One of the great Freudian slips of all time was uttered by the New York Times’ former editor Howell Raines a few years ago, concerning the Times’ push for greater diversity in the newsroom:
“This campaign has made our staff better and, more importantly, more diverse.”
But how diverse is the culture of the typical newsroom? On Hugh Hewitt’s Thursday show, Mark Steyn had some fascinating comments on the monolithic groupthink that pervades the legacy media:
I was once, a couple of years back, I was talking to a couple of journalists in New York, and they were asking whether I was going to be back in town for something. I said I wouldn’t be able to, because I was going hunting. And they were stunned. Their jaws hit the floor.
HH: Yes, stunned.
MS: Now millions of Americans own guns. Millions of Americans are evangelical or Christian. Millions of Americans oppose abortion. But how many of those millions of Americans would find kindred spirits in the average New York Times or Washington Post or CBS Newsrooms?
HH: Exactly. When I was at the Columbia School of Journalism last week, I quizzed a group of students, sixteen, how many owned a gun? None. How many had been to church in the last month? Three. How many voted for Kerry? All but three who were not American citizens. It is an intake valve that is permanently stuck on left of center. And as a result, that’s what happens to the media.
What’s the cure? Tough to complain about groupthink looking over the profiles that have been going up over the past few weeks over at Pajamas Media. Any consortium that includes David Corn, Tammy Bruce, Baldilocks and myself, well…
To paraphrase Howlin’ Wolf, and his prodigies, the Rolling Stones, got media diversity if you want it.
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