This column was published in the Wilson Times Aug.
17, 2019.
The American public has
taken little notice of the collapse of a great American industry, one that
helped British colonists win the American Revolution and American families to
follow the battles of the Civil War, when nearly every family had someone — a
son, a brother, a father, a cousin, in jeopardy. This industry went on to
inform the American public about events in far-away battles of World War I and
World War II, as well as Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf and Iraq.
Newspapers, so important in
the minds of the Founding Fathers that they made freedom of the press a topic
of the First Amendment to the Constitution, have faced a crisis of loss of
revenue as advertising migrated from print to digital. Twenty years after the
“dot com” explosion, many newspapers now face extinction.
The New York Times earlier
this month published a thorough report on the terrible toll of disappearing
newspapers in locations as varied as large cities (New Orleans and Denver are
examples) to small towns such as Warrroad, Minn., where the weekly Pioneer
recently printed its last edition. At the University of North Carolina School
of Media and Journalism, Professor Penelope Muse Abernathy has published a
study on “news deserts” — places where there is no source of local news because
of the closing of small newspapers.
The impact of these news
deserts is important. Without a local news source, the outcome of the high
school football game goes unreported. The team’s conference standing is not
provided to local fans. The heroics of high school athletes go unrecorded. No
impartial reporter covers city council or county commissioner meetings. Local
government budgets are not examined in the way newspapers have examined them in
the past, living up to their “watchdog” role. Ignorance of local crimes could
lead to dangerous complacence when residents have no newspaper to report on
crime, criminals and courts. Without a local newspaper, fewer residents will
attend public hearings, concerts, plays and other events because they had not
heard about it. Local charities will have more difficulty keeping donors aware
of community needs without a newspaper to fill its role as town
crier/messenger.
In the last 15 years, the
New York Times reports, 2,100 local newspapers, comprising a fourth of all
newsrooms, have closed or merged with a competing paper. It’s not just the
newspapers that folded that are creating these news deserts. Some venerable,
usually family-owned, newspapers have been sold to investors, such as hedge
funds, with no experience in journalism and no interest in news. They see
little newspapers as overlooked, potential cash cows. By laying off most of the
news staff, consolidating printing and layout work and squeezing the financial
life out of these papers, the new owners sometimes succeed in turning a profit,
but readers still lose their community pride, connection to local events and
common interests.
The centuries-old
relationship between newspapers and the public has been threatened not only by
changing business strategies but also by changes in the minds of potential
subscribers. Fewer people read, and shortened attention spans trained by
television and social media limit in-depth reading. A 12-year-old quoted in the
New York Times story said, “most (potential readers) probably moved to social
media by now. Most kids don’t even pick up a newspaper in their life.”
The public is looking
elsewhere for information, but “elsewhere” has no assurance of truthfulness or
disinterest. Little of what appears on a Facebook feed or elsewhere on the
Internet has been vetted for truthfulness and accuracy, and mendacious
individuals and groups have used this lack of accountability to sow hatred,
violence, discontent and disinformation.
At the beginning of the
Great Recession, when the federal government was bailing out the auto industry,
banks and investment houses, I suggested the federal government should offer a
tax deduction to households that subscribe to a local newspaper, perhaps $50 to
$100 a year. Such a deduction, with no direct outlay by the government, could
have saved hundreds of newspapers, large and small, and given them a chance to
reconfigure their business model to get on sounder financial ground. No one
embraced my ploy, so newspapers continue to struggle and drown.
We have already begun to see
the long-term impact of the loss of newspapers. Public interest in elections
and government policies is waning. Simple knowledge about politics (Can you
name your state’s two senators? Who is your congressman? Your state’s
lieutenant governor?) is in sharp decline. Young people know nothing about
current legislation but know all about “American Idol” and “The Bachelorette.”
The Founding Fathers
guaranteed freedom of the press for a reason. Voters must have solid
information in order to make wise decisions in the voting booth. When that
information is unavailable, democracy fails.
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