4A • COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL • OCTOBER 24, 2018
O PINION
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Political/Election Letters:
Future of local journalism takes commitment —
of journalists and readers alike
By Caitlyn May
cmay@cgsentinel.com
T
here was an email going
around this weekend.
It came into a
newsroom in Portland from a
Southern Oregon militia man
who wrote:
"So this journalist named
Kashoggi gets set-up and
murdered by Saudi operatives
in Turkey and we’re supposed
to care? Don’t get me wrong,
murder is and always will be
wrong, illegal and a violation
of God’s laws, which means I
wouldn’t do it and most decent
Americans wouldn’t either. But
ask yourself this question: Are
you really sorry a ‘journalist’ is
dead?
I don’t care about this dead
journalist because journalists
don’t care about the truth, so
what good are they alive?”
Th e writer goes on to detail
a story that ran in the Mail
Tribune about a city council
candidate who used abusive
language in responding to
comments.
“And you know what?” he
writes, “If this guy completely
imploded and murdered all of
the Mail Tribune’s executive
staff , I wouldn’t approve of what
he did but I also wouldn’t shed a
tear, either. Th e truth is that most
murder victims have it coming.
It is a fact that most murder
victims know the person who
murdered them and they usually
did or didn’t do something that
just about assured their murder
… Th at is what has changed in
America; today if a journalist
is murdered, nobody outside
the radical left and the media is
really going to care. Frankly, the
media has lost its usefulness to
our society, so why would we ever
miss them?”
Last week was National
Newspaper Week and it was in
my every intention to write a
piece for this page espousing
the benefi ts of local news and
praising a country that would
weave such a right into its
founding documents.
But, my workload got a little
heavy and the day I usually set
aside for extra writing projects
— Saturday — was booked with
something else: Th e Society
of Professional Journalists
Conference.
More
than
50
local
journalists from Oregon and
Washington met at Lane
Community College for the
annual conference, where there
were panels on public records,
investigative reporting, rural
news and building diversity in
the newsroom.
I know that journalists get
it wrong sometimes. But I
honestly have never met a group
of professionals so fi ercely
dedicated to their jobs that
they’d sacrifi ce their Saturday to
to spend talking about how to
get it right.
I know the political landscape
has inexplicably tangled itself
into questions about the media’s
existence. It’s raised even the
most fundamental questions of
what our job means, when we’re
allowed to do it, how well we do
it and if we should be allowed to
do it at all.
It doesn’t extract from that
discussion the complicated
diff erences between what we
have always understood as the
press, and what we’re currently
defi ning as the media.
Our
political
division
has somehow leached into
our understanding of what
commentators are and how they
diff er from what journalists are.
It is within that confusion
that local journalists are paying
the price for the media machine
of corporate-held news driven
by metrics and ratings.
Branded “news” personalities
engage in propaganda far
removed from the tenants of
journalism, then cast local
journalists in the role of villain
for their audiences.
And so, here we are.
On Friday, the University
of North Carolina’s School of
Media and Journalism released
a study reporting that more than
1,300 communities had lost
their newspapers since 2004. Of
the 3,143 counties in the U.S.,
more than 2,000 are without a
daily newspaper; 1,449 have one
newspaper — a weekly or twice
weekly — and 171 counties have
no newspaper at all.
“Th e stakes are high,” the
researchers say in their report.
“Our sense of community and
our trust in democracy at all
levels suff er when journalism is
lost or diminished. In an age of
fake news and divisive politics,
the fate of communities across
the country — and of grassroots
democracy itself — is linked to
the vitality of local journalism.”
Th at premise, illustrated
by the email that landed in a
reporter’s inbox this weekend, is
no longer readily believed.
And that’s our fault.
As journalists, we’ve failed
to understand that we’ve
been allowed to educate the
electorate because the electorate
has allowed us to. We grew too
far away from the duty gift ed
to us in the Constitution in the
quest to brand ourselves and
increase our personal worth in
an industry that was crumbling
around us.
We threw around terms
like “media literacy” when we
really just meant we had failed
so hard at explaining to our
communities how we do our
jobs that our communities no
longer understood what we
were doing — or how.
We started buying into the
concept of “engagement” as if
it wasn’t something we were
supposed to be doing all along.
And when we got it wrong, we
stopped apologizing.
Because, sometimes, we do
get it wrong; everybody does.
Th e plumber installs the wrong
fi xture; the mailman delivers
packages to the wrong house
and waiters bring the wrong
food.
Journalism, like all of these
professions, is a profession of
service and our intentions, like
theirs, are good. And just as a
wrong fi xture or mail mix-up
wouldn’t warrant the murder of
a plumber or mailman, neither
should an error in a news story
carry the penalty of death for a
journalist.
So, while my intention had
been to write a sunny story
about the benefi ts of local news,
I’ll instead say this:
In rural Oregon, I always get
out of my car, one arm raised in
an open-handed wave, the other
clearly holding my notebook
when I stop at the end of a long,
dirt driveway and am greeted
by someone who may not know
why I'm there — a gun tucked at
their hip.
Once, a rifl e in their hand.
I've made appointments
with farmers in the middle of
nowhere; have taken tours of
towns in the passenger seat of of
a car owned by people I've just
met; followed demonstrators
into crowds, carnival workers
behind the curtains and
craft smen into the back of
welding and paint shops — all
to better tell their story.
It's become too easy and too
common for some to harass
journalists under the guise
of sticking it to the nebulous
concept of “the mainstream
media.” But for every story we
read, there’s a journalist on the
other side of it who followed
someone into war, to the back of
the shop, around town or onto a
submarine.
Or into a consulate.
Some of them, like Kim Wall
and Jamal Kashoggi, never
come home.
Admittedly, in rural Oregon
I've gotten it wrong a lot. But
the only way this continues to
work — the only way local news
doesn’t fall to the darkness of
things that once were — is if,
should we get it wrong, we’re
given the opportunity to make
it right. And that those mistakes
come with understanding:
An understanding on the part
of readers that we’re not acting
out of malice and we’re not
going to be perfect;
And an understanding on the
part of journalists that we must
be willing to sacrifi ce some
Saturdays to learn how to do it
better.
Because our communities
deserve it.
Bohemia Mining Days cele-
brates its 60th Diamond Jubi-
lee next summer and we want
the community’s help to make
it fun and meaningful.
Th e BMD board is now in
planning mode for the July 18-
20, 2019, event and wants com-
munity feedback on what spe-
cial events should be included.
For example, resurrecting
the Lemati Gang’s old west
shoot outs on Main Street is a
Send letters to:
nhickson@cgsentinel.com or cmay@cgsentinel.com
HOW TO CONTACT YOUR REPS
Oregon state
representatives
Oregon federal
representatives
• Sen. Floyd Prozanski
District 4 State Senator
PO Box 11511
Eugene, Ore. 97440
Phone: 541-342-2447
Email : sen.fl oydprozanski@
state.or.us
• Rep. Cedric Hayden
Republican District 7 State
Representative
900 Court St. NE
Salem, Ore. 97301
Phone: 503-986-1407
Website: www.leg.state.or.
us/hayden
Email: rep.cedrichayden@
state.or.us
• Rep. Peter DeFazio
(House of Representatives)
405 East 8th Ave.
#2030
Eugene, Ore. 97401
Email: defazio.house.gov/
contact/email-peter
Phone: 541-465-6732
• Sen. Ron Wyden
405 East 8th Ave., Suite 2020
Eugene, Ore. 97401
Email: wyden.senate.gov
Phone: (541) 431-0229
• Sen. Jeff Merkley
Email: merkley.senate.gov
Phone: 541-465-6750
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LETTERS
Ideas for BMD 60th
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frequent request from old tim-
ers who have fond memories of
them. If this is to happen, we
need a Lemati Gang Commit-
tee that will take this on as a
60th year only project.
Another idea is to start a
new tradition of Ore Cart Rac-
es (similar to Virginia City’s
annual outhouse races and
soapbox derby competitions)
between Slabtown and Lemati
families.
To do this we will also need
to have a planning committee.
Th e BMD board is under-
taking an oral history project
to host one or two videotaped
gatherings of former festival
organizers to share their mem-
ories of “the good ol’ days.”
Th e BMD board would love
to have a group photo of all the
past BMD presidents, too. Call
the BMD offi ce at 541-942-
5064 to be invited.
Th e BMD board wants to
build enthusiasm for next
year by scheduling some early
Slabtown vs. Lemati feud com-
petitions to help raise addi-
tional funds for producing the
Diamond Jubilee.
Anyone with other ideas or
a favorite memory to share can
do so on the BMD Facebook
page.
We’re looking forward to
sharing this rare celebratory
milestone with all the commu-
nity.
—Cindy Weeldreyer
BMD Festival Coordinator
(USP 133880)
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