First thing I learned at journalism school is that the mission is objectivity. Find the news and research and report all the angles of the facts. Never give your opinion. Make impartial judgments. Never let your emotions or opinions or prejudices show in what you write. Inform in a neutral and fair fashion. Be impartial, non partisan, truthful and free of bias. Stick strictly to the what, when, where, who, why and how.

Today, so called journalists seem to invent their news, and seldom do they explain WHY something is happening. Facts? What is that?

We were taught to research and learn about the subject of the news. The more a journalist knows about the news, the better his/her articles will be able to correctly inform the public about what is going on.

And that is the real journalism: inform. Let your reader or listener or viewer decide what they think about the facts you are reporting. Don’t distort facts through your own filters.

Journalism is not trying to change what people believe through insisting in false news. Also, repetition of false news can dangerously transform society to whatever the owners and investors of a newspaper, radio or network want. (That is called editorializing!)

I love technology and how fast the news can reach the public today. However technology, and especially social media, also spreads lies, fake news and accusations without any basis. Technology encourages evil-intended people to poison others with innuendos and half truth.

Another important thing I learned is that, when you are writing your news, you should start and finish with the subject of the information. In other words, the head and the legs of your article need to emphasize what the information is all about. This is so that if a person is listening to the news on the radio or watching it on TV, and did not hear the first part of the news, the person will know what the information is about, when that particular news ends. The body of the information contains the details and makes the reader, listener or viewer understand the who, the when, the where, the how, and, if possible, the why of the information.

Today I find myself trying to guess what they were talking about if I did not start at the beginning of a broadcast. In other words, I learned to tell people first what the information is going to be about, then inform them, and then repeat what the information was about.

That also helped me later as a professor.