April 23, 2021

An antidote for the aversion to good news.

First, thanks to the many supportive comments on the missed GR. I received more likes and positive comments than I ever have. Motivates me to miss more weeks :-). This week, because of the historic trial in Minnesota, I felt a comment was called for.

I was both amused and troubled by the lead story in Wednesday’s “The Morning,” The New York Times daily email newsletter. It speaks volumes about our era. The headline read: “Derek Chauvin, convicted of second-degree murder, is the exception of exceptions.” It went on to report, “Chauvin’s conviction will not automatically signal a new era of police accountability.”

And this regarding a story that is profoundly good news.  A white police officer convicted of murdering a black man was given a fair trial. He had a competent lawyer. He faced a capable prosecutor. He was tried before a jury of his peers. The legal process was patient and careful, and by all accounts the guilty verdict was fair.  We’ve seen how justice can get thwarted in the best of systems, especially for African-Americans. But it worked. And it will put a man behind bars who deserves to be there. And it will, as the incident and trial already have, prod more humane law enforcement policies for years to come.

But if there’s a gray cloud to avert our gaze from this silver lining, I’ve found that The Times can be especially good at spotting it some days. In this instance, the newspaper itself did a more balanced job on its front page than did the newsletter, which I had imagined is supposed to reflect the newspaper’s front page. Apparently not. The habit, however, is widespread in the media: Over the past couple of months, Chicagoland’s Daily Herald, has run headlines like “Thousands of Elderly Get First Vaccine. But Minorities Still Lag.” Columnists and opinion writers, of course, are especially tempted to focus on the dark clouds. (I write as one who has succumbed to this temptation more than I like to admit.)

When it comes to certain topics, the news media is afraid of good news. There are many reasons for this. One is the long-standing media aphorism: “If it bleeds, it leads,” meaning bad news sells. So we should not assume that the daily news gives an accurate picture of the state of the world.  Instead, it’s a picture of the bad news that editors think is important enough to publish. There is, of course, more bad news they have refused to cover (note how, contra daily COVID-19 updates, they never update us on the number of the unborn who have been killed.)  

There is also this: Many news outlets now believe that one of their main jobs is to promote social justice, and of course, only on a few issues, mostly to do with individual rights of one minority or another (well, except for the unborn). But promote they must. It used to be that news outlets thought it sufficient to report bad and controversial news fairly and accurately, and if memory serves me correctly, a higher percentage of columnists eschewed vitriol for careful analysis. Now there is the self-imposed demand to put every story “into context,” which usually means to highlight failures regarding a social justice issue.

What this means in practice is illustrated perfectly by the recent NY Times newsletter. Because racial justice is a high priority with the editors (yes!), they simply cannot let their guard down. Or better, our guard. They cannot celebrate a victory for justice and bask in another wonderful moment when our legal system works as it should. They must remind readers, in the headline and lede no less, that racial injustice is still a “big problem” and “there is much work to do.”

I have no objection to doing that in the course of the story. Or better, an accompanying story. But to do it in a headline and lede—well, it just turns news into browbeating. Can we have one day in which we just celebrate some good turn of events? It’s as if journalists are praying to St. Francis’s alter ego:

Lord, make me an instrument of agitation,
Where there is pardon, let me sow injury,
Where there is union, discord,
Where there is hope, despair,
Where there is joy, sadness.

This is no reason to stop reading the news. How can we intelligently love our fellow citizens if we don’t stay abreast of current events, so that we can intelligently vote and give ourselves wisely to worthy causes?

But by its very nature, the news media, along with the good it does, also inadvertently inculcates vices in us, like anxiety, anger, and despair. First, journalists are trained to look for bad news and what’s missing—thus one reason cynicism pervades news rooms and even the hallways of Christian news outlets. It’s a moral hazard of the job. And second, many news writers imagine the main way to motivate people to do good is by stoking anger and frustration with the way things are. This is one of the sad fruits of secularization, which has forgotten the keen insight of many religions in recognizing that there are better ways to motivate people for the long haul.

Thus the continuing need to spend time with sources that nurture faith, hope, and love. And to pray in the spirit of the great saints:

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace; 
Where there is hatred, let me sow love; 
Where there is injury, pardon; 
Where there is doubt, faith; 
Where there is despair, hope; 
Where there is darkness, light; 
And where there is sadness, joy. 

O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console, 
To be understood, as to understand,
To be loved, as to love, 
For it is in giving that we receive, 
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned, 
And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life. 
Amen.

Grace and peace,

Mark Galli
mark.galli.com