Are journalists truth seekers or vultures feeding on tragedy?

The Grenfell residents are hardly alone in accusing the media of not serving their needs. It’s no secret that trust in the media has declined. file photo | nmg 

By JOHN LLYOD

Summary

• The Grenfell residents are hardly alone in accusing the media of not serving their needs. It’s no secret that trust in the media has declined.
• In the United States, trust in the media has risen from 33 per cent during last year’s election campaign to 38 per cent this year.
• That may be because, as the Reuters report notes, “concern about the spread of false news online” increased the perception of the value of professional journalism.

London’s Grenfell Tower fire victims aren’t furious just with local authorities for ignoring safety concerns raised before this month’s blaze killed at least 79 residents. They’re angry with journalists too.

As reporters covered the fire at the apartment block last week, some residents turned on Jon Snow of Channel Four News, the most senior of Britain’s news presenters, and accused journalists of being vultures attracted to death and tragedy.

“You didn’t come here when people were telling you that the building was unsafe!” one man told Snow. “That is not newsworthy. You come here when people die. Why?”

The Grenfell residents are hardly alone in accusing the media of not serving their needs. It’s no secret that trust in the media has declined. But the latest Reuters Institute Digital News Report provides sobering insights into how the digital revolution has disrupted the way we gather the information we believe we need to orient ourselves in the world, or in our neighbourhood.

The report shows that trust in the media varies from country to country, from over 60 per cent in the Scandinavian countries to the low 20s in Greece and South Korea.

In the United States, trust in the media has risen from 33 per cent during last year’s election campaign to 38 per cent this year.

That may be because, as the Reuters report notes, “concern about the spread of false news online” increased the perception of the value of professional journalism.

Most sobering is the report’s comment that “the economic outlook for most media companies remains extremely difficult.”

That statement doesn’t include the communications giants like Twitter, Facebook and Google, the latter two of which garner more than 80 per cent of the advertising that used to go to traditional media.

But two issues are likely larger. One is what Janine Gibson, the chief editor of Buzzfeed UK, calls “representation without judgment.”

It’s also becoming clearer that measurements of “trust” in the news media don’t really measure trust in the news media. They measure pleasure gained from the media. The Digital News Report says that there exists “a strong connection between trust in the media and perceived political bias.” That is, people trust the reports which flatter and further their views.

Now readers are empowered by technology, often aggressive in their distrust and disgust, to intervene in stories.

We still live in the first phase of a revolution, not just of journalism but also in the ways in which we seek and use information, and in what we place our trust. As printing disrupted the late medieval world, so the replacement of print by digits has disrupted the 21st century. It is presently calling into question the nature of truth, and the trust we can place in it.

Truth is hard to get right, especially at times of tragedies like that at Grenfell Tower. Finding and publishing it won’t always avoid anger directed at the messenger, but journalists need to show they are truth seekers rather than vultures feeding on tragedy.