Journalism, patriotism and man-bite-dog news

Last week, the Uganda Civil Aviation Authority (UCAA) wrote to protest an editorial in the Daily Monitor titled, “Streamline works at Entebbe airport” (September 7). The editorial was commenting on the previous day’s story, “Entebbe airport floods amid UPDF construction,” (Daily Monitor September 6).

UCAA was of the view that Daily Monitor had not only exaggerated a small “water incident” at the airport caused by blocked drains near an area under reconstruction, it also brought back old issues that were long resolved (or were not true) to discredit the airport facility. That while UCAA was thankful its comments were carried in the story, the timing of the story during an on-going aviation audit at Entebbe was unpatriotic as it could negatively influence the result of the audit by International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO). 

Daily Monitor editors were unapologetic, saying “As a media house, we have always aspired to stand for the truth and play a positive role in national development. Our exposés aim to illuminate areas for corrective actions/improvement, not to destroy… We’re hopeful UCAA will stay on top of the game and nothing compellingly newsworthy happens.” The matter is regarded resolved at this point by both parties, with UCAA and editors respectfully agreeing to disagree. It however threw up two interesting subjects worth exploration: journalism and patriotism on one hand, and news and truth on the other.

First, the former. Patriotism is generally defined as love for one’s country and loyalty/devotion towards it. Patriotic journalism, according to media scholar Michael Schudson, is “…journalists’ abandonment of the remote, neutral, and objective stance and instead their adoption of a solidary, emphatic manner towards their nation or ethnic group when reporting events”.

Patriotic journalism is most visible during times of war and conflict and its manifestations are well defined by media scholar, Tamar Liebes in her paper, “Our war/their war: Comparing the Intifadeh and the Gulf War on US and Israeli television”.

She says: “There are six ‘framing mechanisms’ that relate to the patriotic reporting of ‘our wars’: (1) Excising – not showing the other side of the conflict (the enemy); (2) Sanitising – avoiding showing blood, destruction, victims, etc.; (3) Equalising – not addressing the power inequality between ‘our’ forces and the enemy’s; (4) Personalising – portraying the humanity of the two sides asymmetrically; (5) Demonising – describing the enemy as demonic, evil, or not human; (6) Contextualising – minimising the broad context of the conflict and focusing on episodes within it.”

If you have been following the coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war on western media – BBC, CNN, Sky News, etc or conversely on RT, CGTN et al, you have seen classic patriotic journalism at play. Patriotic journalism is anathema with media “code of ethics” because it defeats key tenets of objectivity, accuracy, fairness and balance, and blocks free flow of information.

Second, to the news values of oddity and truth. Oddity is one of the most important news values and for eons, journalism has thrived on “man bite dog” stories. Truth/facts likewise is one of the pillars of defence and rationale for a news story. A pool of water in the departure lounge at Entebbe airport, hyperbolically referred to as a “flood”, is therefore an oddity, a fact and a truth. Journalists will defend to the hilt the right to publish this “important” story and wave their impartiality and objectivity in telling it. The audiences (and news subjects) that have seen pictures (motion and still) of floods in India, China or Mozambique will, on the other hand, wonder why a puddle of water in a room at an airport undergoing reconstruction takes up a whole page and an editorial.

These quotes from two media scholars perhaps come close to answering these questions:

Onora O’Neill: “Journalistic codes of ‘media ethics’ are formulated exclusively from the point of view of media professionals, not media audiences, and issues of media ethics are not generally thought of as the subject of legitimate intervention by members of the public”. (BBC Reith Lectures – 2002),

Gary Younge: “We choose whose stories are told, whom we go back to, and where these resources are deployed. And those choices are not objective. They are made on the basis of what stories we subjectively consider are worthy of being told at any given time.” (“Democratic Imbalance: Who Decides What’s News,” The James Cameron Memorial Lecture, City University in London, February 22, 2016).

In short, patriotism, news and truth are subjective.