Ingredients of good Journalism

When we consume food, we check labels to see the ingredients and calories, we are even cognizant of various ways in which food companies navigate loopholes to get around certain toxic aspects of their products. However, as consumers of news, we rarely question if certain news coming out of established media houses stands the test of good journalistic practices. We take it at face value even if it breaks the bedrock of journalism. Just like the consumers of food items have had to learn the pitfalls of reading food labels and ingredients and taking them at face value, consumers of news items also have to be careful of their ingredients.

Most people are consumers of news items and not creators, as such, they may be ignorant of the pillars that hold up the profession. Ignorance may not be bliss in this instance.

There are a lot of authoritarian sources that point to different qualities that make up good journalistic practices, some of them cramming so much into the list that you come away stuffed with more than you can hold down. What it comes down to however are just three things,

Truthful

This is obviously the most important of the principles. The word has become too much of a cliche for its definition to be left open-ended, so let's see if we can make it air-tight. Truth has the following characteristics:

* Made up of verified facts

Just to make sure it does not deteriorate into your truth and my truth, these facts must be independently verifiable. This plugs that hole that is so abused by the news media that consumers have almost developed a blindness to it. We have all heard of "sources close to the matter", "some experts", "sources that do not wish to be named", "anonymous sources", "unnamed sources", "credible intelligence" etc. The list is exhaustive. If the source upon whose testimony or the intelligence upon which the facts are established cannot be made public, then what do the readers/listeners attribute the facts? The journalist's say-so? We can understand that there may be valid concerns due to which the sources must remain anonymous, but is that justification enough to open up an entirely new loophole that can be used to obfuscate the truth?

* The whole truth, in its entirety

A half-truth is a full lie, as the adage goes and it is very relevant here. Quoting a partial fact or a fact out of context can put a whole different spin on the "truth".

Independent

Most average readers can identify the political leanings of their favorite publication or journalist. In fact, that lean may be the very basis of why they read it in the first place. This is tainted journalism, where facts are coloured by inclinations of the journalists, editors, or indeed the owners of the publication.

Subscribing to this kind of one-string banjo may leave the audience open to living inside a bubble, leaving them oblivious to other facts or perspectives. The greater danger, however, is political or business lobbies hijacking the narrative to pastures of their choosing leaving the people unaware of the special interests shaping the reality on the ground.

Relevant

There are multiple events happening around the world at any given point in time and there are only a finite number of things that can be handled by the people who consume news. The question here is, what is relevant? What affects people more, a non-descript person in some corner of the world advocating alternative medicine to cure gout or a new breakthrough in medicine which significantly improves cancer treatment? Publications are the first line sifting through all the gunk to present people with that which has wide-reaching consequences. The more irrelevant issues they throw at the people, the more noise you hear about irrelevant things which don't really have a way of improving society.

Of course, it does take objectivity on the part of the consumer to be able to assess their favorite publications and make sure they are not being fed something that only masquerades as journalism

(just because you consume ravioli, does not mean you know the ingredients!).