Columns are dungeons
Prominent commentators and editorial writers are preachers who have lost their faith, and as such, they are to be pitied. A paradoxical plea for less opinion-mongering and more realism in the media.
Column Commentators and editorialists are preachers who have fallen away from the faith and as such are to be pitied. A paradoxical plea for less opinion-making and more realism in the media.one of the questions you never want to have answered in life is what senility feels like: do you notice it when it starts? And if so: Are you the first to notice it, or do others notice it first? And how do you know that it hasn't already started? Nobody can be unafraid of this question, least of all journalists. There are simply too many examples with names and faces. Journalists are forced to publish until they die (at least professionally): Their senility thus becomes a public spectacle.
It usually starts gradually. The craft works almost to the end. The sentences, arguments and punchlines still roll out. Nevertheless, something is missing. It's the old melody - only it sounds like it's coming from a music box with an overstretched spring. And soon everything smells of decay and decomposition.
Premature senility seems to strike the best and most powerful in the industry like a curse: current and former editors-in-chief, sought-after experts, reporters who once commanded respect. Examples? You know enough.
Statistically speaking, the mental decline of the profession's most famous people is far too frequent to be attributable to individuals. Consequently, the problem is not a personal one, but a structural one: our best people are being rushed into an impossible task. In fact, the diagnosis can be summed up in one word. It is "opinion".
The dangerous thing about one's own opinion is that it is overrated. Disastrously, it is seen as a central component of personality. Yet there is little that is more impersonal and random. Opinions grow as automatically as hair. You have countless of them, whether to
Sex, cell phones or world politics.
And that's okay. After all, life is neither a philosophy seminar nor a quiz show. The only thing that's not okay is when nonsense is published. Of course everyone has opinions that are interesting and relevant: opinions that are backed up by real knowledge and real passion. But how many are there? A dozen at most. Too few for a professional life anyway.
It is not for nothing that the letter to the editor is considered the lowest genre of journalism: opinion is free here and is not paid for. This makes it all the more unfathomable that the opposite applies to the same product in the form of columns, commentaries and editorials: just because a name with a photo is writing here.
Every week, talented people write about topics where you can't find any other
The result may be provocative, even intelligent. The result may be provocative, elegant, even intelligent, but it will always just be the word on Saturday: a sermon without faith, prejudice in sauce.
The antidote to opinionated nonsense is called research or reportage. What they have in common is that none of the assumptions made at the desk can be confirmed outside. This not only appears more honest, but above all more interesting. "Little," as the roving reporter Kisch knew, "is more astonishing than reality."
The deadly thing about a career in journalism is that trainees write stories while the established writers drive themselves out of their minds line by line. Sure: from time to time you have to go easy on tired journalists and fire exhausted editors-in-chief. The only problem is that there is no rehabilitation program for them. So they shouldn't be put out on the street, they should be sent. Giving them journalist status means cooking them in their own sauce. Because columns, Mbwana, are dungeons.
PS: Have you noticed anything yet?
> Constantin Seibt is domestic and business editor at WochenZeitung (WoZ).
It usually starts gradually. The craft works almost to the end. The sentences, arguments and punchlines still roll out. Nevertheless, something is missing. It's the old melody - only it sounds like it's coming from a music box with an overstretched spring. And soon everything smells of decay and decomposition.
Premature senility seems to strike the best and most powerful in the industry like a curse: current and former editors-in-chief, sought-after experts, reporters who once commanded respect. Examples? You know enough.
Statistically speaking, the mental decline of the profession's most famous people is far too frequent to be attributable to individuals. Consequently, the problem is not a personal one, but a structural one: our best people are being rushed into an impossible task. In fact, the diagnosis can be summed up in one word. It is "opinion".
The dangerous thing about one's own opinion is that it is overrated. Disastrously, it is seen as a central component of personality. Yet there is little that is more impersonal and random. Opinions grow as automatically as hair. You have countless of them, whether to
Sex, cell phones or world politics.
And that's okay. After all, life is neither a philosophy seminar nor a quiz show. The only thing that's not okay is when nonsense is published. Of course everyone has opinions that are interesting and relevant: opinions that are backed up by real knowledge and real passion. But how many are there? A dozen at most. Too few for a professional life anyway.
It is not for nothing that the letter to the editor is considered the lowest genre of journalism: opinion is free here and is not paid for. This makes it all the more unfathomable that the opposite applies to the same product in the form of columns, commentaries and editorials: just because a name with a photo is writing here.
Every week, talented people write about topics where you can't find any other
The result may be provocative, even intelligent. The result may be provocative, elegant, even intelligent, but it will always just be the word on Saturday: a sermon without faith, prejudice in sauce.
The antidote to opinionated nonsense is called research or reportage. What they have in common is that none of the assumptions made at the desk can be confirmed outside. This not only appears more honest, but above all more interesting. "Little," as the roving reporter Kisch knew, "is more astonishing than reality."
The deadly thing about a career in journalism is that trainees write stories while the established writers drive themselves out of their minds line by line. Sure: from time to time you have to go easy on tired journalists and fire exhausted editors-in-chief. The only problem is that there is no rehabilitation program for them. So they shouldn't be put out on the street, they should be sent. Giving them journalist status means cooking them in their own sauce. Because columns, Mbwana, are dungeons.
PS: Have you noticed anything yet?
> Constantin Seibt is domestic and business editor at WochenZeitung (WoZ).
