Did we just experience the hardest decade in journalism? Reflection 12

By: Makaila Gaston

The article, Did we just experience the hardest decade in journalism? discusses the changes that journalism has endured over the past ten years.

It's interesting because Joy Mayer, who taught print design at the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism ten years ago, believes that her career focus has now shifted to defending journalism’s relevance. Maybe I’m naive because reading this article definitely opened my eyes. Maybe because I am a journalism student but I’ve always believed that journalism is an important part of society, its structure and its preservation. However, it makes more sense the more I think about it.

The article talks about some of the things that contributed to this. For one, newsrooms shrank significantly from 2008-2017. The author asked 15 journalists, all at different points in their careers, “What’s the biggest change you’ve seen journalism go through in the last decade?” The answers pointed at Social Media.

After giving it some thought, I believe a contribution that also contributed to the “decline of journalism” which wasn’t discussed in the article is the rise of tabloids, especially social media tabloids. In the rise of social media, most people prefer to get their news this way and it's now become so sensationalized, that traditional journalism sort of became obsolete in some peoples’ minds.

In a way these organizations have turned journalism into a joke because these days when you think of journalism, you don’t think of it in the true and traditional sense, you think of this. Is this even Journalism? The simplest definition of Journalism by Google is “the activity or profession of writing for newspapers, magazines, or news websites or preparing news to be broadcast.” These social media tabloids are preparing news to be broadcasted. So, is it considered Journalism? That can be argued.

I believe that if Journalism were to ever disappear, the world would go mad. Journalism is one of the foundations of our society. American society has an unconscious need to be informed (which is just one reason why we’re always in everyone’s business.)

Good questions to begin asking is, what can we do to save Journalism? Also, if we cannot save traditional journalism, how can journalists evolve? This may be something to consider especially as technology continues to progress.