Dear Journalism:

Hey there. I thought you could do probably do with a note of appreciation. It has been a rough couple of years, hasn’t it? Much of the time we who consume your products take you for granted. You are part of our lives, omnipresent. Like the air we breathe, it just seems a bit naff to think too much about you. At least, that’s the attitude most of us adopt.

When you do not suit our purposes, or when you get dirty, again like the air we breathe, we are quick to complain about it. But when things are good, meh. You know, for granted.

My sympathies are with you, of course. You are one of the most integral supports of that other thing that people take for granted until it is ailing: Liberty.

Yes, liberty steals all the limelight, that shameless panderer, never acknowledging how impossible her existence would be without your strength and healthy support. The Fourth Estate they call you, but we both know you should be ranking higher in the hierarchy of necessities for a reasonable existence.

Case in point: These democracies that we try to run depend on the idea of people choosing in their own interests, based on the assumption that people make rational decisions... Are you laughing? Stop it, trying to be serious here.

As I was saying, rationality demands information. Not just information – it needs knowledge, which is where you tend to come in. A piece of data is only so useful, but put into context and analysed in conjunction with other pieces of data: That’s the good stuff. Which is pretty much what you do when things are going well, isn’t it?

That’s why I had to write you this note. Maybe you’ve heard the term “fake news?” It has become quite au courant, causing no end of distress and danger.

Listen: I know you have been through these kinds of poop-covered shenanigans before. People have been doubting journalism’s veracity and agenda since your inception – a position that has admittedly kept you honest in your better incarnations. But at the moment you seem severely embattled and I’m concerned.

You have to get better. You just do. Without you, we’re left in the dire situation of falling prey to our own stupidities. As you are well aware, humans don’t need much encouragement in this area. Between you and me: It is a constant battle to keep us out of the mire of our self-destructive tendencies.

You have been one of our best protections against the depredations of this our mass dumbness. Unfortunately, technology and sheer laziness is getting in the way of our ability to distinguish between you and your evil twins: Misinformation and propaganda.

We both know what those two can get done when they put their mind to it. A little internment camp here, a little genocide there, wee touch of atomic bombing preceded and followed by crusades, jihads, anti-science, racism, sexism, unhinged consumerism, all ending with an irreversible case of planetary annihilation.

Inconvenient, you will agree, which is why you need to find a way to surmount your current challenges. I have a suggestion or two on how to do that, if you don’t mind.

Maybe first and foremost is to abandon your commitment to so-called partisanship: While ideology is valid and objectivity is more of a goal than a reality, if you could just follow your own rules of multiple points of view and verification, that would be great.

The ultimate solution, as always, is the people that work you. But you know, the right ones – the ones who have courage and rectitude, ethics, creativity et cetera. Stop scraping the bottom of the idiot barrel.

For survival’s sake recruit more young people into the craft. There is a surfeit of talent there but you have to protect them from being co-opted by despots with the promise of access and celebrity and effective neutering.

Shield their talents under the strong and weathered wings of hard-core veterans while giving them the freedom to innovate. Less pretty domesticated president-licking twits in make-up, more thoughtful complex content, you know?

Anyways, this was supposed to be a note and it has gone on a bit long – there’s just so much to say! Oh well. Let me end by assuring you of my continued devotion to The Cause of Great Journalism. Never doubt how much you are needed and appreciated, ever. Hang in there, buddy.

Love.

e.

Elsie Eyakuze is an independent consultant and blogger for The Mikocheni Report. Email: [email protected]