schudson, “Objective reporting takes pains to represent fairly each leading side in a political controversy. According to the objectivity norm, the journalist’s job consists of reporting something called ‘news’ without commenting on it, slanting it, or shaping its formulation in any way.” These are values Eligon believes in, as he trusts the reader to make the correct judgments on the people that he interviews and covers.
In terms of stating it quite literally how it went down, Eligon stressed leaving quotes alone and let them speak for themselves. One quote in particular that he told us about had to do with a racist southerner he and another black reporter interviewed. The man’s last name happened to be Cotton and when he told the two reporters this he made a comment about how his name is what they used to pick. Obviously this was an extremely inappropriate, insensitive and racist comment. Eligon would have been well within his rights to bash this man in his article for his comments. But, he finds it more effective to leave the quote alone and not let his thoughts get in the way. Eligon said he does this often as he finds it is the best way to get other people’s perspectives out there, as he often times talks to people with very different backgrounds.
What Eligon was really stressing during this lecture was that as a reporter your job is to report and leave the rest up the reader. By telling it how it is and letting quotes speak for themselves, the readers will see what the reporter saw as well.
Citations
Schudson, M. (2001). The objectivity norm in American journalism*. Journalism: Theory, Practice & Criticism, 2(2), 149-170. doi:10.1177/146488490100200201