Fail

Dear Day of Commenting,

You were a great idea. In fact, you should become a holiday. A day dedicated to providing feedback, commenting, reacting and reacting to comments on feedback.

If you were a holiday, you would be like many other holidays in my life. Days that come, which I will probably have to work on anyway, and likely will ignore.

I wanted to give you the attention you needed, but it just wasn't going to happen.

Sincerely,

Bad Feedback Citizen

The call-in assignment...

Jean-Luc Cornec's sheep phones courtesy of temp13rec via Flickr and Creative Commons

Okay. The radio assignment.

I tried. I did try. I spent a good 45 minutes listening to the Thom Hartmann show on WHMP. I caught him with a guest who was talking about global economics and as interesting as the topic was I didn't really have anything to contribute. So I waited for a new guest. And on came some woman who had written a book about whiteness and race and I thought to myself, "okay, this I can handle. I will call and ask a question about those people who believe that racism is now over in America because we elected Obama over McCain." (In case you are wondering, I think that people who believe that are incredibly unaware of racial issues in America and the reductive ignorance of a statement like that pretty much terrifies me).

So I dialed. And I was expecting to be put on hold or to reach an automated "press one for live questions" menu. Instead, a woman answered the phone directly. And then my brain and mouth launched into a debate with each other. Uh, why am I doing this? What is the point of my call? Do I care more about getting a good grade on this assignment or about making a valuable contribution to this conversation?

Instead of asking her if I could go on the air, I asked her if the show was pre-recorded or live. (Honestly, I was curious). She said it was always live. I paused for a moment and considered my options. And then I thanked her and hung up the phone.

I will be the first to admit that there's a lot of irony to my reaction. I can elaborate on this more in class, but suffice it to say that I've got a long history with radio and spend a lot of my time preaching the greatness of it as a medium. And don't get me wrong, I still think radio is amazing. Radio is one of the best communication tools we have -- it is a one-time investment that can keep us connected to news and culture with no additional cost. But as I sat on the phone with the woman who answered my call I realized that the entire root of my motivation was this assignment. I didn't want to ask a question just for the sake of doing it. I was just going through the motions. And that sort of empty interaction is not going to elevate the discourse on anything. So I hung up.

I've decided to take this assignment in stride as a sort of conscientious objector. Now don't get me wrong, had I taken the time to consume talk radio non-stop for the past few weeks I am absolutely positive I could have found a discussion going on that I actually wanted to participate in. And for that, I recognize that the reason I was unable to really complete the assignment is partially based on poor time management. (In all honesty, my thesis is due in ten days and I work about 50 hours a week on top of taking this class…excuses, excuses, I know). But after going through the forced motions of the LTE assignment, I just couldn't bring myself to do it again.

So let me instead close by going into some detail about why I think elevating the discourse is important enough for me to refuse to complete the assignment. I considered calling in to a program that played music to sound off about the host’s choices. But as I pointed out in my last post, that is not journalism. That’s cultural critique, it’s opinion, but it’s not reporting. My opinion on whether the music is any good, or on the things one should consider before adopting a pet from the pound (another fabulous program running on AM talk radio this morning), or even me calling in to Rush’s show to tell him that I can’t stand him and feel he is a symbol for everything that is wrong with America today – none of it is journalism.

If we re-frame this class as one on the role of interactivity in an emerging digital media space and its impact on culture, politics, and democracy then I would have a completely different take on this entire thing. Because all of these elements, from LTEs to talk radio to restaurant reviews to Twitter are all impacting culture, politics, and democracy. But that doesn’t mean they are journalism. And framing it that way has me asking the following: at what point did the lines completely blur between reporting and commentary?

I’m the first to say that when dealing in definitions about journalists and journalism we are confronting an important issue that is both nuanced and complex. This whole landscape of “citizen journalism” (a term that is immensely problematic) directly challenges a lot of the established and accepted definitions of what defines a journalist.

But that’s exactly it. I don’t know if the definition of a journalist is necessarily as important as the definition of journalism.

Old formats spewing old stereotypes; remain closed for comments

Photo courtesy of Certified via Flickr and Creative Commons

Today’s edition of the media-mogul Rupert Murdoch owned New York Post featured a cartoon that has drawn extensive (and I would say deserved) criticism from the blogosphere for its portrayal of a monkey shot dead by police officers with the caption "They'll have to find someone else to write the stimulus bill." The cartoon has also been severely criticized by civil right leaders, such as the Rev. Al Sharpton.

The New York Post is standing behind the cartoon and its artist, Sean Delonas, claiming that it is was meant to imply that the stimulus bill recently signed into law by President Obama was shoddily composed and may has well have been written by a monkey. It also attempts to parody a violent pet chimpanzee that was shot dead by police officers in Stamford, CT on Monday. However, America's culture of slavery and certainly its connection to racist sentiments is not as far behind us as Post Editor-in-Chief Col Allan may believe.

Allan has issued a statement claiming that, ""The cartoon is a clear parody of a current news event, to wit the shooting of a violent chimpanzee in Connecticut. It broadly mocks Washington's efforts to revive the economy." Allan continues this verbal march of ignorance by stating that "again, Al Sharpton reveals himself as nothing more than a publicity opportunist."

Though it is possible that the artist's intentions were as Allan states and lacked a malicious intent, it remains a poor reflection on Delonas and Allan's poor education in American cultural history. This tactic of turning a blind eye towards a very recent past in which African Americans were compared to primates, presumed to lack the same intellectual abilities as whites, and were bought and sold as property seems at best an ignorant oversigh and at worse an outright racist act.

The Post cartoon itself and the Associated Press coverage remain closed for comment. Instead, users on news aggregation sites like Digg are reposting the story and commenting on these sites. A write-up on The Huffington Post reveals some 4078 comments on the story.