The words journalist and moralist happen to share the same last
five letters, but beyond that they have nothing in common. So what makes some television
journalists think their job entitles them to share their sanctimonious (and often
simplistic) moral judgments on the events of the day?
Their function is to report the news and leave viewers to
form their own conclusions. They have no more moral authority than a bus driver
or supermarket checkout operator.
Newshub’s political editor Tova O’Brien is an habitual
offender. She was at it again last night, self-righteously declaiming – prompted
by leading questions from newsreader Mike McRoberts – on the government’s failure
to anticipate and head off every personal misfortune suffered as a result of
the Covid-19 pandemic.
O’Brien reported that a woman had her publicly funded breast
surgery cancelled and had to pay for an operation with her own money. Another
cancer patient had to be told by phone rather than face-to-face that the illness
was terminal. A woman miscarried but her husband wasn’t allowed into the
hospital to comfort her. A new mother said she felt “disempowered” because she
was unable to have the water-birth that she had planned and complained about
being treated like an animal, which I suspect might have been just a tad melodramatic.
Oozing empathy and indignation, O’Brien lamented that Kiwis
(we’re always referred to using the folksy term “Kiwis”, never as New
Zealanders) had to face these “heartbreaking” experiences alone. Tragedies that
were impossible to bear were made even harder, she said. Later she resorted to the emotive
phrase “horror stories”. Of course.
But hang on. New Zealand is in the middle of an unprecedented
medical and economic emergency that no one saw coming. The ground is shifting
day by day, almost hour by hour, under the government’s feet as it scrambles to
deal with issues no New Zealand government has faced before. Inevitably, a lot
of people will suffer sad and painful consequences; politicians and bureaucrats
can’t anticipate every personal tragedy and salve every psychological wound.
Oh, but O’Brien thinks they can and should. Fortunately for
her, journalists are able to take refuge on the moral high ground. They are in
the privileged position of observing and critiquing without actually having to
take responsibility for finding solutions to the myriad unforeseen problems they report.
They are even free to grandstand at the prime minister’s daily press conference
and insist that something be done, then note with smug satisfaction that the
prime minister has promised to act.
O’Brien has previous form. It was she who led the media
charge against Health Minister David Clark when he broke the lockdown rules. Clearly,
she wanted a scalp to hang on her belt. Okay, so Clark acted stupidly and
embarrassed the government. Even cabinet ministers do dumb things. But O’Brien
pursued him so fiercely that I half-expected her to call for the reinstatement of the Nuremberg war tribunals.
Again, fortunately for O’Brien - in fact all journalists - their own lives aren’t subject to the same remorseless scrutiny that public
figures must endure. If they were, they too would be revealed as flawed – in some cases deeply flawed – human beings. (And lest this be misconstrued, I'm not alluding here to O'Brien, whose private life I know nothing about.)
What, then, makes them think they’re entitled to impose their bumper-sticker
moral judgments on their audience, night after night? They certainly can’t
claim to represent public opinion. Few people are in a worse position to gauge what
the public is thinking than press gallery journalists, trapped as they are in
their own little self-absorbed Wellington bubble.
Why can’t they just stand back, tell us what’s going on,
free of emotive or moralistic embellishment, and leave the viewers to decide for themselves
what to make of it all? They might find that by doing so, they’ll win back some
of the respect journalists have lost.
