Obsidian Potency 3.0
Opinion Cycles
posted Friday, 19 October 2007
A few weeks ago, Ombudsman (woman) Le Anne Schreiber 'penned' a fantastic article on the state of the media today. Although (as an ESPN employee) her focus is sports, the points she made can easily be generalized to the media as a whole.
She focused on readers complaining about terrible announcers discussing a team that wasn't playing while a fantastic game unfolded before their eyes; the coverage of Oklahoma State Coach Mike Gundy's unsolicited tirade directed towards a newspaper columnist; the New England Patriots spying incident; Donovan McNabb's comments on race; and the uncertain Eli Manning injury updates from a few weeks ago.
All these stories had the following in common: the media reported based more on opinions and "inside rumors" than on facts, and the subjects of their inquiries reacted with extreme hostility towards the media. Their reactions ultimately provided even more media fodder.
Gundy's Tirade
About Gundy: "It was not just the squall of the day but the perfect storm for the entire week's opinion cycle, allowing the media to mount personal attacks on the coach for mounting a personal attack on the reporter who had mounted a personal attack on the college quarterback, who, as far as I can tell, was the only one who had enough class to keep quiet."
ESPN and other news outlets talked a lot about Gundy's reaction, and even spoke with the columnist. But a no time did any of these outlets actually give viewers a piece of the article itself: "But why did I hear no one at ESPN explicitly note that the column that so enraged Gundy was based on rumors and rumblings and the sayings of "insiders"? Because they want to be allowed to take those same liberties? Because they didn't bother to read the column? Because all that mattered was milking that videotape for a week's worth of commentary? Because the boundaries between fact, opinion and rumor have become so porous that nobody noticed rumor crossing the border with a fake passport?"
But this is the most salient point she makes: "The rage is general all over the land of sport. Fans, not to mention coaches and athletes, are sick and tired of being subjected to a relentless media onslaught of opinion that is simultaneously overheated and half-baked. Unfortunately, in a kind of sports Stockholm syndrome, many of them have learned to imitate the rhetorical belligerence of the media masters they resent."
I have been just as guilty of this as anyone else -- all you have to do is look at a lot of the ramblings on OP to see that. But in my own defense, I didn't pick up this brash style out of thin air. I know it grabs people's attention, and sometimes elicits visceral emotions. Basically, it forces the reader to pay attention.
The Beli-cheat Scandal
A perfect example of this is how I bought into the underlying hype surrounding the Patriots spying incident. As Schreiber points out, "It was clear Belichick had violated a league rule, but what kind of "cheating" did that amount to, what kind of unfair competitive advantage could it bestow? Reporting might have answered that crucial question, but the question was tossed to the realm of opinion."
"Easterbrook is entitled to his opinion, to his logic, to his analogies, however strained I think they are, but what is not OK is cloaking opinion in the camouflage of reporting. In his Sept. 18 piece, "Dark days for NFL," Easterbrook indulges in several speculations about Belichick's spying, couching his imaginings in "perhaps" and "might have beens" and "the rumor mill says," which leads him to suggest "the Patriots' cheating might have been more extensive than so far confirmed." That "so far confirmed" is sneaky, implying there is only a small gap between his imagination and fact."
"My attitude is that you get the proof, or at least sources whose reliability you are willing to characterize and vouch for, before you publish. Until then, you keep your rumor-based speculations to yourself."
McNabb
I've weighed in on this before, saying that the whole thing didn't seem very controversial at all. But the media made it into a big-time mess of opinions founded upon twisted 'fact':
"McNabb's answers were mostly variants on saying he followed his parents' example of quiet, calm persistence. In that context came questions about being a black quarterback in the NFL, and he said, "There's not that many African-American quarterbacks, so we have to do a little bit extra." And of white quarterbacks such as Peyton Manning and Carson Palmer, he said, "Let me start by saying I love those guys, but they don't get criticized as much as we do." Even before the interview aired, the opinion cycle swept up the last clause of that last comment, wrenched out of context from an HBO press release, and turned McNabb's commonsense observations into a "controversy," thus arguably proving his point. In a week of stormy news conferences, he was accused of playing "the race card," asked to defend or retract his statements."
The hell? I just don't get it. The media took his comments out of context, and some took them really personally. To his credit, McNabb did not back down from what he said. As Michael Wilbon put it, "He [McNabb] said something he would say a thousand times again, and any black quarterback not 22 years old would say the same thing." Schreiber adds, "But opinion cycles feed on sound bites, and larger contexts are too cumbersome to digest."
This is the quick-serve culture we live in, where everybody races to "report" on nothing and everyone races to catch public figures in a sick, unending game of "Gotcha." And just like with fast-food, the viewing and reading public pays the consequences: "The loss for fans is that there is progressively less reason for any athlete to speak thoughtfully, candidly or at length about anything because his or her words, like McNabb's, will only be mined for nuggets of controversy potential."
Is this the media we want? Is that the coverage we want? Well, yes, apparently. Until more people take a stand and take their dollars elsewhere, this is the crap we will keep getting fed. And of course I'll stay blustery.
She focused on readers complaining about terrible announcers discussing a team that wasn't playing while a fantastic game unfolded before their eyes; the coverage of Oklahoma State Coach Mike Gundy's unsolicited tirade directed towards a newspaper columnist; the New England Patriots spying incident; Donovan McNabb's comments on race; and the uncertain Eli Manning injury updates from a few weeks ago.
All these stories had the following in common: the media reported based more on opinions and "inside rumors" than on facts, and the subjects of their inquiries reacted with extreme hostility towards the media. Their reactions ultimately provided even more media fodder.
Gundy's Tirade
About Gundy: "It was not just the squall of the day but the perfect storm for the entire week's opinion cycle, allowing the media to mount personal attacks on the coach for mounting a personal attack on the reporter who had mounted a personal attack on the college quarterback, who, as far as I can tell, was the only one who had enough class to keep quiet."
ESPN and other news outlets talked a lot about Gundy's reaction, and even spoke with the columnist. But a no time did any of these outlets actually give viewers a piece of the article itself: "But why did I hear no one at ESPN explicitly note that the column that so enraged Gundy was based on rumors and rumblings and the sayings of "insiders"? Because they want to be allowed to take those same liberties? Because they didn't bother to read the column? Because all that mattered was milking that videotape for a week's worth of commentary? Because the boundaries between fact, opinion and rumor have become so porous that nobody noticed rumor crossing the border with a fake passport?"
But this is the most salient point she makes: "The rage is general all over the land of sport. Fans, not to mention coaches and athletes, are sick and tired of being subjected to a relentless media onslaught of opinion that is simultaneously overheated and half-baked. Unfortunately, in a kind of sports Stockholm syndrome, many of them have learned to imitate the rhetorical belligerence of the media masters they resent."
I have been just as guilty of this as anyone else -- all you have to do is look at a lot of the ramblings on OP to see that. But in my own defense, I didn't pick up this brash style out of thin air. I know it grabs people's attention, and sometimes elicits visceral emotions. Basically, it forces the reader to pay attention.
The Beli-cheat Scandal
A perfect example of this is how I bought into the underlying hype surrounding the Patriots spying incident. As Schreiber points out, "It was clear Belichick had violated a league rule, but what kind of "cheating" did that amount to, what kind of unfair competitive advantage could it bestow? Reporting might have answered that crucial question, but the question was tossed to the realm of opinion."
"Easterbrook is entitled to his opinion, to his logic, to his analogies, however strained I think they are, but what is not OK is cloaking opinion in the camouflage of reporting. In his Sept. 18 piece, "Dark days for NFL," Easterbrook indulges in several speculations about Belichick's spying, couching his imaginings in "perhaps" and "might have beens" and "the rumor mill says," which leads him to suggest "the Patriots' cheating might have been more extensive than so far confirmed." That "so far confirmed" is sneaky, implying there is only a small gap between his imagination and fact."
"My attitude is that you get the proof, or at least sources whose reliability you are willing to characterize and vouch for, before you publish. Until then, you keep your rumor-based speculations to yourself."
McNabb
I've weighed in on this before, saying that the whole thing didn't seem very controversial at all. But the media made it into a big-time mess of opinions founded upon twisted 'fact':
"McNabb's answers were mostly variants on saying he followed his parents' example of quiet, calm persistence. In that context came questions about being a black quarterback in the NFL, and he said, "There's not that many African-American quarterbacks, so we have to do a little bit extra." And of white quarterbacks such as Peyton Manning and Carson Palmer, he said, "Let me start by saying I love those guys, but they don't get criticized as much as we do." Even before the interview aired, the opinion cycle swept up the last clause of that last comment, wrenched out of context from an HBO press release, and turned McNabb's commonsense observations into a "controversy," thus arguably proving his point. In a week of stormy news conferences, he was accused of playing "the race card," asked to defend or retract his statements."
The hell? I just don't get it. The media took his comments out of context, and some took them really personally. To his credit, McNabb did not back down from what he said. As Michael Wilbon put it, "He [McNabb] said something he would say a thousand times again, and any black quarterback not 22 years old would say the same thing." Schreiber adds, "But opinion cycles feed on sound bites, and larger contexts are too cumbersome to digest."
This is the quick-serve culture we live in, where everybody races to "report" on nothing and everyone races to catch public figures in a sick, unending game of "Gotcha." And just like with fast-food, the viewing and reading public pays the consequences: "The loss for fans is that there is progressively less reason for any athlete to speak thoughtfully, candidly or at length about anything because his or her words, like McNabb's, will only be mined for nuggets of controversy potential."
Is this the media we want? Is that the coverage we want? Well, yes, apparently. Until more people take a stand and take their dollars elsewhere, this is the crap we will keep getting fed. And of course I'll stay blustery.
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