What is the point of being a Journalist (except for easy money and not having to do anything other than copy + paste) if you are only allowed to "write", word for word, the article they give you to publish?
If you identify sufficiently with the people giving you the article to publish, it's not a "they" but an "us". Even if the decisions are taken in rooms you don't have access to.
Maybe they think they'll get access to them eventually if they're loyal.
It might seem cowardly, but it isn't that different to what happens every day in business. Society is full of organisations working on the "make the boss' opinions your own" principle.
You're never heard of biased or militant journalists have you?
In fact the most common form of journalism you will find is what's akin to a Propaganda channel of a Sponsoring Party (Defense, Media Company, Political party, Rich Individual with an agenda, etc). Essentialy a PR employee.
But this is true since always.
The kind of journalism we usually think of though is Investigative journalism, but that's a different beast and usually doesn't really pay.
> if you identify too little with them, you probably don't even get to "sit where you're sitting", as Chomsky said
The people winning White House credentials are political influencers. Chomsky was an interesting linguist. His political observations are about as scientific as our current crop of Silicon Valley elites’.
What he said, and I agree is true and important, is that you won't get to work as a journalist and do things like, say, interview people for BBC, unless you believe most of the things your employer believes.
Chomsky's observations about how the media works may not have been solid science, but from the way you describe the present circumstance it really sounds like Chomsky is still on target.
> from the way you describe the present circumstance it really sounds like Chomsky is still on target
The refutation is there are lots of places to sit. Like, yes, the people at a linguistics conference will predominantly be linguists. That doesn’t suggest a linguistics conspiracy.
> "That doesn’t suggest a linguistics conspiracy."
That's Chomsky's point. In Manufacturing Consent, Chomsky explains how the appearance of collusion can arise without conspiracy. Like-minded people hiring and promoting like-minded people isn't a conspiracy, it only looks like one because people with similar incentives and values will behave in similar ways given similar circumstances.
So you don't have any problem with the Hegseth Pentagon demands then? There are still many places to sit, and who gets access is mostly decided by neutral competence anyway? (That's what your linguistics conference analogy suggests).
Chomsky's whole point is that it doesn't take a conspiracy for journalists to share their superiors' views. Not for those superiors to be very aligned with each other.
What is the point of being a Developer (except for easy money and not having to do anything other than copy + paste) if you are only allowed to "code", word for word, the feature specifications ("user stories") they give you to build?
