The peril of reporting in the Age of Outrage

I admit that half the entertainment value in reading the news online is found in the comments after a story.

There’s a perverse pleasure in seeing people lose their minds, particularly over things that don’t matter. For instance, the New York Times ran a recipe for Texas chili awhile back. One reader was outraged there were beans in it. This devolved into how the Yankees don’t understand the South, and suddenly they were back to fighting the Civil War. Over chili.

What’s less amusing, in the Age of Outrage, are complaints about why a story exists in the first place or the motives of the media outlet dispersing it.

Here’s an article the Saskatoon StarPhoenix posted on Facebook this week: “Canadian doctors group warns about the adverse effects of medicinal marijuana.” The Canadian Press was reporting on an advisory by the Alberta College of Family Physicians. There was a lack of research on medical marijuana, the association said. In fact, there was more evidence of it causing “adverse events” than there was of it helping.

The story quoted the physician behind the advisory, in addition to Health Canada and the head of the Canadian Medical Cannabis Council.

I doubt the StarPhoenix posted the story because it thought the Alberta doctors were right. But the article was timely, amid all the interest in medical marijuana, the growing economic clout of producers and the impending legalization of weed.

People read it and some objected, which is fine. But I was shocked and saddened by what they objected to.

“The writer who wrote this should be ashamed,” commented one reader. “These doctors should be ashamed. And the Star Phoenix should be ashamed of publishing this uncritically.”

A line is being crossed. “The writer should be ashamed”? What are you talking about? It’s news. A reporter reported about a report. That’s what they do.

Another comment: “What is shameful is that this fear mongering is perpetuated in print by the StarPhoenix and any other ‘news’ source as being factual.” News has never been more pervasive or, I would argue, misunderstood. Some people don’t know the difference between a news story, a column, an editorial or an ad. I wrote a column recently on my antipathy toward the band the Eagles and someone objected to my “review.” Sometimes it’s our fault for not labelling things, but seriously, how obvious do you have to be?

What sustains the Age of Outrage? A theory: People are most comfortable reading things they agree with, like the opinions of hand-picked and curated “friends” on social media. Whatever muscle people used to have for reading things that challenged their world view has atrophied.

Dovetailing perfectly is the ease with which they can respond without a filter or second thought. In that cloud of outrage, they want the source of the opposing view extinguished, whether it’s the person quoted in the story, the person who wrote it or the outlet that distributed it. Hence the ultimate insult, calling the StarPhoenix a “news” source in quotations. How Trumpesque.

It’s interesting to me that you can’t take a pop can back for recycling without seeing a sign that says “verbal abuse will not be tolerated.” Not so in my esteemed profession. It’s more like “verbal abuse assumed and encouraged.” The mindset of “I respect your opinion but I disagree” is now apparently as old fashioned as the Queensberry Rules of Boxing.

To summarize: a news story isn’t an opinion, an opinion isn’t a news story and what you just read here (maybe not past the headline) was a column.

Now, can we get back to arguing about chili?