Being a watchdog means we find a lot of faults in those we cover, which we describe in news stories that shine a light on outrageous government behavior and editorials that call elected leaders to account. When someone publicly finds fault with us, then, I think it only fair that we accept it with grace. My longstanding practice has been to remain silent in response to criticisms – to not use the power of our platforms to fire back. People should feel free to disagree with us without fear we will bully them. Separately, We have a fairly recent policy of not amplifying hateful and nonsensical statements made by politicians desperate efforts to get headlines. The last thing we want to do is use our platforms to spread baloney. It is with hesitance, then, that I wander down the path I’m taking with this column. It is about both criticism of our newsroom and inflammatory balderdash. But it also is about how your tax dollars are being spent, and I’ve never seen anything like it. A few weeks ago, I wrote a column about our work to measure the diversity of the sources we quote on our platforms. When we go out to speak with the general public or subject experts, we believe our sources should reflect the communities we cover. I’m talking about diversity by race, religion, gender, age and more. If want to know how the economy affects people, the answer might be different based on race, economic strata or other factors. Is a downturn harming Asians more than others? Hispanics? Are low-income people – often minority populations – bearing a disproportionate brunt? Or maybe it is a story about lakefront projects. Are they acceptable to people with disabilities? Unless we make an effort to reach people from a variety of backgrounds, we likely are not reflecting the full spectrum of thoughts from Northeast Ohio. We’re not alone in examining diversity. Nearly every employer is working to ensure it is welcoming to all, in the workplace and with customers. The police killing of George Floyd caused a reckoning across America, resulting in a massive self-examination and drive to end discrimination, even when it is unintentional. Our work to examine our sources seems to me to be an absolute good, something we should be doing, so you can imagine my surprise when the Ohio Senate published a vicious attack on it, deeming it “progressive think.” The Senate did this on a platform it created earlier this year called “On the Record – The Views the News Excludes,” which includes a podcast hosted by the senate president. It’s part of the official website for the Ohio Senate, paid for with tax dollars. We published a story about it a few months ago. The platform has been an intense critic of our coverage and platforms, and of me, specifically, for comments on our weekday news podcast discussion, Today in Ohio. I welcome it. As I say above, we accept criticism with grace. The blast about our source diversity is different. This is the Ohio government viciously attacking an employer for working to ensure it is fair. And using tax dollars to do so. What would the Senate prefer us to do – just talk to white men like most of them? Would they prefer we not seek the sentiments of Black or Hispanic people? How about Jewish or Muslim people? No? Women? Forget the LGBTQ community. Ohio’s elected Republican leaders already have villainised them through a variety of proposed legislation. Or, might our Republican state senators be afraid our readers will discover how lacking in diversity they are, as you can see by their photos in the website linked below? The attack on our source audit uses some warped logic to argue that we no longer seek facts. How you can make that deduction based on the column I wrote is way beyond my powers of logic, and it’s not at all true. As I said, I’ve never seen anything like this, and I’ve been a journalist for going on 44 years. A government spending tax dollars to attack a business for work to be welcoming -- publishing that attack on a government-operated website. The other shocker for me is that not one Republican senator has publicly disavowed it, which makes them complicit. The Republicans have a super majority in the senate. It is their website that is attacking a business for trying to do the right thing. Again, this is not about the senators taking issue with our reporting, podcasts or editorials. They do that plenty, and we welcome it. I’m not asking you to take my word for it. I hope you will read it for yourself. I’ve including the full text of the diatribe below, as it is a public document produced with your money. Decide for yourself whether this is an appropriate use of your taxes, or a proper function of government. When you look at the state tax withholding line item on your pay stub, is this what you imagine the money pays for? After you read it, maybe let your senator know what you think. Based on my email, I’m pretty sure a small percentage will agree with it, and those are probably the only ones that our current batch of senators will hear. But even if the rest of you are ignored, it’s worth letting them know what’s on your mind. You can reach state senators through this website: https://www.legislature.ohio.gov/members/senate-directory Here's what the Ohio Senate published on its official website: WHEN A LARGE NEWSPAPER EMBRACES A RACE-BASED AGENDA Cleveland Plain Dealer goes all in on identity politics as foundation of coverage By John Fortney October 17, 2023 On The Record If you, like so many others, question whether your local newspaper is relevant to your neighborhood and your life, look no further than what the Cleveland Plain Dealer and its online arm cleveland.com announced this week. The editor wrote a column outlining a new directive requiring reporters to retrieve race-based research on the people they interview. I’m not kidding. Read all about it here. “Reporters will ask anyone they speak with how they define their gender along with their race and ethnicity and the year they were born.” According to the editor, it is an attempt to bring more diversity to their reporting. Here’s a radical idea from me, a former political reporter, how about concentrating on bringing the facts to a story rather than quotas? This is exactly what I’ve been pointing out. Today’s newsrooms are now practicing advocacy journalism. The only things newsrooms should be advocating for are the facts. Not societal narratives and race-based opinions based on the ever-changing bar of so-called social justice. The Plain Dealer is working with another organization to compile the demographic information to help make sure their newsroom staffing is more reflective of the community in general. Well, there you go. That ought to do it. If I worked in that newsroom I would be applying for other jobs, because suddenly skin color, sexual preference, and radical gender identity are now more important to the newspaper than quality and competence. Ask yourself what skin color, sexual preference, or gender identity you want your brain surgeon, heart surgeon, or retirement planner to be? What was that you said? You want to make sure they’re competent? Because results matter? Wow, I didn’t realize you were so racist and radical. Time for you to be deprogrammed in the Hillary Clinton classroom of global elitists. So, for the next two weeks the paper’s poor reporters (yes, I still have some sympathy for a few of today’s reporters) will be asked to survey the people they interview so the data can be compiled through a branch of the American Press Institute called “Source Matters.” Its mission is to “track and improve the diversity of sources in your news stories.” What this tells me is what you and I have known for the better part of a decade. Print newsrooms have lost their way and are becoming irrelevant to the communities they cover. Facts matter. And as a matter of fact, qualifications of a source should always take precedence over the skin deep issue of diversity. Dr. Martin Luther King knew that decades ago when he emphasized the content of character over the color of skin. I used to tell my newsroom that a good story is a good story. Relevant, well written and founded in facts. In other words, not only do these editors not understand their audience. They are under the misconception that quotas are the answer. Maybe the Plain Dealer didn’t cover the story about the U.S. Supreme Court ruling race-based affirmative admissions policies unconstitutional in higher education. When a newspaper advertises $1 subscriptions for six months of content it shows how they can’t even give it away, and, if that’s the case, the business model will fail. Personally, I’ve decided to bypass the bulk of our messaging around the legacy media’s liberal filters. At some point, someone at the very top of these companies will be faced with a scenario when downsizing reporters, canceling print editions, and outsourcing the copy desk will no longer get the company to break even. When that happens, a simple question will be asked. Who decided to base the business model on quotas rather than compelling stories based on facts? By then it will be too late. Maybe it already is. This type of progressive-think has already allowed privately funded dark money blogs like the Capital Journal to pose as objective newsrooms as the old guard grinds to a halt, and goes the way of the printing press and the dodo. John Fortney
Director of Communications I’m at cquinn@cleveland.com. Thanks for reading | 