How We Get the World We Deserve

The decline of the noble craft of journalism and the part in this we did and can yet play.

Close inspection, Unsplash | NEOM

In today’s media landscape, both news and social media platforms wield significant influence over the dissemination of information, often acting as selective filters that shape the facts and news presented to the public. This gatekeeping role places us, the consumers, in a precarious position: on one hand, we are subject to the agendas of these media entities, which can range from politically motivated biases to commercial interests. On the other hand, we as consumers share in the responsibility for this skewed information ecosystem. Our lack of discernment and our propensity to contribute, often thoughtlessly, to the overwhelm of online discourse exacerbates the issue. When it comes to news consumption, many of us are now caught in the gravity well of confirmation bias, seeking out and aligning with media that echo our preconceived notions, instead of pursuing a more balanced and comprehensive understanding of events. Alternatively, some choose the path of apathy, disengaging entirely from the news under the pretext of “avoiding negativity”. Both approaches—confirmation bias and apathy—serve to further entrench us in a cycle of misinformation and under-informed public discourse, undermining the foundation of a knowledgeable and engaged society.

This raises a crucial question: In a world where the lines between fact and agenda-driven narrative are increasingly blurred, how can we, as individuals, navigate this complex media landscape to reclaim the integrity of our information sources? And more importantly, what active role can we play in reshaping the future of journalism to ensure we get the world we deserve, rather than the one we inadvertently endorse through our choices and actions?

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Fossicking through the discord and strife in the world, to find some alluvial meaning, or trace elements of hope, and the common truth about their value and their sources, we have to kneel down, get close, and appreciate anew, the difference between muck, fool’s gold and gold.

Our social media is inundated with sensationalist news, boosted and curated deliberately to incite outrage, and as a society, we have normalised the habit of ejaculating our meaningless opinion onto everything.

Our news media have long since ceased being the vigilant guardians of public discourse, the Fourth Estate's foundational role. They have declined in virtue and value, increasingly favouring immediacy over investigation, and provocation over profundity, leaving the essential mission of informing the public with unbiased and thorough journalism in the balance. This decline has eroded the bedrock of trust and accountability that should underpin our information landscape.

And I say “our”, for deliberate effect—implying ownership, and some responsibility.

The Fourth Estate, (a term synonymous with journalism), serves as a foundational pillar of a democratic society by informing the public, acting as a watchdog against abuses of power or neglect of responsibility, providing a forum for debate, setting the public agenda, educating on diverse issues, and encouraging civic engagement. Through these roles, journalism wields the influence to shape public opinion and holds the powerful accountable, ensuring transparency and contributing to the health of society's democratic processes.

In the quest for truth and enlightenment, akin to panning for gold amid the debris, the Fourth Estate should be the discerning eye that separates valuable insights from the commonplace gravel of information. But they are not only failing to live up to this charge but have become guilty of agitating the sediment they ought to sift, clouding the clear stream of understanding they are meant to serve. This failure has led to a proliferation of the very confusion and chaos the Fourth Estate was intended to dispel.

The quality of our media landscape is a direct and telling reflection of our collective choices and the standards we allow and uphold in ourselves. By elevating those standards, both as consumers—and potential creators—of content, we are empowered to shape a more informed, empathetic, and truthful world.

Marshall McLuhan, a visionary media theorist, famously asserted that our creations, particularly in media, profoundly reshape our societal and individual norms and vice versa.

"We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us."

Marshall McLuhan

The current state of the news media is such that many journalists and news organisations are driven more by political correctness and commercial incentives than by journalistic integrity. The public was both victims of this and complicit, in accepting the declining standard and contributing actively albeit mindlessly to the problem in the orgy of opinion spray and insult exchange which social media has become.

This shift has negatively impacted the public, particularly those who do not critically evaluate the news they consume. As a result, public discourse has degraded into a hostile environment characterized by confrontational and sensationalist journalism. In our defence, it was not as if we knew what was happening while it happened, and were unaware of the nature of psychological capture and the destructive consequences of our behaviour while we were doing it. It might be understandable, but we actually cannot afford to play ignorant for much longer, the stakes are too high. When a society has this degree of mistrust in institutions, government, the media and each other, it creates the perfect conditions for “double-speak” and ultimately fascism.

According to Marshall McLuhan's theories, if readers start exercising greater discernment in their media consumption and demand higher standards from journalists and media companies, this trend could be reversed. In other words, just as a decline in media standards can lead to a deterioration in public discourse, an increase in critical engagement and demand for quality journalism can improve it.

There is a small merit to shock journalism, that being to short-circuit the insular perspective of the reader’s own province of belief or special interest that fails to consider broader contexts or differing viewpoints. But when everything is a shock, nothing is. We have hedonically adapted to the prevalence of shock headlines to the point where even if we are not dragged into the bilge of outrage and animus, we slide into the languid pools of apathy.

The following poem is a window onto the psychological practice of ‘a type of journalism’, an internal stance of accountability, courage, radical honesty, discernment and coherence that we are invited to practice, to tidy up our own distortions and drama. This is the only way in which we might make way for perspective and understanding. Our present moment in history, our mounting storm of troubles and our contribution to the story of humanity is defined less by the facts and details of conflict and suffering in the world, than by our inability to resolve the conflict we feel within.

A good poem is like a joke, if you have to explain it too much, some quality is diminished in the exchange, but like a good joke, if you don’t have the full context, something else is lost in the telling, so I lose nothing by lifting the veil.

That said, the line breaks in this poem are multivalent; which is to say that each line, within its context, suggests a specific meaning, while the complete sentence offers another, with both meanings interdependently influencing each other—if that’s your thing. For those who enjoy encountering “easter eggs” in games and meta-layers in art, the poem both describes and enacts the essence of journalism.

PRESS BRIEFING? THIS WAY.

Only the very clear
or the very bright
will get this, but
you might as well 
all hear it 
together.

I want to 
invite you to 
put your journalists' hat 
on.  

Writing 
to explain 
it to myself 
like this 
is how I 
process. 

Make sure 
you understand 
that. 

It allows me to 
put on my journalist's hat, and 
look 
closely at things 
the human heart wants 
to look away from, 
especially 
when we 
are in anguish or 
in grief.

We get to 
be vulnerable,
you know?
We get to 
be honest, 
without shame
—even how we are left,
to shame 
more by circumstance, 
than by sin or flaw.
You can see 
how it is
right?

It allows me to 
report honestly, 
not clinically, 
not in a reductionist way at all, 
but in that 
special way 
that journalists sport
that, which we may call 
the curiosity 
of a saint 
about the nature of 
a trouble 
or a joy.
Where they take 
a completely objective stance, 
to even 
the rawest livid aftermath and 
its most grievous need 
for compassion.

They do this 
even climbing 
through the broken window
—of their own, 
and others'—raw! and 
empathetic hearts. 

This 
allows 
them 
to create 
a report, 
the elements and essence of 
a human story, 
that can reach people. 

And so often, 
the best way to 
reach people 
when they are aggrieved 
or grieving, is 
via the heart.

Good journalism can 
convey truth in this way. 
It is so ironic that we 
should make careers named 
for this noble indifference, 
where the impostors 
are incapable of 
such courage and 
such an unsung 
quality of 
true leadership.

That’s it!

The hat
looks good on 
you.

This way,
We look forward 
to your contribution and 
we celebrate 
your devotion to 
this 
noble craft.

Rocco Jarman

So, this then, is the invitation for you today;

To either be that journalist at times yourself, when looking at the discord and strife in the world, and honouring, like the journalist must, the clean way of holding that messy line — between paying real attention, not letting your emotion cloud your perception and remembering clearly what you observe and recalling faithfully, the clamour of emotion, right down to the shoes it wore, that attempted to rush into the room and trample over the scene. To be both: the dispassionate eyes of the pathologist doing an autopsy on the body, not yet fully rigid, preparing to give the most clinical account—and the eulogist—the bearer of the ladle of emotion, stirring the deep pot of human feelings, to lift the settled bits from the bottom, and spoon a rich but ultimately digestible serving of the whole truth of the stew.

And for the rest, when the truth, gravity, and the scale of it all, lie far beyond your fair attempt to capture, then, you have to honour the standards of journalism from both sides of the pen. That means three things: the first, is committing to refrain from assumption and heated speculation until the autopsy is finalised, until all the facts are in. The second is to not judge the meal until you have tasted it, until you have made a concerted effort to chew through the tough bits, and given some time to properly digest it.

Lastly, and just as key, it must mean demanding better commitment to the standards of those who would hold the scalpel or the ladle. We have to demand better standards of ourselves when it comes to news how we receive it and how we interact with the poor expressions we find online, and a better standard in alignment with the true vocation of journalism than we have been getting from those who assume to wield the pen.

I want better for you, not from you.

We get what we allow. We are who we repeatedly choose to be. Until we, the people, demand better, from news media, from social media and both from and for ourselves, we will get the internet and ultimately the world we deserve.

Our Legacy, Still Possible - Unsplash | Josh Applegate