View all newsletters
Sign up for our free email newsletters

Fighting for quality news media in the digital age.

  1. Comment
June 5, 2020updated 30 Sep 2022 9:21am

Why I’m proud to be a member of the #scummedia

By Dominic Ponsford

A rather nasty anti-journalist tendency which has been simmering on social media manifested itself on the streets of London this week in the form of physical attacks on reporters.

An Australian Nine News reporter Sophie Walsh was grabbed live on air, another was chased down the street, and outside Downing Street journalists were hounded by protesters perversely shouting “fuck the Daily Mail”.

We were lucky that a freelance photographer was not more seriously hurt after being bottled and knocked out. He said there were “a lot of people baying for blood, saying ‘he’s Daily Mail, he deserved it'”.

It seems that pent up frustrations felt during three long months of lockdown are erupting into incidents of shooting the messengers who have been charged with sharing so much bad news.

How ironic that protesters at a Black Lives Matter protest should single out the Daily Mail – the paper which fought for years to secure justice for Stephen Lawrence, the young man killed in 1993 in the UK’s most notorious racially motivated attack.

The paper provokes visceral hatred from those on the left because of its role helping to secure Britain’s exit from the European Union with a strategy that at times blurred the lines between journalism and propaganda.

But former editor Paul Dacre also risked his own liberty with a 1997 front-page that photographed and named Stephen’s alleged killers and called them “murderers”.

Content from our partners
MHP Group's 30 To Watch awards for young journalists open for entries
How PA Media is helping newspapers make the digital transition
Publishing on the open web is broken, how generative AI could help fix it

The financial risk of being sued for libel was tangible, but the story was also potentially contempt of court which is a criminal offence for which the editor is personally liable.

Journalism is almost by definition imperfect. It is the first draft of history, produced to deadline with limited resources to the best of our abilities.

Yes journalists get things wrong (I felt it important that Press Gazette point out the charge of hypocrisy that our industry left itself open to when journalists breached social distancing rules in the clamour to interview and photograph Dominic Cummings).

But overall this pandemic has highlighted more clearly than ever before the vital role of the so-called #scummedia in holding government to account during the most perilous period our country has faced since the Second World War.

The best examples are highlighted here by Press Gazette in our Coronavirus Journalism Excellence Survey. If you would like to recommend any examples of great journalism during the pandemic please to so here before the final deadline of Sunday night.

They include the vital role of journalists in:

  • highlighting PPE shortages
  • exposing the hypocrisy of leaders and advisers flouting the social distancing rules they helped impose
  • revealing the extent of the death toll ripping through care homes
  • and dissecting the mistakes which have led to the UK having possibly the highest per capita death rate from coronavirus of any country in the world.

Journalists have done all this while, in many cases, taking pay cuts and picking up extra work from colleagues who have been furloughed.

They’ve also universally taken great pains to ensure the information they share is based on evidence and not hearsay.

And journalists have played a huge role binding communities together by highlighting the keyworkers who have kept the country going – especially at a local level. Without the news media it is doubtful that Captain Tom’s fundraising efforts would have been anything like as successful.

In many ways the growth of online media has democratised journalism and made it more accountable. We are all probably far better informed than ever before as a result.

But the total lack of regulation and accountability for the UK’s biggest media companies – the online platforms – has allowed toxic misinformation to spread and I fear the current attacks on journalists are a symptom of this.

Based on our industry’s performance during the coronavirus crisis I for one am proud to be part of what some call the #scummedia.

Topics in this article :

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

Select and enter your email address Weekly insight into the big strategic issues affecting the future of the news industry. Essential reading for media leaders every Thursday. Your morning brew of news about the world of news from Press Gazette and elsewhere in the media. Sent at around 10am UK time. Our weekly does of strategic insight about the future of news media aimed at US readers. A fortnightly update from the front-line of news and advertising. Aimed at marketers and those involved in the advertising industry.
  • Business owner/co-owner
  • CEO
  • COO
  • CFO
  • CTO
  • Chairperson
  • Non-Exec Director
  • Other C-Suite
  • Managing Director
  • President/Partner
  • Senior Executive/SVP or Corporate VP or equivalent
  • Director or equivalent
  • Group or Senior Manager
  • Head of Department/Function
  • Manager
  • Non-manager
  • Retired
  • Other
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
Thank you

Thanks for subscribing.

Websites in our network