What the Experience of One Sports Journalist Can Tell Us About Media in Canada
On February 15th 2014, Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice punched his fiancée in the head in the elevator of an Atlantic City casino, knocking her unconscious. The casino’s cameras captured the incident, the details of which became known to the Ravens mere hours later. Sometime thereafter, the National Football League also became aware of Rice’s actions and the existence of the videos.
Precisely when the league came to know about the incident has engendered considerable controversy. In short, the league gave Rice a laughably tepid two-game suspension, after which video of the incident surfaced publicly. The league then went into damage-control mode, blaming Rice for not being forthcoming with them about the contents of the videos, absolving themselves of responsibility. Subsequent reporting, however, cast these claims into serious doubt. It has become clear that both the team and the league knew the true nature of the incident before Rice’s disciplinary hearing and before the videos became public. Despite this, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, in a post hoc attempt to justify the league’s insipid response and perfidious obfuscation, continued to maintain that the league was unaware of the true nature of the incident.
This situation evidently became too much for Bill Simmons, one of ESPN’s most popular personalities. On his podcast, which last year was downloaded over 32 million times, Simmons said:
“Goodell, if he didn’t know what was on that tape, he’s a liar, I’m just saying it. He is lying. I think that dude is lying. If you put him up on a lie detector test that guy would fail. For all these people to pretend they didn’t know is such f–king bullsh-t. It really is. It’s such f–king bullsh-t. And for him to go in that press conference and pretend otherwise, I was so insulted. I really was.”
In response, ESPN suspended him for three weeks, prohibiting him from writing, using twitter, or appearing on TV, radio, or podcast. Why was he punished in such a manner when ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith was suspended for only two days for suggesting that Rice’s fiancée contributed to her beating by provoking him? Why was he suspended for stating what the network’s own coverage had already implied? The answer, as many have already suggested, is the $15 billion “Monday Night Football” deal between the NFL and ESPN. Simmons was disciplined for being too critical of ESPN’s business partner. While ESPN’s coverage had presented the facts that would allow one to deduce the league’s duplicity, Simmons stated the case unequivocally. Punishing Simmons also sent an undeniable message to other reporters: keep the volume on criticism of the league low. In other words, disciplining Simmons created a chill effect on journalists in the company, reminding them to self-censor without having to issue explicit edicts constraining their coverage.
So, what do the trials and tribulations of one sports journalist have to teach us about real life?
There is an inherent danger when the subject of the news is also paying the bills.
Earlier this month it was revealed that Postmedia had purchased the Sun Media chain of newspapers. The purchase includes 140 weekly newspapers, 27 small market dailies, and 5 major daily papers. As a result, several cities, including Calgary, Edmonton, and Ottawa, will join Vancouver on the list of cities whose major news publications share a single owner. It will also give Postmedia about 30% of the Canadian newspaper market. The advantage for Postmedia is clear: by sharing content and centralizing aspects of their operations, the company can offer advertisers more eyes at a relatively lower cost to the media company.
That advertising revenue drives the media market is nothing new. Postmedia CEO Paul Godfrey stated as much in discussing the acquisition, saying that the acquisition will help drive increased digital and print advertising revenue. Increased reliance on advertising revenue creates a real danger that the interests of advertisers will restrict the scope of news coverage. The same chill effect that Bill Simmons’ suspension created for ESPN reporters can exist in media outlets reliant on large advertising clients. There is an inherent danger when the subject of the news is also paying the bills.
This chill effect can emanate from other sources as well. Dr. Robert Everton has closely analyzed the reporting in the CanWest Global newspapers (acquired by Postmedia in 2010) of one particular incidence of Israeli-Palestinian violence. Everton found that the papers, including the National Post and some of the country’s biggest dailies, were repeatedly mistaken about key facts. This was due, in part, to the fact that sources relied on for the stories were from an incorrect report from the Israeli military. Though the military acknowledged the account was mistaken, the CanWest papers failed to adjust their reporting or acknowledge their mistakes, instead continuing to run stories with plainly mistaken facts. That this happened against the backdrop of then CanWest owner Izzy Asper’s unequivocal support of Israel and outspoken criticism of anti-Israel bias in the media furthers the perception that coverage can be shaped by political or economic imperatives coming down, even implicitly, from the top of the organization.
That a chill effect on media coverage exists due to the influence of advertisers and the political views of media moguls should, I think, be taken as a given. Indeed, the argument in most quarters is not whether such an effect exists, but the degree to which it does. We should consume media understanding the limitations of any given outlet. One of the best ways to mitigate the potentially harmful effects of this reality, however, is to limit the monopolization of media sources. Greater diversity of ownership limits the impact that any one set of influences on coverage can have.
The acquisition of Sun Media will be reviewed by the Competition Bureau in the coming months. The experience of Bill Simmons is a stark reminder of why we should be very concerned about their findings.