The Titanic has entered our mythic and archetypal consciousness. The unsinkable ship that foundered on its maiden voyage has become a symbol of overconfidence. In lack of planning for the worst-case scenario, there were insufficient lifeboats for all passengers and crew. The ethical standards of the time were enforced by the crew in allocating available lifeboat seats to women and children. Maintaining calm in the face of death was exemplified by the band, which played on to the end. It has even entered the vernacular, as in saying that he was rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, meaning he was busy with trivial matters during an emergency. [Image from www.titanic-nautical.com]

   [Although this article was written for journalists, it applies to everyone who finds herself besieged by the circumstances of life. The temptation to survive often swamps our highest values.]

    Many journalists are quietly panicking. Newspapers and magazines are folding, ad revenues plummeting, media merging and standards melting away. We see it all around us and feel buffeted by rising seas, swamped by confusion. Our ship is sinking.

    "Nobody reads anymore" is the current axiom shaping policy at some media outlets that pander to the lowest common denominator, that tiny percentage of blank-faced idiots in our society. This becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, however, because the many people who do reason and read cancel their subscriptions and turn to alternative sources in disgust at the declining standards.

    Granted, publishers and broadcasters feel caught between a rock and a hard place in a fluctuating economy. Since more and more media outlets are owned by corporations, rather than by old-school journalists, stress causes a clash of ethical codes between owners and the front line press people. Keeping ethical standards up when the chips are down is the true test of character.

    Most journalists are well-versed in the basic ethics of their profession. We must realize, however, that the ethics code of these new corporate employers is a much simpler one: PROFIT. To further aggravate this situation, few business schools teach any ethics at all. "Efficiency has been enshrined as the only value, rather than equity, and as a result we've had a very skewed perspective," said Kirk O. Hanson, a business professor at Stanford University.

PANDERERS AND PROSTITUTES

    Magazine critic Bob Sipchen wrote in the L.A. Times, August 15, 1991, "No one seems to be questioning the existence of journalistic prostitution, but merely haggling over the price."

    The publishers of newspapers and the corporations that own the networks say their market researchers have informed them that the public is only interested in entertainment and sex. It is good business to give the public what it wants. But it makes for damn lousy journalism because we are supposed to give the public what it needs to maintain our democracy. We're not selling shoes.

    This conclusion that the public only wants entertainment and sex is arrogant and elitist. Do you personally know a single human being whose desires are so limited? Unless you are a misanthropist, your own perception will tell you that it is not true.

    The purpose of this article is to put the situation into another perspective, to give you a fresh look at things, to encourage you to cleave to the standards of journalism that give you pride in a profession that is vital in maintaining and evolving a free society.

    Evolving society? Yes, indeed! Bob Dylan wrote, "He not busy being born is busy dying." Nothing is static no matter how much some of us like to maintain the status quo. Dying media outlets are wailing loudly -- after all, they own the voice to make the noise and cast blame on others for their demise.

    Buggy whip manufacturers and medicine show mendicants also died, no doubt all the while complaining about a degenerate or ignorant public. New technologies evolved and they were unable to change fast enough. It had nothing to do with the quality of their customers. They simply became dinosaurs.

    This is exactly what is happening in media. The near future will show a very different landscape: many newspapers will fold, network TV will degrade further from the "great wasteland" to a sensationalist garbage dump. The corporate drive to pander to the lowest common denominator will continue to drag down the intellectual level of some mass media outlets or kill them outright.

WATCH THE DONUT, NOT THE HOLE

    The other side of this coin is the birth of an exciting future rich in diversity with greater choice and control for media consumers. Focus on where we are going and be prepared when we arrive. Those who moan about the rough ride and an ungrateful public, who adopt a "survive at any cost" mentality that demolishes their integrity, will find themselves to be embittered and irrelevant when this trip is over. We are moving on to a new life. We can cry about the home we have left or we can look forward to the new job, experiences and friends.

    Just as medicine became so technical it had to divide its knowledge and skills into specialties, thus will journalism and the media go. The rising trend is toward limited circulation, narrow interest publications and broadcast media. The proliferation of these esoteric little periodicals is amazing. There is a magazine or giveaway newspaper for every consumer group imaginable: e.g., auto glass installers, ballroom dance hobbyists, recovering addicts, desktop publishers, body builders, gun enthusiasts, mercenary soldiers, even the homeless. You get the picture. And if the publication doesn't exist, some optimistic entrepreneur who hasn't heard that nobody reads anymore is going to start one because the market is there.

    Are you wondering where some of the ad revenue is going that used to go to large newspapers and TV networks? Advertisers love these small publications because the ads are relatively inexpensive and they only advertise to consumers who will be interested in their product or service. Many of these little publications are doing just fine. But their success doesn't make headlines.

    [In 1991, the internet was a minor player with the emphasis on free information. Nobody foresaw the meteoric rise of this medium which is now the major drain of advertising dollars away from print and broadcast media.]

    Cable TV will expand further in its specialized diversity, like MTV (rock music), Nickelodeon (children and adult nostalgia), Family Channel (conservative values), CNN (less censored news), Lifetime (women), AMC (old movies), etc. Metropolitan areas like Los Angeles already have UHF stations with programming in Japanese, Vietnamese, Thai and Spanish for minority segments of the local community. These UHF stations will tend to mimic cable's subject specializations tailored to regional needs. Smaller, narrow interest audiences are tuning in and watching ads aimed directly at them.

    The new census data documents that the fastest-growing segment of the population of the United States is among the minorities that mass media do not reach. "Advertisers increasingly want to target their messages at demographic and ethnic niches, something newspapers have not divined how to do," wrote Thomas Rosenstiel. [L.A. Times, 5/8/91]

    Newspaper publishers and cable companies are fighting it, but the phone company will be the next news and entertainment medium. With the advent of fiber optic cable, your telephone line can also bring a multitude of cable TV channels, as well as the daily news served up on your computer screen. This may be the beginning of the end for the printing press, a technological wonder in its day that changed civilization and put a lot of monks out of work. [Wall Street Journal, 8/13/91]

    Telephone companies are also developing a system whereby a consumer could dial into a central computer on his home telephone and select from a library of movies. The potential is there to dial up information by subject as well. [L.A. Times, 5/4/91]

    Technology is in use now for readers to modem into a central computer database and get news hot off the wire services. Are you tracking trends in shareholder's rights or the spread of free market thinking in Eastern Europe? Your computer can be programmed to sort the wheat from the chaff for you. It will ignore Donald Trump (please!), scandal in state legislatures, and police brutality, assembling only articles of interest to you. You can create a "newspaper" with a distribution of one, a custom fit.

GO WHERE THE CUSTOMERS ARE

    The people who think and read are out there. But they are very busy and need to filter their input in an information-clogged culture, specializing as readers to keep quality up. They skip network news or use it for headlines, and they forego the dummied-down newspaper written in seventh grade English with the big color pictures. A stack of well-written, special interest material occupies their limited time.

    Sick of election ads on TV? You may not have to endure them much longer because they will come right to your house on video tape. Rather than spend money advertising to people who do not vote, candidates and issue sponsors will produce video tapes and mail them to registered voters. Another revenue loss for television. [L.A. Times, 8/21/91]

    Even product advertisers are turning to video. Today's educated woman spends her limited time with quality special interest publications rather than on the wasteland of television. Estee Lauder is aiming at her by attaching a video taped ad for its new perfume to a small number of Elle magazines. These particular 14,000 magazines will be sold at prestige locations in large cities. More revenue loss for television. [L.A. Times, 8/19/91]

    [The two paragraphs above show that the fact that the internet would become the 800-pound gorilla in the arena was not foreseen by people in media at the time. However, the specialization did come to pass. Think “Google AdSense,” which is those little targeted ads that show up in the margins of your web page. Notice how they are usually germane to what you are looking for.]

    Advertisers no longer hunt with shotguns! They use laser beams. It is up to innovative media people to help them hit targeted consumers. It is up to clever journalists to anticipate where the jobs will be.
    Have courage and keep your standards high. The future looks great for communications.

ETHICS CHECK FOR JOURNALISTS:

    Is it legal?  Does it violate civil or criminal law, or company policy?

    Is it accurate and truthful?

    Is it relevant to real life?

    Does it serve the purposes of a free society by educating citizens in what they need to know to make informed choices, or does it pander to degraded interests?

    Does it make me feel good about myself?  Will I be proud?  Would I want my peers to know about it?

    Is this a decision based on journalism or on business?

    Am I justifying a compromise of principle by believing the worst of my fellow man?

This article was published in the December 1991 edition of PressWoman, the magazine of the National Federation of Press Women. At the time I was the Ethics / First Amendment Chair of the California Press Women, the state chapter.