Columbia Journalism “Professor of Professional Practice” Sree Sreenivasan, still smarting from an encounter with James O’Keefe, seems to have declared himself the ultimate arbiter of what is, or is not, citizen journalism:
PEOPLE LIKE O’KEEFE THINK THEY ARE ACTING LIKE JOURNALISTS. They think having a camera makes them a journalist. Instead, this is a cheap caricature of journalism…
No, Prof. Sreenivasan, scribes who hide behind the varnish of objectivity to sell a political agenda are what pass for cheap caricatures of journalism.
The erosion of faith in media began before O’Keefe was born, and “professors of professionalism” like Sreenivasan enable it. There is no such thing as journalistic objectivity–accuracy, yes, but objectivity, no. Objectivity is a fairy tale told to idealistic activists who want to enter journalism so they can “change things”; they already know there’s no glory in the role of an “objective observer.”
Granted, there are a few who strive for objectivity as an ideal–but they are rare, and they won’t be found under the tutelage of Sreenivasan or fellow Columbia professor Dale Maharidge.
Prof. Sreenivasan has the audacity to lecture citizen journalists–who report facts that the mainstream media leaves out for the sake of “objectivity”–simply because they have, rightfully, reclaimed journalism? Please. Go troll on Facebook and whine about it some more, “professional journalists.”
Perhaps Prof. Sreenivasan believes that citizen journalists are responsible for polling such as this:
Pew: Public opinion of media never worse
Americans See Liberal Media Bias on TV News
Distrust in U.S. Media Edges Up to Record High
The Hill Poll: Most voters see media as biased and unethical
Americans View Media Bias As Big Problem, Poll Shows
Public trust in US media eroding: Pew study – Yahoo! News
Shall I continue?
The continual decline of public trust in media is not the fault of James O’Keefe or other citizen journalists–citizen journalists were created in response to it.
People like O’Keefe have it in for professional journalists.
Could Prof. Sreenivasan be more self-exalting and misleading? Do “professional journalists” send out profanity-laden emails to people with whom they disagree? Is this what Sreenivasan calls “journalism?”
On Monday, Project Veritas released its first installment of our investigation, “To Catch a Journalist.”
Within the video, we interviewed Columbia Journalism School Associate Professor and Pultizer Prize winner Dale Maharidge.
Maharidge’s impressive background includes ten years at Stanford University as a visiting professor and bylines within The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Nation and Mother Jones among others.
Given his distinction within what he describes as the “Ivory Tower” Project Veritas was surprised to receive a profanity-laced email apparently from Mr. Maharidge at 5:36 in the morning.
We contacted Dale Maharidge about the email and posting and he declined to comment.
The email simply read:
Hey shitheads,Check out my comments about you:
Fuck you, man. Bring it on.
Dale Maharidge
Maharidge, who admittedly stayed up through the night wrote an initial post on his Facebook account (he has since attempted to revise and tone down his comments) disparaging Project Veritas and James O’Keefe.Within Maharidge’s early morning rant, he went on to state, “O’Keefe does his so-called journalism for. He is a toady of the bankers and 1 percent . . . Michael S. Williamson and I have done our work for the 99 percent.”Maharidge then segued into a rambling macho-flash paragraph that was then deleted in a duplicate post later in the day:
“This is fun because O’Keefe is so stupid. Remember: you have to laugh. Or you cry. And this dude ain’t cryin’. Dude’s from Cleveland. . .a dying steel town. . . I’ve lived the shit. . .lots of shit. . . .I’ve walked through fire and chortled about it, have had guns pulled on me–and a lot worse. I should be dead. Two times over. Nothing scares me.”
Actually, it seems more like Maharidge has it in for O’Keefe than vice versa. Prof. Maharidge was targeted by O’Keefe because he’s a huckster; O’Keefe asked Sreenivasan for a comment on the above because he’s the Dean of Student Affairs and Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia School of Journalism. Sreenivasan comically responds by mocking citizen media.
These are people who depend upon the dwindling public trust in the theory that journalists tell the truth. They need the public to believe it, so they can sell their lies. Citizen journalists threaten their livelihood, so they work to make the practice of news distribution more exclusive. Citizen journalists are the “unwashed masses” to people like Sreenivasan; their lot simultaneously believe that they are part of the people while special among them, singular in their gift of information distribution.
It’s a racket. If the polls I have linked above are any indication, the American public has had enough. Bloggers, most of them anyway, at least have the courtesy to own their bias, both on the right and left. There is more honor in that than in pretending that bias doesn’t exist.
Kudos to the citizen journalists who bust in, cameras blazing, who reject the idea that only a select few of the same ideological mindset are fit to write the pages of tomorrow’s history.