Posted by Eugene Volokh:
Stephen Bainbridge on <a
href="http://www.professorbainbridge.com/2005/02/reaping_the_whi.html";>the
Mainstream Media, Authority Figures, and Credibility</a>:
An excerpt:
My generation turned against authority in a huge way. And, it must
be said, with some justification. Watergate, Vietnam, and so on all
called into question the legitimacy of most authority figures. As
boomers entered the media, the [mainstream media] evolved from
bastions -- even defenders -- of authority into authority's chief
public critic. Woodward and Bernstein defined the wet dreams of
every subsequent journalist -- to take down authority figures. And
so it has been ever since, with every minor scandal being elevated
into "[fill in the blank]-gate."
But now this particular pigeon has come home to roost. . . . [T]he
media has reaped what it sowed. The media legitimated and
perpetuated the Sixties' radicals critique of authority. In doing
so, however, it sowed the seeds of its own loss of authority. Since
some of those seeds turned out to be dragons' teeth, the media is
now reaping the whirlwind. . . .
Read the [1]">whole post for more.
References
1. file://localhost/var/www/powerblogs/volokh/posts/<a%20href=
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