The Imagination of a Journalist
Bowler Hat Science from Matthew R Francis
Cynicism comes easy right now. Many of my ostensible colleagues in the political press have abdicated their responsibility to report on what’s going on, framing illegal actions by the American executive branch as just another partisan fight. Whenever we post something on social media to express anger and grief over the rapid destruction of civil rights or the social safety net or whatever else, a common response is “you’re surprised? the United States has always been bad, nothing has changed, you’re just [insult insult insult]!” This very morning, the President of the United States openly said that he is interfering in the New York City mayor elections.
So yes, there is a lot to be cynical about. After all, much of the population of the US has already been living in a police state: the expansion of ICE into an unaccountable Gestapo operating concentration camps is an increase in authoritarian violence, not something truly new. (I’m sure someone will tell me I’m still being too naive and actually helping the fascists, since that is also a common thing on social media.) To combat that cynicism — without veering into delusion — I’ve been thinking a lot about imagination.
Now journalists aren’t supposed to use imagination in our work, for good reason. In our job, we have to stay grounded in facts, and any speculation on the part of our sources must be reported as such. I would even argue that the failings of my anti-trans colleagues are because they look at the evidence in favor of trans healthcare and say “but what if things were completely different? could we justify the harms in this imaginary scenario?”: a misuse of imagination against reality if there ever was one.
However, imagination is not the same as making things up. At this knife’s edge of disaster, where we will fall off or get badly cut no matter what we do, it’s all the more important to imagine a future, a better reality than the one we experience. Journalists in particular need to imagine this future, not just because of self preservation in a nation where we’re called “enemies of the people”: when we say truth matters and that things don’t have to be this way, we wield imagination against cynicism and despair.
Again, I don’t mean make things up or spread disinformation. I mean we must hold on to the idea that what we write can matter. Even if we don’t change the hearts and minds of fascists (that would be delusional, let’s be honest), we remind ourselves and each other that our enemies are not all-powerful and don’t control what is true. Our imagination about a better world is what lets us push back against their blather about “alternative facts” and “fake news”, and blatant lies about the criminality of immigrants or trans people.
Two Cats and Tuba
Bowlerhattishly thine,
Matthew
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