Criticism
The concept of watchdog journalism is not free of criticism. The whole field of watchdog journalism has decreased over time and parts of journalism observers affirm that this period "is not a time of rich watchdog reporting in any media". This comes with the framework and the problem that many journalists tend "towards reflecting the status quo, rather than radically challenging it". This decrease, however, cannot lead to the presumption that there are not enough critical topics to write or report about. In fact, the opposite is the case and there is enough material to work with. While watchdog journalism in the US helped to force Nixon out of office in 1974, the situation presented itself differently in 2003. During the Iraq war part of the established media turned out to take more of a "pro-war attitude", without fully fulfilling their function of a critical watchdog. Many professionals in the media "appeared to feel that it was not their role to challenge the administration". However, critics direct the blame in party to the general public itself, since their interest in watchdog journalism is "inconstant and fleeting at times". They also see the role of watchdog journalism as "driven by its own interests rather than by a desire to protect the public interest".
Read more about this topic: Watchdog Journalism
Famous quotes containing the word criticism:
“It is the will of God that we must have critics, and missionaries, and Congressmen, and humorists, and we must bear the burden. Meantime, I seem to have been drifting into criticism myself. But that is nothing. At the worst, criticism is nothing more than a crime, and I am not unused to that.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“Unless criticism refuses to take itself quite so seriously or at least to permit its readers not to, it will inevitably continue to reflect the finicky canons of the genteel tradition and the depressing pieties of the Culture Religion of Modernism.”
—Leslie Fiedler (b. 1917)
“Parents sometimes feel that if they don’t criticize their child, their child will never learn. Criticism doesn’t make people want to change; it makes them defensive.”
—Laurence Steinberg (20th century)