On "fake news", ivory towers and fear of the unknown
Author's Note: I know. I know. Another thinkpiece from another haughty journalist naïvely and futilely defending his chosen profession. It's the worst. But I promise I'll try to take a different tact.
At 8:05 a.m. on January 31, 2007, the city of Boston was plunged into a panic. A passenger riding the train spotted what appeared to be an improvised explosive device near a train station. Five hours later, another was spotted. In sum, more than 35 devices had been placed around the greater Boston area.
Police and bomb squad were scrambled to the locations, shutting down transit and closing bridges. The small panels appeared to have their own power source, exacerbating the fear that the devices could be detonated wirelessly. Authorities were eventually able to destroy the IEDs safely and return the city to normal, but for several hours, the 23rd largest city in America was paralyzed by a threat from a diabolical terrorist organization that few Americans had ever heard of: The Mooninites.
Like most terrorist organizations, the Mooninites have an undying devotion to their homeland: the moon. Their leaders, Ignignokt and Err, have launched frequent attacks on citizens of the United States. It's probably important to note that the Mooninites are cartoon characters.
The devices, depicting the two-dimensional villains from the Cartoon Network show Aqua Teen Hunger Force, were LED displays — essentially Lite Brites — not explosives. They were part of a guerrilla marketing campaign to promote the upcoming season of the cult adult animated series.
It's funny now, a decade after the incident, but the Great Mooninite Panic of 2007 (which you can read more about in this piece from The Boston Phoenix's Barry Thompson) speaks to an indisputable truth about humans: when we do not know something, our first reaction is to fear it.
Perhaps you've heard that the President of the United States isn't too fond of journalists. He's famously referred to them as "fake news" and his battle with the press corps reached a new apex recently when he declared the media "the enemy of the American People."
This isn't new, of course, for the President or for his party. American conservatives have long decried "the mainstream media" as inherently biased and untrustworthy, claiming that the press is more interested in pursuing its agenda than reporting accurately.
(A side note: One thing I've always found bizarre is the labeling of "the media" as monolithic, as if all journalists get together and discuss things. Do people not understand that most media are competing with one another?)
This steady drumbeat of alleged media bias has helped to deteriorate the relationship between journalists and the citizenry. A recent Gallup poll found that just 32% of Americans say they have at least a "fair amount" of trust in mass media; that same poll was 72% back in 1976.
So Americans do not trust journalists. And in some respects, that's a good thing; skepticism — and maybe even cynicism — can be a positive. But the President and his party's attitude of the media goes far beyond that healthy skepticism and into full-on vilification.
And it's working. Why? I believe it is, in part, for the same reason Boston feared the Mooninites.
For decades, many journalists existed in a sort of ivory tower, dispensing their wisdom and information from on high to the masses. Simply by having your name in print, you were somehow above the audience you served. As a result, a distance between communicator and audience was established.
Let's put it this way: of the 68 percent of people who do not trust mass media, how many do you think have ever met a journalist? I'd bet the answer is "not many."
And that's the key: if we fear what we do not know, then it is understandable that the public fears journalists.
As media has morphed, accessibility is more important than ever. With increased competition in the information marketplace — from a proliferation of "traditional" media outlets to social media's ability to turn anyone into an on-the-scene reporter — that ivory tower mentality must crumble in order to build trust. Journalists must go to their audience, introduce themselves, be available and accessible.
Because in the end, journalists are just people with a job. Some are better at their job than others. Some have more integrity than others. But they're just people with a job.
I truly believe that if more people knew journalists, more people would trust journalists. Until then, we'll be as foreign and scary as Ignignokt and Err.