Prof Bob: While I openly admit to
being a Chicago sports fan...it's my hometown...
I teach journalism students to always stay neutral in their
public reporting. But many
in the national sports media did not do that before the NFC
Championship Game
January 21, 2007, and CBS News raised the question:
MEDIA BIAS - WHY?
Yesterday, the New Orleans Saints
lost the NFC Championship Game to the Chicago Bears. A
win would
have taken the Saints to the Super Bowl. I didn't really
have a rooting interest in either team, but looking at
today's coverage and the coverage leading up to the game, I
must admit a part of me is glad the Saints lost.
That's because in their quest to turn the Saints' surprising
season into a feel good story, sportswriters around the
country couldn't help but tie the fortunes of the team to
the fortunes of their city. To some extent that was
justifiable, as the Saints' success surely did lift the
spirits of some New Orleans residents.
But people in the press have
a tendency to take such connections too far. At times,
reading the coverage, it felt like we were being told that a
Saints Super Bowl win
would have magically solved New Orleans' problems. And
while such a win surely
would have been good news for the city, the challenges New
Orleans faces in the
wake of Katrina have little to do with the outcome of a
football game.
The Associated Press, for example, today
wrote that the "Saints' dream season came
to a heartbreaking end Sunday, abruptly sending fans across
the city back to the stark
reality of post-Hurricane Katrina New Orleans." The "stark
reality," one imagines, hadn't disappeared when the Saints
made the playoffs. Still, that was among the more
restrained efforts. Some writers suggested that the Saints
were more than mere football team: Stephen Sabludowsky
argued that "[m]ore than anything else, they energized a
community, brought races together at a time of great
friction, ignited hope to a City when
its citizens have lost faith in all forms of government,
insurance companies and
community leaders." The only people not embracing the hype,
it seemed, came from –
you guessed it – Chicago. "What drives us crazy is the
blabbermouth national media, projecting their own desires in
their stories, putting the Saints on the side of the angels,
and the Bears on the side of Katrina,"
wrote John Kass.
I know I'm being somewhat cynical about all this. The
Saints' success did make a nice
story, and it surely had a big impact on the psyche of the
city. As the "Early Show"
story this morning nicely illustrated, the team's
success gave New Orleans residents something to cheer about
in the midst of a long period of struggle. But football is
not a panacea, even if it does make for some good
storylines. A Saints Super Bowl win would have lifted New
Orleans' spirits, but it ultimately wouldn't have changed
much for those
still trying to recover from Katrina, no matter how much the
press corps wanted it to.
I
share (Prof. Bob's) feeling that journalists make too much
of sports.
When
you think about it, promoting sports is good business for
news media
(even though promotion violates neutrality norms of socially responsible
news
organizations):
Sports
are catnip for males, particularly young males whom
advertisers covet.
Sports
are dirt cheap to cover – indeed teams subsidize
coverage providing free mezzanine seats and eats, game
video and stills, access to locker
rooms, etc.
The
periodicity of sports resembles that of daily news
media; everyday
there’s a set of scores and games to report on among the
various
professional sports – and thus a reason for people to
pick up the paper or watch the news.
Sports
reporting almost never offends advertisers.
Sporting events help advertisers such as local bars,
restaurants, etc. make money on game days.
The
next time a newspaper editorializes for public funding of a
stadium, it will
talk of civic benefits to civic spirit, racial harmony, etc., but see if
publishers
mention their self-interest.
John McManus Ph.D.
Director,
GradeTheNews.org
http://www.gradethenews.org/index.htm
Saints And Sinners
