By Kimberlee Josephson
Jeff Bezos recently released an op-ed on why the Washington Post will be refraining from endorsing political candidates and why he believes faith needs to be restored in journalism. At the start of the article, he gives an analogy to illustrate the media’s present problem:
Voting machines must meet two requirements. They must count the vote accurately, and people must believe they count the vote accurately. The second requirement is distinct from and just as important as the first.
Likewise with newspapers. We must be accurate, and we must be believed to be accurate.
These statements are easy to understand, but the matters involved are complex. A voting machine can be made to work properly, and newspapers can go to great lengths to verify sources and situations, but as for the second part of Bezos’s statements about believing it to be true, well, that’s tricky.
How deeply one believes, how long one has believed, how one came to be a believer, and what constitutes the core elements of what one believes are important factors. Moreover, understanding why some choose not to believe is just as important as understanding why some do. Boomers may claim that the news used to be a believable source, while Zoomers, having been raised in the noisy digital age, may never feel like legacy media can be trusted.
It is also worth noting that conflicted feelings about what one believes can emerge at any time and can be influenced by circumstance. For instance, with the holidays drawing near, many children are questioning their belief in Santa and are adjusting their behavior after having not thought about the jolly gift-giver since last December. Similarly, as this election season comes to a close, many adults are questioning their confidence in a two-party system and are re-evaluating the role politics plays in their everyday life.
When it comes to making tough decisions, or understanding that which is hard to believe, we tend to take cues from others and seek to validate our viewpoints, just like children who question their parents after hearing from friends that Santa is not real. And, with this presidential election, many are having a hard time believing the choices we’ve been given and are looking for guidance as well as reassurance. According to a poll conducted by the American Psychiatric Association, 73 percent of U.S. adults are anxious about the election.
People have tuned in in high numbers for Ezra Klein’s talk with Vivek Ramaswamy, Bari Weiss’s moderated debate between Ben Shapiro and Sam Harris regarding “Trump or Kamala?,” and Joe Rogan’s long sit-down with none other than Donald Trump. People are hungry for information and desperate to justify casting their ballot, which brings us back to Bezos’s last-minute decision to do an about-face on the Washington Post’s decades-long practice of endorsing presidential candidates. Bezos is right about the fact that a newspaper endorsement is unlikely to swing someone’s vote choice; however, many people were likely relying on it as a reference point. In fact, Bezos’s judgment call resulted in roughly 250,000 readers, about 10 percent of the Washington Post’s audience, canceling their subscriptions. And while some news outlets followed suit and others helped pave the way (L.A. Times and USA Today), other outlets have chosen to double down on their political positions. The Atlantic gave their endorsement of Kamala Harris earlier this month and re-released that endorsement in an email blast after Bezos’s announcement.
News outlets have long helped to inform the populace as well as politicians of hot topics and changes in culture and public opinion—and they do so in one of two ways. A media outlet can be impartial and functional with what it covers (which is easier said than done), or it can take a stance and be transparent about it. Most outlets like to think they do the first when reporting, but in reality they’re doing some form of the second method with muddled transparency.
When news outlets endorse a candidate, it serves as a spotlight for where interests and allegiances lie. For those looking to consume information from outlets on opposite ends of the spectrum, these signals help. Media bias is real, and while reporting should always be based on facts, readers should always be aware of how perspectives and preferences can vary greatly in relation to what gets reported and by whom. Thomas Sowell aptly advises that “If people in the media cannot decide whether they are in the business of reporting news or manufacturing propaganda, it is all the more important that the public understand that difference, and choose their news sources accordingly.”
The Washington Post’s readers had an expectation for an endorsement but instead found themselves facing cognitive dissonance over the paper’s position, and some subscribers as well as employees made their jaded feelings known. Even if one argues that Bezos made the right move, it undoubtedly should have been done further out from Election Day. Indeed, the rapport a newspaper has with its readers relies on communication being both timely and relevant, in addition to being true. And the timing and tone of Bezos’s op-ed clearly rattled the relationship status it had with many who will no longer refer to the Washington Post as a trusted source.
Overall, the news sector must come to terms with the fact that confidence in the media is at an all-time low and while regaining trust will be an uphill battle, it is one that must be fought. Americans have access to more information than ever before, but it seems we are far from being truly informed. In his book Who Governs?Robert Dahl notes that an informed and engaged electorate is ideal, but reality often reveals constituents to be a far cry from policy experts and apathy to be commonplace. It is for these reasons that the media matters—the media can (and should) help to educate and energize the electorate.
The press has an instrumental role to play in the political realm; it is referred to as the fourth branch of government for a reason. If the fourth branch fails to live up to its role, we will all be worse off for it. As Oscar Wilde quipped, “In America, the president reigns for four years, and journalism governs forever and ever.” The American media mustn’t shirk from its role, and the American people are right in wanting more from it. We may not trust the news, but my God, do we need it.
- About the author: Dr. Kimberlee Josephson is an Associate Professor of Business at Lebanon Valley College in Annville, Pennsylvania, and a Research Fellow for the Consumer Choice Center.
- Source: This article was published by FEE
