Unbridled Passion

With three weeks left during my semester reporting for the Missourian, the last thing I wanted (or had the energy) to deal with was a big scoop. But news doesn’t have a schedule, and the Missourian got a scoop that we couldn’t ignore, about Bruce Brotzman, then principal of Rock Bridge High School. My friend and roommate was the lead reporter and I was helping out since I had interviewed Brotzman earlier in the year for a brief about his leaving Rock Bridge for another job. The principal and involved community member had been banned from Ellis Library for sexual misconduct. The incident conveniently coincided with Brotzman’s departure from the school, and the Missourian was looking for links between the two events. Eventually, a series of stories revealed that the two events were connected and that the school district appeared to be covering it up. Consequently, Brotzman lost the job he was leaving for as a school administrator in Ohio. But there’s one story about Brotzman that was never told, although it was arguably the most compelling, because it was based on an anonymous source. The source (and the source’s father) told us that Brotzman had forced his son into certain sexual acts, while the son was working at Rock Bridge as a janitor. Given that he was a public figure, entrusted to care for and guide young adults, it was really difficult not to hit the keyboard and produce a shocking story that would shake-up the neatly woven tapestry of the school district, who had tried to cover-up Brotzman’s misconduct. Ultimately though, we all knew this was a decision for Tom Warhover since it dealt with an anonymous source. We didn’t run the story, with the rationale that the potential fallout outweighed any gain (the man had already been fired from his new job, what more did we want?) and that was the end of it.

Jason Leopold’s opposing perspective on using anonymous sources is what shocked me most about him as a journalist, and I suspect it has something to do with his obviously unbridled passion for the industry. I found it hard to understand, while reading his book, how he could be so unquestioning when it came to not naming sources and usually not involving his editor. I also found it shocking when he responded in class that his editors (for the most part) didn’t have a problem with this. At MU, we’re always preached to about proceeding with caution when it comes to anonymous sources, but we’re dealing with a much smaller news outlet and, most likely, editors that are more involved, every step of the way.

Leopold, on the other hand, was working for wire services or larger newspapers that required tighter deadlines and less one-on-one time with an editor. He expressed both in his book and in class that he got a buzz from publishing a story or putting it on the wire, and in a way, journalists are programmed to feel that way. Or, at least, modern media organizations are structured in a way that supports such a mindset. While in the moment, quick-as-you-can journalism might seem like a good idea, especially for newspapers who may be battling it out with other online sources, it’s also an opportunity to introduce error and for poor news judgment. In a column for the American Journalism Review, President Thomas Kunkel, also a dean at University of Maryland’s journalism school, discussed the potential danger in producing news at an increasingly faster pace.

“One could argue that the faster we produce journalism, the more time we should be thinking about journalism, but of course the reality is just the reverse. Our breakneck, 24-7 media environment simply allows no time to contemplate what we do, or why it matters, or how to do it better. There's only time to keep shoveling--which has grave repercussions, which we should be thinking about, but there's no time…” (Kunkel, American Journalism Review, January/February 2003, What is Journalism Education?).

This reiterates, regardless of how soon your deadline is approaching, the idea that everyone involved in a story should be held accountable along the way. That’s not just Leopold and his editor, but copy editors, the copy chief, designers, etc. Of course, this isn’t to shift the duty of the reporter, but everyone should share a bit of the burden.
Bill Kirtz, a professor at Northeastern University, offered advice on developing better reporting techniques from Deborah Nelson, a Los Angeles Times editor, in an ethics story for Poynter.org. “…[the] ‘no surprises at the end’ technique helps ‘bullet-proof’ stories from irate subjects and lawyers. Another is meticulous fact-checking. [Nelson] makes reporters verify every fact against their source notes, documents, including ‘names that you think you know. Double-checking saves your credibility,’” (Kirtz, Poynter.org, May 22, 2006, Unleash the Watchdogs).

Another key issue Leopold discussed was passion, which comes across in his work, but can be shaky ground to stand on. In fact, it seems like passion is what often got him into trouble. Should journalists have a love for what they do, and realize that their basic objective is informing the public? Yes. But there’s a certain element of checks and balances that need to be present. Leopold said he thrived on “the immediate gratification of getting a story out, or reporting a rumor.” That’s not responsible journalism. That’s an ego, yearning to be inflated. Just the phrase “reporting a rumor,” says a lot about his ethics as a journalist. He claims his goal has always been to report the truth, but the truth is nebulous if it can’t be backed up with sources. He seemed to think – maybe he thinks differently now—that readers would believe him simply because he was a journalist. That may be true to an extent, but it doesn’t necessarily yield an enduring track record.

Jill Geisler, a Leadership and Management Group Leader at the Poynter Institute, addressed the problems passion can bring about in a story based on a survey of the leadership of Poynter’s high-ups. She found that having passion often translated into being a poor communicator, having a “bad temper” or being “impatient,” (Geisler, Poynter.org, July 9, 2001, A Problem with Passion).

The consensus after Leopold spoke with us in class seemed to be that he was a nice guy. Sure, he’s a nice guy, but he also contributed to the camp that makes our jobs much more challenging. We are entering the world of journalism during a period of rapid change, with citizen journalism, new media, celebrification of the news and shaky credibility. And while it’s great that a journalist could be so candid in a book about how his personal life affected his professional career, I still find his story unnerving because it means I have to work even harder to reverse the damage he, and similar people, have done.