Equality

I’ve been thinking a lot about the question of whether or not journalists should be certified all week. I’m still going with my original answer of no for several reasons—there are many great journalists without educations, it would be hard to decide a way to measure whether someone should be certified, etc.---but I’m not as sure about it as I was Monday.
I’ve heard the notion before that journalism school is a waste of time. Newspapers hire kids off the street to come in and write stories and work their way up. Maybe I’m being selfish, but I don’t want my degree to not mean anything. I don’t want to be held in the same esteem as a kid off the street or someone with no journalism background who creates a website to rant and rave about Mizzou sports.

The good thing, though, and the reason I still don’t feel a pressing need for certification, is that I think we ARE given more merit. I don’t feel threatened that I am going to lose my spot on press row to a blogger, not if I’m working for a newspaper with any kind of a reputation in a community.

Maybe that’s just me being naïve, but I don’t think so. It’s up to a newspaper to earn the public’s trust in their communities enough to be held above less qualified potential competition. Likewise, it is up to me to show that my education was worthwhile, through my work, not by holding up a certification card. I am confident that I can do that, and my work will be representative of the first-class education I have received.

Wednesday, the topic was whether we, as journalists, are “more equal” than others. My answer is simple: absolutely. When I cover a sporting event, I have credentials that give me the opportunity to go where the average person can’t. That pass obligates coaches, players, and whoever else, to talk to me in a way they may not feel obligated to talk to a fan in the crowd. In the same way, politicians and government officials are obligated to talk to reporters on the news side.

Certainly, then, we are more equal. It’s a privilege, and it’s a responsibility. We have to ask the questions that those who don’t have the opportunity to do so would ask. When public figures deserve to be called into question, we have to be there to do that. We have to act like their equal, if we feel below them or intimidated by them, we won’t ask the questions that need to be asked in order to show the public the truth about a corrupt cop or a lying politician.

To do our jobs, we have to be equals, especially in our own minds. By considering ourselves to be "more equal" we are not being cocky or putting ourselves on a pedestal, we are just acknowledging the truth.