One of the common themes running across the short-lived but engaging TV series The Newsroom was a tense tussle between ‘old school journalism’ and ‘new journalism.’

Old school journalism exhibited patience and made sure that all the facts were in place before a story could be published or aired. New journalism is dominated by overly opinionated TV talk shows, the social media and that awfully populist thing called ‘citizen journalism.’

One can now safely claim that old school journalism is as good as dead. Even some of the oldest mainstream media outlets are struggling to stick to their own traditions. They too are now likely to get sucked in by the messy world of fake news and ‘propaganda wars’ that are constantly raging on social media and WhatsApp groups.

Whereas the star outlets of new journalism willingly plunge into this mess and even populate it with fake news, the more mainstream media is constantly fumbling to separate the fake from the real. There is just not enough time these days to check and counter-check stories in a reality in which ‘news’ is always ‘breaking’ and ‘scoops’ are a dime a dozen. The slow and the steady does not win the race anymore. It is the fast and the furious (and often fraudulent) that does.

The unverified report that Hamas “beheaded children” in Israel is a classic example of how new journalism is obsessed with cynically creating moral panics

New journalism happily undermines the whole idea of neutrality. It sees it as a relic of a bygone, ‘elitist’ past. It romanticises subjectivity, hyperbole, jingoism and sees no need for journalists to even slightly mask their personal biases.

Recently, when some scions of new journalism began to proliferate the ‘news’ with claims that “Hamas men had beheaded babies”, this ‘story’ was not just picked up by the tabloids but by some mainstream American and Indian journalists as well.

However, it didn’t take long for the claim to be debunked. Credibility to the tabloids never meant anything. They would happily report an alien invasion from Uranus if it served a financial or political purpose. But to maintain some semblance of credibility, the mainstream media outlets that ran the ‘story’ had to confess that they had erred. 

There is nothing new about media outlets endorsing a political ideology. This was present in old school journalism as well. However, the endorsements were restricted to editorials. They did not impact the placement of news, even if that news went against the endorsed ideology. 

Fox News was one of the pioneers of new (electronic) journalism. It migrated tabloid journalism to mainstream journalism. It began reporting political ‘news’ as a tabloid would an alien invasion from Uranus. Being openly right-wing, its endorsed ideology spilled over into all of its content. Fox News manufactures moral panics. It then follows this up with equally manufactured content that neutralises the feeling of dread created by the panic. 

So, in the end, Fox News viewers are always made to feel good. However, during the 2020 US presidential election, when Fox managed to bag enough evidence about Donald Trump’s possible defeat in an important ‘swing state’, the network wasn’t sure whether to report it, unless it wanted to offend its large pro-Trump viewership. 

But, surprisingly, old school journalist instincts kicked in and Fox announced that Trump would lose the state. The network’s anchors and viewers flew into a rage. The call was correct, though. Trump did lose the state. But instead of appreciating those who had made the call, Fox went into damage control mode to secure its disappointed viewers. It quietly fired the two news executives who were responsible for making the call. 

One subject which sees old school and new journalisms converge in the West is Israel. Old school journalism always avoided explaining whose violence was justified and whose was not. But when it comes to Israel, both old and new journalisms in the West are quick to point out victims and villains, or define justified and unjustified violence. 

Many Western journalists working for or writing for mainstream media outlets are conscious of this. In the April 28, 2022 issue of The Washington Post, Laura Albast and Cat Knarr wrote, “Newsrooms cannot pick and choose which state-sanctioned violence is legitimate. They must make an effort to report the actions of the Israeli military and Israeli settlers in the same way that abuses in Ukraine and other countries are covered.” 

In 2021, more than 500 journalists put their signature on a letter calling out “harmful malpractice in US media coverage of Palestine.” According to Albast and Knarr, “the outcry was not heard and biassed coverage continues to be the norm.”

European and American media is compelled to portray Israel as a besieged state retaliating against Islamist terrorists. But this is really a post-Cold War narrative. During the Cold War, Israel’s enemy was not the Islamist but secular and left-leaning Palestinian outfits such as the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). Western media relished in demonising it.  What’s more, there is now enough evidence to suggest that Islamist outfits were actually bolstered by the US and Israel to neutralise the PLO. 

This is why the Western media’s coverage of the Palestine-Israel issue is largely ahistorical. It lacks context. A majority of people in the Muslim world exhibit outrage when Israel bombs places such as Gaza. But this in no way means that they support Islamist militants. How can they, when it is Muslims who have suffered the largest number of casualties in terror attacks by Islamist militant organisations, many of which evolved from outfits that were manufactured by Western powers to counter the Soviet Union.

The wider Muslim outrage is thus a contextualised response, which emerges from a historical understanding of the so-called ‘Palestinian question.’ In 2022, the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalists Association explained this context. It stated, “Palestinians are subjected to an unjust and unequal system, which has been documented as apartheid by international organisations.” 

Now, returning to the “beheaded babies.” In 1963, the late Walter Cronkite, a prominent example of classic old school journalism, allowed himself to shed some very quiet tears and some silence while announcing the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Instead of spiralling into a rage or spewing conspiracy theories, and without the word ‘breaking’ attacking him from all sides of the TV screen, he gave viewers time to absorb the shock. He had refused to announce the death until he was absolutely sure that Kennedy had died. 

One can’t expect this nature of journalism anymore anywhere. New journalism is more about cynically creating moral panics, despite the fact that moral panics are almost always shaped by outlandish exaggerations or even outright fibs. The story about beheaded babies was exactly that.

Published in Dawn, EOS, October 22nd, 2023