No curly questions in protocol journalism
Eric LooPublished: Dec 7, 2006 11:58 AM | Updated: Jan 29, 2008 6:21 PM
"He's so lucky he has Pak Lah as his father-in-law," said the education minister to The Star (Hishamuddin: The keris is here to stay, Nov 26) on what he thought of Khairy Jamaluddin's political performance with Umno so far.
But, aren't you also lucky your father was a prime minister? Sounds like a good question. But, going by mainstream media rules, curly questions are seldom asked of our ministers.
Critical readers with a good sense of right and wrong would have been chafed at The Star's muted Q&A with Hishammuddin Hussein. Yawn. 'The people's paper' has again shown its penchant for protocol journalism. Where was the journalistic insight at a time when public appetite was perhaps at its peak for a context to the Umno assembly theatrics.
"He's so lucky he has Pak Lah as his father-in-law," said the education minister to The Star (Hishamuddin: The keris is here to stay, Nov 26) on what he thought of Khairy Jamaluddin's political performance with Umno so far.
But, aren't you also lucky your father was a prime minister? Sounds like a good question. But, going by mainstream media rules, curly questions are seldom asked of our ministers.
Critical readers with a good sense of right and wrong would have been chafed at The Star's muted Q&A with Hishammuddin Hussein. Yawn. 'The people's paper' has again shown its penchant for protocol journalism. Where was the journalistic insight at a time when public appetite was perhaps at its peak for a context to the Umno assembly theatrics.
Mustafa K Anuar, a learned colleague and joint-coordinator of Charter 2000-Aliran describes the "unquestioning acceptance of the utterances of public officials" as bad journalism.
Without any indication of whether the Q&A was conducted via email or face-to-face at the minister's office, one wonders if "cue journalism', as Mustafa terms it, has become pass in the mainstream papers? 'Cue journalism', Mustafa explains, are stories that wait "for the 'clearance' from the powers-that-be" before they're published.
Aren't you lucky as well?
Let's revisit The Star's Q&A and see what follow-ups could have been asked:
The Star (TS): The target seemed to be non-Malays rather than Umno's political opposition.
Hishamuddin Hussein (HH): "if you read my speech in detail, you will realise the targets are those who were wrong in their assumptions and arguments such as Asli and Lee Kuan Yew."
Missed follow-ups (MF): Please clarify what were the "wrong" assumptions and arguments by Asli and Lee Kuan Yew?
TS: But do you have to keep brandishing the keris? Will you carry it again next year?
HH: " We will do whatever it takes to bring them (the Malays) to a point where they don't feel they are alienated in their own country I want non-Malays to understand that our doing this is not to take anything away from anybody Allowing the release will help the stability of the country. It won't drive off investments."
MF: How are Malays 'alienated' when they account for more than 60% of the population? And politically, when Umno calls the shots? Allowing Umno delegates to 'release' at the assembly by making racial threats, won't it 'drive off investments' from the country?
TS: What does all this say about race relations after almost 50 years as a nation?
HH: If you were talking to me when I was (Youth and Sports Minister), I'd say we could do it in our lifetime. But now I am more realistic because you get pulled in so many directions. You have to look at things from so many angles. It is very difficult being in a society that is very complex, but there is strength in diversity. If we galvanise that, we have something to offer the world.
MF: Huh? Please explain?
TS: Your deputy Khairy Jamaluddin had a controversial run-up to the assembly. How do you think he fared?
HH: He did very well he has learnt a lot but he's still got a lot more to learn. He's so lucky he has Pak Lah as his father-in-law.
MF: Aren't you lucky too that your late father was the country's third prime minister?
Journalistic excellence
OK, the follow-ups may not be the best ones. Nevertheless, the point is journalism's more than setting up a Q&A, getting the story and transcribing the answers. Good journalism comes from thinking journalists. Journalists who would claim pride in the papers they represent. And papers that have a tradition of publishing stories, and commentaries of significant depth that a new generation of reporters can emulate as a model of journalistic excellence.
Chay Hofilena, an investigative journalist and educator at the Asian Center for Journalism at Ateneo University in Manila says in her commentary for my book-in-progress on 'Best Practices in Asian Journalism': "There is little time for reflection or constructive criticism of the work that is churned out on deadline. There is little debate about the rightness or wrongness of editorial decisions because harmony in the newsroom is paramount. There is little opportunity for peer criticism because journalists are part of a small community whose members are bound to bump into each other during coverage.
"The unspoken rule, especially in Asia, is: better to be silent than to be critical lest one be perceived to be too self-righteous. Public criticism of colleagues in the profession is something that many Asian journalists are not completely comfortable with. Indeed, journalists sometimes behave as if they were part of a fraternity."
Freedom to think
The impressionistic content analysis of the Q&A shows that the answers you get depend on the questions you ask. Padma Iyer, special projects editor at The Australian newspaper in Sydney, has this to say on how mid-career journalists need continuing training, and extra-media competition, to produce more insightful journalism:
"What is guaranteed to journalists, even under controlled regimes, is the freedom to think about superior ways of engaging with the task of content gathering and presentation. Journalism education addresses this freedom at the individual level, and develops it by identifying key questions a journalist can ask."
"The answers inevitably undergo a process change before they can be broadcast or published," Iyer says. "They may be adapted to 'suit' the audience, as the publication perceives it to be, or they may be 're-angled' to fit in with the flow of news. Even if the results are completely ignored for space reasons, the questions deserve to be asked, and this task is truly a journalist's metier."
What can be done to reclaim journalism's once noble task to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable? Enlightened editors and reflective journalists, who ask what their readers would ask if they had the opportunity to walk the corridors of power.
With talks of a merger between NSTP and Utusan Melayu happening soon, one can only imagine the wildfire spread of protocol journalism and bland uniformity of published political views. Could it get any worse than what it is now?
But, aren't you also lucky your father was a prime minister? Sounds like a good question. But, going by mainstream media rules, curly questions are seldom asked of our ministers.
Critical readers with a good sense of right and wrong would have been chafed at The Star's muted Q&A with Hishammuddin Hussein. Yawn. 'The people's paper' has again shown its penchant for protocol journalism. Where was the journalistic insight at a time when public appetite was perhaps at its peak for a context to the Umno assembly theatrics.
Mustafa K Anuar, a learned colleague and joint-coordinator of Charter 2000-Aliran describes the "unquestioning acceptance of the utterances of public officials" as bad journalism.
Without any indication of whether the Q&A was conducted via email or face-to-face at the minister's office, one wonders if "cue journalism', as Mustafa terms it, has become pass in the mainstream papers? 'Cue journalism', Mustafa explains, are stories that wait "for the 'clearance' from the powers-that-be" before they're published.
Aren't you lucky as well?
Let's revisit The Star's Q&A and see what follow-ups could have been asked: The Star (TS): The target seemed to be non-Malays rather than Umno's political opposition.
Hishamuddin Hussein (HH): "if you read my speech in detail, you will realise the targets are those who were wrong in their assumptions and arguments such as Asli and Lee Kuan Yew."
Missed follow-ups (MF): Please clarify what were the "wrong" assumptions and arguments by Asli and Lee Kuan Yew?
TS: But do you have to keep brandishing the keris? Will you carry it again next year?
HH: " We will do whatever it takes to bring them (the Malays) to a point where they don't feel they are alienated in their own country I want non-Malays to understand that our doing this is not to take anything away from anybody Allowing the release will help the stability of the country. It won't drive off investments."
MF: How are Malays 'alienated' when they account for more than 60% of the population? And politically, when Umno calls the shots? Allowing Umno delegates to 'release' at the assembly by making racial threats, won't it 'drive off investments' from the country?
TS: What does all this say about race relations after almost 50 years as a nation?
HH: If you were talking to me when I was (Youth and Sports Minister), I'd say we could do it in our lifetime. But now I am more realistic because you get pulled in so many directions. You have to look at things from so many angles. It is very difficult being in a society that is very complex, but there is strength in diversity. If we galvanise that, we have something to offer the world.
MF: Huh? Please explain?
TS: Your deputy Khairy Jamaluddin had a controversial run-up to the assembly. How do you think he fared?
HH: He did very well he has learnt a lot but he's still got a lot more to learn. He's so lucky he has Pak Lah as his father-in-law.
MF: Aren't you lucky too that your late father was the country's third prime minister?
Journalistic excellence
OK, the follow-ups may not be the best ones. Nevertheless, the point is journalism's more than setting up a Q&A, getting the story and transcribing the answers. Good journalism comes from thinking journalists. Journalists who would claim pride in the papers they represent. And papers that have a tradition of publishing stories, and commentaries of significant depth that a new generation of reporters can emulate as a model of journalistic excellence.
Chay Hofilena, an investigative journalist and educator at the Asian Center for Journalism at Ateneo University in Manila says in her commentary for my book-in-progress on 'Best Practices in Asian Journalism': "There is little time for reflection or constructive criticism of the work that is churned out on deadline. There is little debate about the rightness or wrongness of editorial decisions because harmony in the newsroom is paramount. There is little opportunity for peer criticism because journalists are part of a small community whose members are bound to bump into each other during coverage.
"The unspoken rule, especially in Asia, is: better to be silent than to be critical lest one be perceived to be too self-righteous. Public criticism of colleagues in the profession is something that many Asian journalists are not completely comfortable with. Indeed, journalists sometimes behave as if they were part of a fraternity."
Freedom to think
The impressionistic content analysis of the Q&A shows that the answers you get depend on the questions you ask. Padma Iyer, special projects editor at The Australian newspaper in Sydney, has this to say on how mid-career journalists need continuing training, and extra-media competition, to produce more insightful journalism:
"What is guaranteed to journalists, even under controlled regimes, is the freedom to think about superior ways of engaging with the task of content gathering and presentation. Journalism education addresses this freedom at the individual level, and develops it by identifying key questions a journalist can ask."
"The answers inevitably undergo a process change before they can be broadcast or published," Iyer says. "They may be adapted to 'suit' the audience, as the publication perceives it to be, or they may be 're-angled' to fit in with the flow of news. Even if the results are completely ignored for space reasons, the questions deserve to be asked, and this task is truly a journalist's metier."
What can be done to reclaim journalism's once noble task to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable? Enlightened editors and reflective journalists, who ask what their readers would ask if they had the opportunity to walk the corridors of power.
With talks of a merger between NSTP and Utusan Melayu happening soon, one can only imagine the wildfire spread of protocol journalism and bland uniformity of published political views. Could it get any worse than what it is now?
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