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Note: The following
is a column I wrote for the Pacific Daily News,
Guam's biggest newspaper, that the editors of the
PDN decided not to run. While I'm not upset at them
about this decision, I am disappointed because I
think this criticism is part of a discussion that
needs to take place about the media in
general.
Please note that
the column singles out the PDN, but to be fair, it
really talks about problems in the Guam media in
general that aren't specific only to the
PDN.
Because I feel that
their decision not to run this column is a stifling
of criticism and a restriction of my opinions --
both contrary to the freedom of speech the PDN
should stand for -- I've decided not to write for
the PDN anymore, and I'll be writing my column
weekly for malafunkshun.com.
Leo Babauta
-----censored column
follows-----
The media should be
a defender and facilitator of freedom of expression
and a watchdog of public institutions, and as such,
I'm disappointed in the recent performance of the
Guam media.
The Pacific Daily
News, which did no worse than other Guam media,
provided coverage of the protests around the
Republican National Convention in Philadelphia that
failed to live up to the newspaper's ethical
standards, in my opinion. The poor coverage points
to deeper problems in the newspaper, and in the
media in general.
The PDN ran stories
of hundreds of protesters' arrests on Aug. 3, 6,
and 7, 2000 and in none of those three stories was
a single protester quoted. More unbelievably, the
stories never told readers what the protesters were
protesting about, except for a brief mention by a
Guam resident that protesters carried signs
"against the death penalty." Protesters were trying
to spotlight a much wider range of issues and
public institutions, and yet readers of these
stories might conclude that they were only
criticizing the death penalty.
Those three stories
seemed to get most of their information from the
police. The story on Aug. 6 was simply a list of
allegations by police of protester violence,
without getting the side of the protesters about
the violence. The only time the views protesters
were even summarized was on Aug. 7, but that was
about their treatment in the jails. Their criticism
of public institutions went unheard.
Such one-sidedness
and incomplete coverage is inexcusable. The PDN has
published its ethics policies, and under the
category of "Exercising Fair Play" is the following
policy: "We will strive to include all sides
relevant to a story and not take sides in news
coverage." It is obvious to me that all relevant
sides were not included; worse yet, the PDN removed
the voice of the powerless and gave a voice to
those in power.
Under the same
ethics category, the PDN also has the following
policy: "We will explain to readers our
journalistic processes." That explanation is badly
needed.
Because these are
national stories, one might blame the newspaper's
wire services. But a scan of wire services on the
Internet showed that all major wire services,
including The Associated Press, ran stories that
talked to the protesters and at least summarized
the issues that triggered the protests.
One might also
blame the copy editors who select and edit national
stories, but in fairness, there are almost never
enough editors or reporters to give each story its
due attention and still do the other thousand
things needed to put out a newspaper.
This points to the
deeper problem: the ethics policies are admirable,
but the newsroom is almost never given the funding
needed to carry out these policies in full.
Reporting on Guam issues is often reliant on phone
calls and government sources for information,
because overworked reporters have to pump out
several stories a day due to a lack of
staff.
The fundamental
problem is that in addition to being a vital public
service crucial to Guam's community, the newspaper
is a business and must report out a profit. Perhaps
an employee-run paper would be less concerned with
profits and serve the public better.
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