Journalism in the Dark Ages: The Real Problems Happening in Newsrooms across the United States
By: Maggie Hawkins
Tags: Journalism, Wealth Inequality, Media Criticism, Capitalism, Local News

Journalists are in a crisis. Corporations are making decisions over their heads for the sake of money. Your journalists are stretching a dime and some are barely living above the poverty line, if that.

Nexstar CEO Peter Sook isn’t a leader who really cares about his employees. These CEOS are looking for ways to maximize their pockets, to give to the higher ups, and to slash jobs and minimize what’s happening in the stations. They’re big on trickle down economics — they’re pro Reagan. Producers are left trying to make newscasts out of rocks and sticks. Reporters and MMJs are often sent to places without photographers reducing the quality of their videos and also risking their safety. Crazy people are often attracted to journalists and want to make a scene — and sometimes they get violent or do something bold. Reporters often have to beg managers not to send them to certain places because they feel unsafe. Don’t expect PTSD counseling.

I literally had a news director brag about how safe things were during a large-scale protest in our city. He wrote in an email to staff that said the coverage was great and even better no one got hurt. Except you know, someone got shot with a rubber bullet in his leg and others got tear gas in their eyes — something that’s considered a war crime. I hope to fire those that got hurt sued the company. There is so much toxic shit thrown at journalists from their own managers. This same manager mansplained pregnancy to me because his wife had 4 children.

There is so much push to make things local that sometimes people don’t know what really matters. I got yelled at for NOT putting in a story about pool openings during the pandemic. That was information that someone who actually cares about that could go and find online. Just because it’s local doesn’t mean it matters.

Priorities get scrambled. Any newscasts this year that didn’t have the pandemic mentioned in some way were clearly missing something major. The pandemic is so embedded in the zeitgeist that it’s touching everything — but some managers think we should stop talking about the pandemic because it’s scaring stock holders. (I mean, this was the bad manager I had.)

I was actually told to stop reporting on the virus numbers. Stop talking about the sickness, even though it’s why we’ve all changed our lives. It’s why some people can’t see their parents in nursing homes, it’s why millions don’t have a job, and it’s why 300,000 Americans will likely die within the next couple of months.

Several years before the pandemic, I interviewed for a station in Louisville, Kentucky. One of the strangest things that came up during my interview was that they always make sure not to offend their base. It’s strongly suggested to keep news positive when discussing the GOP. This manager didn’t want to offend people and have them stop watching news because the Republicans were disparaged. That’s not fair, that’s not balanced, and ultimately when you cater to people like that then you stop telling them important things. You’ve effectively covered up reality.

Not covering negative aspects of political parties is essentially putting your fingers in your ears and making nonsense noises to act like you’re washing yourself clean of it. You have to report on things that make people uncomfortable and upset them. Journalism isn’t about making friends.

You can’t have stations that marry political parties. No matter whether you live in a blue or red state; it is important to give the facts, to analyze what is happening, and to cover things from all sides — not just both sides, all sides. Two sources in any news story isn’t enough — that’s the bare minimum. The reason sources are slim in your news is because it’s cheaper that way and everything in journalism is as cheap as possible. Cheapness reigns supreme in your local news.

People in news stations have bachelor’s and master’s degrees, but many make less than they would flipping burgers. My first job was $11 an hour. A photog I dated made $8.50. That was in 2016.

You’re pumping out stories about abducted children, quadruple homicides, and scandals in the governor’s mansion. But that doesn’t mean you get paid well. Just because what you do is important doesn’t mean you can afford a house. It doesn’t mean you have a normal schedule. The people behind the scenes could be working at any hour of the day. You might clock in at midnight one day, the next 2:00pm, and maybe 5:00am another day. There are not enough people on staff to fill in for vacations, sickness, and army leave. One person could have to produce for any shift at any point. A pregnant anchor I knew had split shifts on the weekends. She would come in at 3:00am to do the morning news, go home for a nap, and then come back around 4:00pm to do the news for the night all the way to 11:00pm. If there were sports that night the last newscast could get pushed all the way to 1:00am.

You’ll develop unhealthy sleep routines, an extreme bruxism and dental bills, and an anxiety that makes your heart pound at 160 beats a minute at resting. This isn’t healthy adrenaline; it’s constant flight or fight in the newsroom because the conditions for the workers (even for frivolous new stories) are like constantly working with landmines.

The infrastructure for journalism is electric thin. It’s collapsing and instead of fighting for it, people are moving to other industries where they can get better pay, where they have better benefits, where they have more security, and they have a schedule that doesn’t turn them into a ghastly vampire.