How we will survive without newspapers

reason.com

2 pointscwan2 comments

> Newspapers, their passionate boosters maintain, are a kind of civic Pilates, the institution that keeps the core of our democratic republic as tight and toned as Megan Fox’s midsection. TV news can show us war zones, and radio news may offer us aerial assessments of traffic jams, but newspaper news does the real heavy lifting of journalism. It sorts fact from rumor. It shines light on government murk and corporate malfeasance and helps our citizenry make informed and rational decisions. Without healthy newspapers, we’re just Myanmar with better department stores and less stylish military uniforms.

How strawmanish. It might even be possibly true if only newspapers resorted to journalism.

"Newspapers never systematically reviewed school-teachers, for example, and now they’ve been scooped by the angry third-grade muckrakers who post at RateMyTeacher.com."

Wait, what? I had to stop reading here. Someone else please finish and let me know if this was satire or not. If the answer is "not," and this guy honestly thinks "RateMyTeacher.com" is a positive indicator of the future health of journalism in America... well, I'll be glad I didn't waste my time with the rest of this article.

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