The Production of Innocence

Speaking as I was (or will, if you haven't read that far yet) of Jay Rosen and PressThink, he has a great look at the media's fascination with the developing media war over the next Supreme Court appointment. It's not about the story, so much, as what he terms, the production of innocence, a purely journalistic conceit.

By the production of innocence I mean ways of reporting the news that try to advertise or "prove" to us that the press is neutral in its descriptions, a non-partisan presenter of facts, a non-factor and non-actor in events. Innocence means reporters are recorders, without stake or interest in the matter at hand.

This basic message--innocent because uninvolved--isn't something said once, in a professional code of conduct. It has to be said many many times a day in the very course of writing and reporting the news. The genre known as He said, she said is perhaps the most familiar example. The production of innocence is one reason you make that phone call and "get the other side" before you run with a damaging story.

The truth and its damages may in certain settings have two sides; and you may, if you're very lucky, "get" the other one by making that obligatory call, but most of the time what results from appying this newsroom rule is not a truth with all necessary sides, but a particular claim of innocence that means a lot to journalists: good, we got the other side. We are being just. And this of course is way better than not making the call.

In the alchemy of these things (they are very akin to magical thinking) "We called you for your reaction" is supposed to prove: We're not on anyone's side, see? And my point is that along with the production of a truthful, honest and compelling report, the reporters I have quoted here are continuously engaged in another ritual: advertising their own innocence, which is necessary if people are going to accept the final product as news cured of views.