發(fā)布時間： 2016年10月27日
Why do so many Americans distrust what they read in their newspapers? The American Society of Newspaper Editors is trying to answer this painful question. The organization is deep into a long self-analysis known as the journalism credibility project.
Sad to say, this project has turned out to be mostly low-level findings about factual errors and spelling and grammar mistakes, combined with lots of head-scratching puzzlement about what in the world those readers really want.
But the sources of distrust go way deeper. Most journalists learn to see the world through a set of standard templates (patterns) into which they plug each day's events. In other words, there is a conventional story line in the newsroom culture that provides a backbone and a ready-made narrative structure for otherwise confusing news.
There exists a social and cultural disconnect between journalists and their readers, which helps explain why the "standard templates" of the newsroom seem alien to many readers. In a recent survey, questionnaires were sent to reporters in five middle-size cities around the country, plus one large metropolitan area. Then residents in these communities were phoned at random and asked the same questions.
Replies show that compared with other Americans, journalists are more likely to live in upscale neighborhoods, have maids, own Mercedeses, and trade stocks, and they're less likely to go to church, do volunteer work, or put down roots in a community.
Reporters tend to be part of a broadly defined social and cultural elite, so their work tends to reflect the conventional values of this elite. The astonishing distrust of the news media isn't rooted in inaccuracy or poor reportorial skills but in the daily clash of world views between reporters and their readers.
This is an explosive situation for any industry, particularly a declining one. Here is a troubled business that keeps hiring employees whose attitudes vastly annoy the customers. Then it sponsors lots of symposiums and a credibility project dedicated to wondering why customers are annoyed and fleeing in large numbers. But it never seems to get around to noticing the cultural and class biases that so many former buyers are complaining about. If it did, it would open up its diversity program, now focused narrowly on race and gender, and look for reporters who differ broadly by outlook, values, education, and class.
全文翻譯
為什么那么多美國人不相信自己在報紙上所讀的東西？美國新聞編輯協(xié)會正試圖回答這個令人痛苦的問題。該組織正在深入開展一個名為“新聞可信度項目”的長期自我剖析工程。
遺憾的是，這次項目只獲得了一些膚淺的發(fā)現(xiàn)，諸如新聞報道中的事實錯誤，拼寫或語法錯誤，以及許多關于讀者到底想讀些什么這樣的令人撓頭的困惑。
但這種不信任有更深刻的根源。多數(shù)新聞記者都學會用一套標準的模式去看待世界，并把每天發(fā)生的事件套入這種模式。換言之，在新聞采編室文化中存在著一套慣常的寫作套路，為紛繁復雜的新聞報道提供了一個主干框架和一個現(xiàn)成的故事敘述結構。
新聞記者和讀者之間存在著社會和文化方面的脫節(jié)，這有助于解釋為什么新聞采編室的“標準模式”讓眾多讀者看上去很陌生的原因。在最近一次調查中，問卷被送到了全國五座中等城市及一座大都市的記者手中，然后隨機地給這些城市的居民打電話，詢問他們同樣的問題。
人們的回答表明，與其他美國人相比，新聞記者更有可能居住在高級社區(qū)，有女傭，有奔馳車，炒股，而去教堂，參加自愿服務，扎根某個社區(qū)的可能性卻很小。
記者們往往屬于廣義的社會文化精英的一個部分，因此他們的工作往往反映了這些精英傳統(tǒng)的價值觀。對新聞媒體的這種令人震驚的不信任的根源不在于報道失實或低下的報道技巧，而在于記者與讀者的世界觀每天都發(fā)生著碰撞。
這對任何一個工業(yè)產業(yè)來說都算是爆炸性的形勢，對于一個正在衰落的行業(yè)來說尤其如此。這是一個備受困擾的行業(yè)，偏偏不停雇用那些因為其態(tài)度而極大惹惱客戶的員工。然后它又出資組織許多研討會和可信度調查項目，去探究為什么顧客們發(fā)火了，為什么會有那么多顧客流失了。但它似乎從來就沒有時間去注意那么多老顧客所抱怨的文化和階級偏見。如果它能注意這個問題的話，就應該進一步開放其多樣化項目(這個項目現(xiàn)在還僅僅局限于不同種族和性別)，進一步尋找那些世界觀、價值觀、教育水平和社會階層各不相同的各種記者。
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