The journalistic sin of smugness

The journalistic sin of smugness

Will Rahn, the Washington editor of the Daily Beast, no less (known both for its liberalism and its snarkiness), has written a mea culpa on journalists’ failure to understand the Trump phenomenon, a confession remarkable for its self-knowledge and its moral diagnosis.

From Will Rahn, Commentary: The unbearable smugness of the press – CBS News:

The mood in the Washington press corps is bleak, and deservedly so.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that, with a few exceptions, we were all tacitly or explicitly #WithHer, which has led to a certain anguish in the face of Donald Trump’s victory. More than that and more importantly, we also missed the story, after having spent months mocking the people who had a better sense of what was going on.

This is all symptomatic of modern journalism’s great moral and intellectual failing: its unbearable smugness. Had Hillary Clinton won, there’s be a winking “we did it” feeling in the press, a sense that we were brave and called Trump a liar and saved the republic.

So much for that. The audience for our glib analysis and contempt for much of the electorate, it turned out, was rather limited. This was particularly true when it came to voters, the ones who turned out by the millions to deliver not only a rebuke to the political system but also the people who cover it. Trump knew what he was doing when he invited his crowds to jeer and hiss the reporters covering him. They hate us, and have for some time.

And can you blame them? Journalists love mocking Trump supporters. We insult their appearances. We dismiss them as racists and sexists. We emote on Twitter about how this or that comment or policy makes us feel one way or the other, and yet we reject their feelings as invalid.

It’s a profound failure of empathy in the service of endless posturing.

[Keep reading. . .] 

"I'm not certain "unfathomable life" is the turning. Even life at 20,000 fathoms, trusts there ..."

Treating Feelings as the Source of ..."
"I don't get it. You appear to associate "what I feel" with "group think." Of ..."

Treating Feelings as the Source of ..."
"I'm on this blog (I think, sometimes I wonder) for cultural and religious issues. It ..."

Treating Feelings as the Source of ..."
"The two "fundamentally different approaches" do not appear to be mutually exclusive. It seems that ..."

Treating Feelings as the Source of ..."

Browse Our Archives

Follow Us!