Non-endorsement isn't 'Objectivity'
In late October, the Los Angeles Times published its list of candidate/issue endorsements for this year's general election. Missing from the list: Any endorsement for president. Semafor reports that the paper's owner, Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, nixed the Times editorial board's planned endorsement of Kamala Harris over Donald Trump.
A few days later, the Washington Post similarly announced that it won't endorse for president this year or "in any future presidential election." Once again, NBC News reports, that decision was made by Post owner Jeff Bezos, who vetoed the editorial board's planned endorsement of Harris.
The stories drew applause from some media critics—unsurprisingly, mostly those associated with the Republican Party—for a supposed move toward "neutrality," or even "objectivity" (those two words do not mean the same thing) by the Times and Post.
Those same stories, of course, drew condemnation from other media critics—unsurprisingly, mostly those associated with the Democratic Party—over their faux silence in the face of Trump as "existential threat to democracy."
Let's get that "neutrality" and "objectivity" nonsense out of the way first.
American news media are not and never have been "neutral." Neutrality means taking no side in a conflict. American media—newspapers in particular—have a long history of identifying with political parties and endorsing those parties' candidates in elections.
In fact, many newspapers once bore the stamp of their party affiliations in their names (I grew up with the Lebanon, Missouri Daily Record, previously the Rustic Republican) and others still do (for example, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette). They weren't "neutral." They took sides.
In the 20th century, under the influence of commentators like Walter Lippmann, journalism began portraying itself as "objective." While many (including far too many journalists) treat that as a synonym for "neutrality," it isn't. Objectivity means accurately representing reality to the best of one's ability.
Reality, objectively reported, often implies a better or worse side.
Reality, neutrally reported, just reports the sides and refuses to take one.
In reality, most news media are neither neutral nor objective. Their reportage is biased, just more subtly than openly.
Most outlets use a more attractive-sounding term for the side they support and a less attractive-sounding term for the side they oppose. Even if a story is accurate in its factual statements, it's written to make one side sound like good guys and the other side sound like bad guys.
Quick example: Pro-choice and pro-life versus pro-abortion and anti-abortion.
Or look at reporting on the war in Gaza. Supporters of one side or the other will mix and match words like "self-defense," "resistance," "terrorism" and "genocide" to make precisely the same actions sound better or worse depending on which side takes those actions.
We know which candidate the editorial boards of the Times and Post prefer—and which candidate the owners of those newspapers prefer. Silence on both isn't "neutrality" or "objectivity," it's just one preference vetoing the other.
We'd all be better informed if the media just went back to wearing their biases on their sleeves.
THOMAS L. KNAPP
The William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism
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