Can a council promoting fairness be fair itself?

A news council's mission is to promote fairness, accuracy and balance within the media. More so, it's to encourage punishments for members of the media that don't abide by these journalistic guidelines.

But where the problem comes in is that the council is simply a collection of people, a collection consisting of former members of the media as well as the general public. Can this group of people really decide if another person has been fair and accurate in describing some event without the group having experienced the event itself? No person, or group of people, can truly be objective him or herself. So how is one person to decide if another has done its job objectively?

Debates last for hours deciding which TV stations or newspapers are more balanced and accurate than others. Yet by implementing a council, we would be suggesting that objectivity (or lack thereof) is fact. It's far from it. Without going through a reporter's notes, I can't assume whom that reporter talked to, which opinions that reporter included/excluded. I can't assume how accurate his or her story is comparison to the events that actually took place without having been there myself.

It's something I mentioned in class, but I think it serves as the best example. NBA All-Star weekend in Las Vegas last month brought back mixed reviews from sports columnists. Vegas was an important site for the NBA All-Star festivities, as the city is trying to get an NBA team some time in the future. It was crucial for the city to provide a positive outlook and prove it was worthy of an NBA franchise. Following the even, many columnists wrote about how great the city was and what a great time they had visiting it.

But Kansas City Star columnist Jason Whitlock, writing for AOL sports for this particular issue, took another angle (http://sports.aol.com/whitlock/_a/mayhem-main-event-at-nba-all-star/20070220103009990001). He focused on the "mayhem" of the weekend in Vegas, pointing out the high number of crimes that took place. Included are events of gang violence, fights, robberies, a shooting and of course, the Pacman Jones incident at a local strip club. Whitlock, for describing what he calls a "unmitigated failure," gets chastised by his fellow sports columnists.

Columbia Journalism Review writer Dan Goldberg was very critical of Whitlock's column, as was ESPN Page 2 writer Scoop Jackson (who Whitlock has been critical of in the past). While Jackson's article, "What really happened in Vegas?" (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=jackson/070228) does not mention Whitlock by name, it is a direct refute of his column for AOL Sports. Blogs across the country also bashed Whitlock for putting All-Star weekend in a bad light. Very few defended Whitlock, until Bill Simmons, who like Jackson is a writer for ESPN Page 2, did so in a Vegas follow-up (http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/page2/blog/entry?id=2784283&searchName=simmons&action=login&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fespn%2fpage2%2fblog%2fentry%3fid%3d2784283%26searchName%3dsimmons).

I can't help but wonder how the news council would view this situation. With most people speaking out against Whitlock's analysis of the events of NBA All-Star weekend, it would seem as if he was in the wrong, as if most of the information was inaccurate, unfair or unbalanced. CJR's criticism focuses more on Whitlock's lack of sourcing (despite the fact he was in Vegas to actually witness the event himself). By the news council's definition of its mission, Whitlock would deserve some sort of punishment. In a round-about way, Jackson goes as far as to claim that Whitlock's accounts are unbalanced and biased, saying the issue is about race and little else.

Judging by other sports columnists’ reactions (as well as many blogs), it would seem as if Whitlock’s views of the event were in the minority. Sure, one has to allow for the possibility that his information and account might have in fact been misleading.

But at the same time, you must allow for the possibility that Whitlock was the one writer who had the guts to tell what really happened over the weekend. He didn’t follow suit and talk about
how great Vegas was for the sake of promoting the NBA. And what if his version of the event was the most accurate? I have a hard time believing that a news council would believe his version over all else with other writers claiming his article was biased and inaccurate (exactly what the council would be trying to get rid of). In this case, they would encourage punishment for Whitlock. And punishing the writer who had the guts to speak up isn’t what journalism is about.

I’m afraid that by establishing a news council and maybe even allowing it the power to punish writers, we would be discouraging them from having an opinion that may be in the minority or one that may shed an unfavorable light on an otherwise positive event. And if we set the standards for journalism as "going with the majority," we have discredited the profession. We will have taken the watchdog role out of journalism.