Quotes About Reporting

The type of journalism that relies on the reporter's notion of what does or doesn't "seem" correct or controversial is self-indulgent and irresponsible. It gives credence to the belief that we can intuit our way through all the various decisions we need to make in our lives and it validates the notion that our feelings are a more reliable barometer of reality than the facts.

The newspaper of today far too often rush into print with stories that are essentially little more than tips, or hints of something toxic or criminal. For lack of time, money or skilled staff, we are besiege with "he said, she said".

The saddest thing I came to understand in researching and reporting this book is that so many of our behaviors draw us into them not because they bring joy but because they promise to quiet anxiety. But the most heartening thing was the realization that the ability of compulsive behaviors to quiet anxieties great and small is one of the greatest gifts our brains can give us.

Spin is everything. An ethical reporter tries to present all sides of a given issue equally, to give a balanced presentation on which readers can then base their conclusions. A reporter who takes sides—a reporter who manipulates the reader—who lets her own convictions shape the story… That person is no reporter at all, and ought, in fairness to the readers she has misinformed and misled, put down her Bic and her pad and never report again.

I know of no human being who has a better time than an eager and energetic young reporter.

On an average day 7 minutes of news happens. Yet there are currently three full-time, 24-hour news networks.

The general policy of the press had been stated by a famous editor five years ago. "There are no objective facts," he had said. "Every report on facts is only somebody's opinion. It is, therefore, useless to write about facts." A

There are no objective facts," he had said. "Every report on facts is only somebody's opinion. It is, therefore, useless to write about facts.

Bitter words normally evaporate with the moisture of breath, after a quarrel. In order to become permanent, they require transcribers, reporters, complicit black hearts.

No reporter worth his buttons will let the facts intrude on a good story.

Paralyzed with fear and overwhelmed with trembling, at that very hour I ordered the things done by all of them to be recorded, and have reported them to your Majesty.

We see this repeatedly in the news. We get neat little packaged reports – even on complex issues. We're told who the bad guys are, who the good guys are, who the victims are, who the perpetrators are.

Journalists assigned to an issue often cover the coverage, creating the notorious media echo chamber.

We never see a journalist saying to the camera, "I'm reporting live from a country where a war has not broken out"—or a city that has not been bombed, or a school that has not been shot up. As long as bad things have not vanished from the face of the earth, there will always be enough incidents to fill the news, especially when billions of smartphones turn most of the world's population into crime reporters and war correspondents.

The peace researcher John Galtung pointed out that if a newspaper came out once every fifty years, it would not report half a century of celebrity gossip and political scandals. It would report momentous global changes such as the increase in life expectancy.

Outrages cannot become public without media coverage.

If you ignore all the years in which an indicator of some problem declines, and report every uptick (since, after all, it's "news"), readers will come away with the impression that life is getting worse and worse even as it gets better and better. In the first six months of 2016 the New York Times pulled this trick three times, with figures for suicide, longevity, and automobile fatalities.

Newspapers should have no friends.

He sends scouts ahead when he goes on patrol. He's set a permanent guard at the camp entrance. He's enforcing every rule. Half the Clan is on punishment duty for breaking one code or another." He glanced over his shoulder. "Everyone's scared they'll be reported. The warriors are so tense they hardly speak to one another, and the apprentices act like they're walking on quails' eggs.

Some day I'd like to cover a war in a country as ugly as war itself.

Everything you read in newspapers is absolutely true, except for that rare story of which you happen to have first-hand knowledge.

I became a journalist partly so that I wouldn't ever have to rely on the press for my information.

I pride myself on having a journalistic remove.

The business of funding digging journalists is important to encourage. It cannot be replaced by bloggers who don't have access to politicians, who don't have easy access to official documents, who aren't able to buttonhole people in power.