Monday, July 28, 2003

One additional thought to 'The American Dream is a Blue Collar Job or Ought To Be' rant below...

Baron von Philadelphia yearns to found a School of Journalism. At the Baron's school, he would attempt to undo everything that the Columbia J. School and its ilk have done to American Journalism. Namely, they've professionalized it. They worship at the throne of Objectivity.

This, too, has it's genesis during the Viet Nam War era. Before Messrs. Woodward and Bernstein happened along, if you wanted to write for a paper, you took your high school degree and got a job at a local paper, and slowly worked your way up to being a reporter. Reporters were not professionals. Reporters were hacks. The newsroom resembled not a corporate board room, but a shop floor. The idea was to Get The Story, not to report the news.

In the UK, it's still pretty much this way. A journalist is not a respectable job. No one goes to Oxford aspiring for a job in Fleet Street.

Another good, decent, working class profession, wrecked by American Higher Education.


No comments: