By: Brittany Lancaster
Seek truth and report it. Minimize
harm. Act independently. Be accountable. This code of ethics is inscribed in
the back of the head of every demographic of a journalist, whether he be retired
or inspired. Objectivity is to reporting as marking your territory is to dog-hood.
Remaining unbiased gets tricky when the
dynamics of a story cross over from reporting the news to features, profiles
and the like. It seems to be that as
writers we wear a different mask as we move from one story to the next. We are
taught to simply report the news, and then to portray our voice, this is not to
be confused with our opinion. However,
if a writer is to cross over to column writing the rules are flopped. The ironical thing is that the business of
writing is subjective in nature. From the writer to the reader to yet another
reader a piece may be perceived differently by each party. Indifference on a topic proves to be the simplest
means to write objectively. Even still
with causes I support or where my opinion is strong I can still remember my
journalistic duty and keep the subjectivity out of my writing. The former, however, proves to be more
difficult for me to report on, something that I find so intrinsically wrong,
where my opinion is strongly against, it’s not that I can’t be objective, but I
can’t produce anything at all. It’s like a writer’s block for things I loathe.
No comments:
Post a Comment