In his final column, longtime writer Ross Abbott talked about the ideological bias of this section. As one of the opinion section editors last year and one of the section editors for Fall 2016, I want to take a second to talk about this section and our relationship with diversity.
To start with, we officially had 12 columnists on staff at the end of last semester. Five were reliably liberal, two were reliably libertarian and one was reliably conservative. The other four either avoided politics or had views that I, as their editor, can’t comfortably classify. Nine writers were male. All were white.
The section has undeniable diversity issues. But I’d peg them as more issues of demographic diversity than anything. That’s not unique here; nationwide, most column inches go to men and the nation’s top editorial boards are overwhelmingly white. Lack of representation nationwide has its own set of problems, but I want to focus on the paper for the rest of the column.
The reasons why we ended up here are complex, long-standing and partially my fault. But it’s worth changing that situation now. The section used to be called “Viewpoints,” and it’s a decent way of thinking about it. The editors select some people with views they think you should hear. When we say that all of the voices worth listening to on campus are white and most are male, we’re reinforcing some problematic things and frankly owe the student body something better.
Even if it wasn’t the ethical thing to do, it also opens up other subjects. There are things that never cross my mind because I don’t have to think about them due to demographics. I’m not going to write a column on them even if they definitely need to be talked about. So from my perspective, fixing race and gender problems in the section is a high priority for next year.
Ideological diversity is also needed, but with some caveats.
American media traditions have historically prized ideological balance, presenting both sides and implying that the truth is somewhere in the middle. Ideological balance and reducing “bias” is a worthy end goal simply because it is.
Under normal circumstances, this might be a noble idea. There are many issues in politics that simply come down to what we choose to value as a society, or deciding between two roughly equally well supported avenues of doing something. Should we invest a given amount in defense or infrastructure? How do we reduce homelessness? The questions don’t have easy, “right” answers. In the absence of truth, we have opinion.
We are increasingly not living in normal circumstances. A handful of matters where one side is objectively true are disputed as matters of “opinion.” These include human-influenced climate change, the theory of evolution, the president’s birthplace and religion, vaccines causing autism, genetically modified organisms not being fine to consume, transgender people being rapists, immigrants committing a disproportionate amount of crime, New Jersey Muslims cheering on 9/11, the Islamic State pouring over the Mexican border and others.
Some of these are admittedly spread mostly by Democrats. The party’s rhetoric on gun control can also get nonsensical at points, such as pushing for an assault weapons ban while talking about the rate of crimes committed with handguns.
But for their flaws, there’s a world of difference between them and most elected Republicans. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders made mostly accurate statements throughout the campaign to justify their opinions. Donald Trump seems to be allergic to the truth. It’s not just him either; the second and third place Republican finishers have expressed doubts over climate change and evolution. Ted Cruz made the nonexistent threat of transgender rapists the centerpiece of his Indiana primary campaign. Marco Rubio implied President Obama is a traitor or hates America repeatedly during the campaign with no evidence cited.
The party as a whole continues to embrace an economic system that studies have often debunked. And worse yet, the party’s false claims are often designed to stir up resentment towards groups of people that are already marginalized, such as Muslims, immigrants, African-Americans or LGBT people.
I understandably would not feel comfortable running a column calling for the murder of a minority group. But at what point, by allowing and even seeking out content that encourages distrust toward or the removal of rights from those groups, would I be helping to create a culture of murder and hate? What opinions are not "opinion" so much as hate or fear with a couple nonsensical arguments attached? And can I really seek to bring new people on to staff to be more demographically diverse while also trying to bring on more people to argue they don’t deserve rights?
These are points where typical “opinions should be freely shared” arguments get murky, and as an editor I have to deal with them in concrete terms rather than the abstract. It’s also worth considering that the ideal of representing all sides was formed when journalists were mostly white men. It’s much easier to have a “debate” over things such as civil rights, women’s equality and same-sex marriage when none of the opponents are advocating that you, personally, shouldn’t have the same rights as everyone else.
So, with all of that in mind, I want to explain how the section might proceed. Before I do that, I want to note that I don’t have sole editorial authority over the section, the opinions expressed here are entirely my own, and I have no more control over our news section than the average reader does. These are only my thoughts on things that appear on the opinion page of the paper or in that section of the website. I also want to mention that I’m not that liberal by some measures. I supported John Kasich over Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton and plan on voting for Gary Johnson in November.
I would love to believe that if most readers saw two arguments of equal length with equally talented writers, one based in fact and the other running counter to it, they would be able to see the stronger argument and be swayed. As a writer, reader and editor I doubt this is the case. It’s why early scientific agencies rejected rhetoric in favor of facts and data alone.
Explaining the truth can take more time than a lot of little, plausible-sounding lies or half truths. Even if we keep the section’s old “no outright lies or inaccurate statements” rule in place, there’s a lot of misleading things you can say without being wrong. So readers could easily be confused by an argument with no fact behind it. The same goes almost doubly for arguments that play on prejudice.
So, ethically and editorially, I support some limited no-platforming. I don’t think the section should be used to promote views that demonstrably run counter to fact. Those are not opinion so much as a list of statements that are objectively wrong. As a curator of opinions worth your time to read, I also don’t see value in arguments for denying or restricting the rights of minority groups without a legitimate argument for doing so not rooted in prejudice.
I also support getting more people with libertarian or conservative views to write for us. There are good reasons we need conservatives. Moderation, perspective, deliberate consideration, individual liberty and prudent consideration of costs are necessary to keep the government working. Liberals can be bad at those things. Sometimes liberal politicians do things that deserve being called out; conservative writers are necessary for those times. Libertarians also have fascinating arguments most Americans haven’t heard before.
In fact, I often get bored reading liberal columnists just because there’s nothing new or interesting to test my beliefs against. Most of the columnists I read with any regularity are conservative. The political right still has sound arguments to make that I think you, as a reader, would be better off hearing. But treating unfounded fear-mongering and science denial as legitimate opinions worth discussing would be a disservice to you.
If you want to send a letter in response to this column or inquire about writing for the section, please email me at opinion@dailygamecock.com.