The Trust Thing

By David Warren:

Polls, at least in the U.S., show “trust in the media” to be a waste of their time, and in particular, will not seek news from sources they believe to be tainted. The exclamation mark is affixed, when the mainstream media sweep the JournoList controversy under the rug — at a moment when their audience is free to read all these appalling e-mails on the Internet.

As I insist, the most damaging thing for a purveyor of news is not bias, per se, but an apparent lack of candour. People want to know “what really happened,” and if it is obvious that Agent A will not tell them, they will turn to Agent B. To my mind, that is exactly why my profession is in big trouble.

It is moreover the reason why every agency in society, which governs itself by strictures of “political correctness,” is in big trouble. People — quite simple, uneducated people, among others — may not have the means to analyse their distrust, but they can sure smell a rat. They may not be able to detect a lie, but they will eventually sense that a writer or speaker has no category for the truth.
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