Jay Rosen has written another of his insightful pieces on the state of modern journalism, today finding the connections between J-School reform and the press mythology of Watergate (Deep Throat, J-School and Newsroom Religion). Read the whole thing, but the following passage was particularly striking to me:

In his excellent book, Watergate and American Memory (1992, Basic) Michael Schudson distinguishes between the scandal, which didn't change the world very much, and the myth of Watergate in journalism. It did change journalism by giving the warrant of history (and the mandate of heaven) to the adversarial press and the Fourth Estate model, where the press is an essential check on government, a modern addition to the balance of powers.

In many ways, this gets to the heart of the problems with the ways that the mass institutional press views itself. The picture the mass institutional press has of itself is that of the Fourth Estate, another branch of the governing structure, albeit unelected. They are adversarial because they seek to check and balance the other powers, which, presumably, do not represent the interests of the people. The mass institutional press has arrogated unto itself the voice of the absent people.

Much of this comes, I think, from a fundamental misunderstanding of "freedom of speech, or of the press".

Let me make this clear:

The interests and purposes of the First Amendment are not identical with the interests and purposes of the mass institutional press. For the purposes of the First Amendment, the mass institutional press is sometimes a means, not an end.

Freedom of speech and of the press is the principle; the mass institutional press is merely one expression of this principle and, as we are learning, is a historically contingent and flawed one at that. The error has come in thinking that the mass institutional press is the only possible means for expressing this principle, and that what the mass institutional press expresses is also an expression of this principle.

This wouldn't be so bad, if the mass institutional press hadn't gotten the underlying principle so darn wrong.

Deans of Journalism, scribble a note: Investigative reporting, exposing public corruption, and carrying the mantle of the downtrodden were taught to McGrath not as political acts in themselves--which they are--and not as a continuation of the progressive movement of the 1920s, in which the cleansing light of publicity was a weapon of reform--which they are--but just as a way of being idealistic, a non-political truthteller in the job of journalist. (Which is bunk.) [emphasis in original]

These two means are expressions of the interests and purposes of the First Amendment, though I would not emphasize that the cleansing light of publicity is not only part of the progressive movement of the 1920s. Political is not synonymous with partisan.

There are other purposes of free speech, but clearly, one of the most important is that of persuasion in service to what we can know of truth. This is inevitably, if not definitionally political. However, the mass institutional press eschews persuasion for a recitation of facts and "he said, she said," in order to avoid persusasion and, thus they think, politics. But gathering and organizing facts is still a persuasive and political act. It is fairly explicit when exposing public corruption. And it exists even in "he said, she said" reporting when it gives one implausible argument greater weight through equal stature with the superior argument. This is particularly insidious in its effects upon the journalists themselves, who seek only arguments on both sides of an issue, rather than the persuasive arguments, and may thus eventually become blind to the difference.

The biggest blindness was, of course, to the reality that fact-gathering and reporting are inevitably political. And, thus,

This kind of instruction is guaranteed to leave future journalists baffled by the culture wars, and in fact the press has been baffled to find that it has political opponents. Well, jeez louise, so did the progressives of the 1920s! As far as the religion knows, none of this is happening. And J-schools--by passing the faith along but making little room for non-believers--are part of the problem.

And so, at least partly, the mass institutional press comes to its present crisis. And what is the solution?

But maybe it should be crashed. Maybe what we need is not funding for a new church, but a breakaway church, or two, or three of them. (And what is Fox News Channel, but that?)

Well, actually, Fox News is a bunch of recreants. They still worship in the church of objectivity, but that is only lip service.

But why new churches? Tear down the church and let a diversity of schools of thought bloom.

UPDATE 2300 PT

Jay Rosen has updated the paragraph I cited above. Here is the new version:

In his excellent book, Watergate and American Memory (1992, Basic) Michael Schudson distinguishes between the scandal, which didn't change the world very much, and the myth of Watergate in journalism. By giving the warrant of history, and the mandate of heaven, to the adversarial press, and the Fourth Estate model (where the press is an essential check on government, a modern addition to the balance of powers); by telling each new crop of journalists how to be heroes and how do good; by glamorizing the underworld of confidential sources, the mythos of Watergate had very definite effects in journalism.