In Pursuit of Elusive Objectivity
Re “Objectivity Is Highly Overrated,” Commentary, April 24: Victor Navasky contradicts the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who said we are all entitled to our opinions, but not our own facts. Navasky and historian Christopher Lasch to the contrary, information is both the foundation and byproduct of debate.
Debate must start from valid facts to serve a public purpose. Debate can then focus further search for fact. Without grounding in fact, opinion is simply noise that confuses the marketplace of ideas. A point of view underlies all reporting.
Still, there is a difference between expressing an opinion and reporting a set of facts; we know it when we see it. To say there is not enough objective journalism is not to be against opinion journalism. It is rather to ask that they be distinguished from one another, and to remember the primary duty of a free press: to make sure that facts get reported objectively as a basis for public opinion.
Supposed news stories in our major papers, the L.A. Times included, far too often mingle opining and reporting. When opinion becomes the news, the press fails in its duty.
The cacophony that passes for the bulk of news and opinion on television makes it pointless to judge which it is slighting more.
Fred S. Hoffman
Los Angeles
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Please assure me that Navasky is never going to publish a daily newspaper. Although there is a place for opinion journalism, the only place it belongs in a daily newspaper is in the editorial page or Op-Ed section. Moreover, there is a world of difference between opinion journalism and interpretive reporting, the latter helping readers to understand the significance of esoteric aspects of a news story -- without the writer’s opinion interfering. Alas, there is a woeful shortage of this kind of reporting today.
N. Richard Lewis
Los Angeles
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Nation publisher Navasky is critical of ABC News President David Westin’s call for more “objective journalism.” Although I agree with Navasky that vigorous public discourse is an essential element of successful democracy, I think he misses an important point. It is not the prevalence of opinion journalism that is disturbing, it is the blurring of the line between opinion and objective journalism that should have us all worried.
Without credible sources for objective information, public discourse and the opinion journalism that feeds it degenerates into propaganda wars, with each ideological faction spewing a respective set of contradictory “facts” that conveniently support one side or the other’s political religion. In this cynical game of winning ideological converts, objective journalism becomes an annoying afterthought. When lines get blurred between opinion and objective journalism, and there are no longer trustworthy clearinghouses for objective facts, the challenge for consumers of opinion is no longer judging who has the best arguments on their side but rather who is and isn’t building their arguments on credible facts. Sorting out fact from fiction is a full-time endeavor that journalists are supposed to get paid to do so the rest of us, who have other day jobs, can spend our precious spare time judging the merits of political arguments rather than playing investigative reporters.
Michael Tope
Tujunga
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I have no argument with Navasky’s praise of “opinion journalism.” Opinion journalism is very important, on the condition that it does not masquerade as the reporting of “facts.” The Los Angeles Times as well as the New York Times clearly distinguishes news and opinion. Unfortunately, many of the media’s news reports are informed by their own political bias. For example, I notice that CNN’s reporting of world events in Europe is subtly slanted when compared with its reporting of the same events in the U.S. Objectivity isn’t “highly overrated,” it’s just highly undervalued.
Lawrence R. Freedman
Los Angeles