As the line between news and opinion blurs, journalists must clarify

By: Lacey Latch

The 24-hour news cycle has completely transformed the journalism industry since its widespread implementation in the 1980s. Three decades later, nonstop cable news has become commonplace and so too has its programming and the personalities that lead it. At the same time though, this process has eroded the divide between news and opinion that was once separated by specifically marked newspaper sections or had very little presence on television altogether. Now, Americans are bombarded with more news-related content than ever before, but their ability to sift through that content has come into question.

“The causes of America’s deepening political divide are many and much disputed, but the differences between an opinion show and a news show might be difficult for people to discern,” Paul Farhi of the Washington Post wrote in 2017. “The reason: Programs such as [Sean] Hannity’s and others on cable news are often a mix of many things — news, commentary, analysis and pure, unadulterated opinion.”

In the fall of 2018, the American Press Institute released a report analyzing a survey of American citizens about their news consumption and this exact question: Can people tell the difference between news and opinion? It turns out that for the most part, the answer is no. Their surveys found that “just over half of Americans say it’s easy to distinguish news from opinion in news media in general.”

This statistic is certainly alarming in its own right but the implications of this reality are far-reaching. With a President who routinely dismisses the press as creators of “fake news,” the American public is already more inclined to question what they’re reading and seeing. That is only compounded by the fact that when they turn on “the news,” there really is no saying what they’ll get in terms of punditry, analysis or hard reporting and there is rarely any label indicating which of those categories the program falls into.

The consumer is of course to some extent responsible for their own media literacy but journalism as an industry also plays a critical role in the formation of that literacy. In another survey the American Press Institute found that “Fully half of the U.S. public is unfamiliar with the term ‘op-ed,’ and nearly three in 10 said they were unfamiliar with the difference between an editorial and news story (27 percent) or a reporter and columnist (28 percent).”

This clearly indicates that there is a disconnect between journalists and the population we are supposed to be serving, one that directly impacts the efficacy and trust placed in our work. It also further erodes the public’s trust in journalism as a whole. Commentators who offer opinions but are presented as reporters reporting fact only support the perception that journalists are inherently biased.

Notably, an overwhelming majority of journalists surveyed about this issue correctly believe that “most people misunderstand the difference between news and opinion content.” But despite the fact that journalists might be aware of the problem, fixing it has become something of a nonstarter in the industry.

While touring newsrooms in New York City in December, I asked DePaul graduate and MSNBC producer Kat McCullough if the network feels it is responsible for making the distinction between news and commentary clear for viewers. While she acknowledged this issue is something the industry needs to reckon with, MSNBC, like so many of their counterparts, has yet to determine the best way to start that process.

Journalists exist to serve and inform the American public. However, that mission can’t be accomplished if readers and viewers don’t know how to interpret what is being presented to them and journalists are responsible for making that easier. By labeling content and defining what those labels mean, journalists will be better suited to do their job because they will be reporting on and for a more media literate audience. Overall, if reporters and the public develop a better understanding of each other, both parties will benefit indefinitely.