Does Bad Money Drive out the Good?
By Kasheba Creary
Journalism as a whole, essentially, must be driven by some force with money so we can get paid for what we do, want to continue spreading public knowledge and the delivering of the news in our daily sphere. What would we do without advertising or money?
How would we learn more about laws and cases going on within politics that would affect us if no one was there to do the job? Many countries are struggling to have a democratic press and this stems from the fact that journalism is profit driven. According to Robert McChesney, an American professor, “How society can construct a medium system that will generate something approximating democratic journalism is a fundamental problem.”
It may be a hard pill to swallow, something very disturbing and at times may have journalist questioning their morals against getting your job done and feeding your family as opposed to feeding the minds of any particular reader anywhere in the world with good honest public interest.
Everything is a game out here and fair game. Almost like who is the highest bidder. During the Progressive Era changes in the US media and power were in fewer chains and money became the motive.
According to McChesney, “It made sense for media owners to grant autonomy to journalists because it gave their product more credibility and worked to enhance their commercial purposes.”
By all means, journalism became intertwined with business because it was actually needed to spread the competition and power and help Journalism become a profession in which I’m currently in school for. Journalism essentially being the watchdogs of the powerful to ferret put truth must be funded to go after anyone who is rich or politically tied.
In an article entitled 76 Ways to make money in digital media, on Slate.com, author David Plotz tells us “journalism hasn't changed that much — blah blah social media, blah blah interactives, blah blah long-form — but what had changed is the money. There didn't use to be any. Now there is a lot.”
He goes on to state the many ways of journalism and how they can be profited. This statement and his research put a smile on my face, giving me the feeling of hope in my career in journalism and to become a news anchor.
