Whose truths are journalists telling?

"Well, I'm not sure what angle you're looking for. Is this quote what you want for your story?"

I was somewhat taken aback when I first heard my interview subject ask this question. Considering that a reporter's job is to be unbiased, it would be at best counterproductive and at worst unethical to go into a story with a specific agenda aside from gathering as much information as possible on a given subject.

This gave me pause. Is it so common a thing for reporters to seek only certain facts, rather than openly seeking a point of view in compiling a story, that people take it as a matter of course that a journalist would only be after a narrow range of information in regards to a story?

The familiar phrase "The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth" comes to mind. If a journalist drives toward only a certain slant, a particular angle, is that journalist leaving open the possibility of finding the "whole truth?" Or instead, does one-even inadvertently-allow oneself to narrow in on one aspect of a story to the point of exclusion of other facts or possibilities?

It is the journalist's duty to leave open all possibilities in order to obtain the most accurate set of facts possible.

This is not to say that a reporter pursuing information regarding the latest presidential election should ask questions about the weather. Of course, information gathering should be limited to that which is pertinent to the topic of the story.

However, journalists can and often will run the risk of narrowing that information gathering too much. Take, for example, an entirely plausible hypothetical scenario. There is a rumor that a well-known government official has been responsible for overpaying private contractors working for the government-contractors who happened to be, in many cases, large campaign contributors to said official.

We all know that corruption is commonplace among government officials, and these rumors, though not yet substantiated, make sense.

It is then the journalist's responsibility to ask questions that drive at new and different ways to find the damning pieces of evidence needed to confirm these rumors, in order to expose to the public this wrongdoing. Journalists serve the public by being watchdogs in this manner.

Right? Preconceptions can combine with the drive to expose for the public good (and the good ratings) such scandals, making this the pinnacle of reporting among many in the industry.

Possible personal bias aside, however, there is also the very reason the story would be worth covering. It is a scandal, that perhaps involves the taxpayers' money being spent wrongly. Definitely worth attention. And without this scandal, there really would not be much of a story to report-unless government contracts are suddenly considered interesting to the public-so why bother covering it?

This reason for coverage, though, can be just as harmful in limiting the information gathered as individual judgments. Combining the two can lead to our journalist inadvertently narrowing his focus not to the lines of, "Is there a cover-up, and if so what is the truth behind it?" but to, "How can I prove this cover-up and get to the facts behind it?"

I have heard this concept of approaching a story with specific coverage in mind expressed in the form of advice in determining what stories to assign at a newspaper: "Have an idea of the story's headline when it is first assigned."

This subtle shift in thought sets a tone for the story, even if the rumors are ultimately proven to be nothing more than just that.

The story itself then guides information gathering. It dictates what quotes are used where and how, in addition to what particular facts are sought, rather than allowing the facts discovered to guide the story's formation.

This is not to say that the media has a specific agenda. It is a hard case to make that any political party controls mass media, or that any one line of thought pervades it.

It simply points to a reporter's humanity. The majority of people who read or hear about a string of shootings and then learn that a suspect has been apprehended substitute the word convict for suspect, even before the trial.

Journalists are no different from any other person, and while they may strive to do their best to set aside such preconceived notions, such prejudice, it seems, can never fully be disregarded.

Then again, my own perceptions and observations led me to write this. Had I wanted to, I could find the questions to ask people to back it up with facts. But would those facts make this opinion the truth anymore than it is now?