Street view: what's missing from press coverage?
October 19, 2010 — Remapping Debate recently visited Union Square Park in New York to sample what some people had to say about the state of press coverage today.
“All of them [reporters] do the same thing, ask the same questions; they don’t have the person thinking for…an answer. On BBC I hear exactly from the person, and I hear better questions from the reporter, more interesting questions.”
— Alex, Brooklyn, New York
“It would be nice if someone gave an unbiased report on what’s going on so you could see both sides and decide for yourself rather than feeling like you’re fed only one side of the issue, and you have to…watch two news channels to get the whole story.”
— Caitlin, Berkeley, California
“There should really be some more substantive discussion about issues, especially economic issues…and about the hard choices that really have to be made….”
— Jeff, Manhattan, New York
“I would like to see things covered in-depth. One thing I find kind of appalling is that, very frequently, there’s a very important news stor[y]…it’s covered in great depth, and weeks, months, even years later you never hear of an outcome, they never follow up on it…The story is done, and then it’s forgotten.”
— Edward, Staten Island, New York
Reporters “should be more passionate about letting people know, they should really want to let people know what’s going on.”
— Joshua, Brooklyn, New York
“It’s not a matter of covering something less or more, it’s a matter of covering something correctly, and with primary research, something that, you know, gives a full perspective…The press chooses hot topics instead of intelligent topics.”
— Stefano, Blanch, North Carolina
“We look at reacts to stuff all the time…We’re not really paying attention to ‘how are we going to fix this?’”
— Megan, Pennsylvania
“Some of the killings, I mean, we need to know about them…[but] it’s just depressing, I would say. [T]he issues that I see not covered — global warming, I guess, that’s one issue I’d like to know more about.”
— Leticia, Boca Raton, Florida
Photo credits: Lori Bikson