Yesterday, during a “research” session into the wonders of modern indie magazines and stylised reporting in general, I came across Delayed Gratification – a quarterly publication specialising in ‘Slow Journalism’, which aims to dissect the top news of the past three months with the privilege of hindsight and context. And honestly? This concept revealed a whole other realm of thought-provoking dilemmas of the modern digital age.
Now, what is Slow Journalism? It’s a relatively abstract idea, but it is, at its core, a stance against the decline of the quality of modern reporting. It is about exploring the full, complicated nature of the “breaking news” headlines, ethically, and without the pressure of beating other newspapers to it. It is about fact-checking the sources, ensuring the story is told fairly, and that the context it is in is considered and not plagiarised.
Many have commented on the current “failure” of the press; I would argue that it is, instead, transforming (albeit not always for the better). There are multiple factors at play here: firstly, we mustn’t forget that most publications have had to adapt to the pandemic, and are feeling the effects still, in terms of the decline of the physical newspaper, as well as the newfound race against social media. It is this digitalisation, in my opinion, that broadly caused a lot of today’s criticisms, and has resulted in our lack of trust in the media, and even partly the rise of ‘fake news’. Why? Because of the attention span of the modern user.
Ever since the process of obtaining information has started to become more and more instant, and the information itself more and more concise, that’s (understandably) become the norm of what the average smartphone user has come to expect. As the average smartphone user is also quite likely to read the news, the main publications chose, as any business would, to cater to said average customer by providing both the physical newspaper and the online article options. And if the only places to obtain that information were registered magazines, journals and newspapers with trained journalists and codes of conduct, news would continue to be obtained (mostly) fairly, ethically and within context. Except, that wasn’t the case. Social media discovered a novel way of entertaining their users, whilst also fitting into their busy and bustling lives. Twitter not only allowed but encouraged people to voice their opinions in 280 characters or less. The ‘virality’ that was cultivated by the instant messaging and the hashtags meant rumours and real information intertwined, and both were promoted equally by our insatiable desire to be ‘woke’, ‘educated’ and involved in current affairs – almost a subsection of FOMO – bringing us to where we stand today.
This cultural shift meant more and more young people were obtaining information from Instagram posts and trending pages, and less and less from credible newspaper websites, which started to struggle financially because of lost engagement. So, they changed their strategy. Instead of trying to maintain the reputation of a credible source, they were now trying to be the first to report; thus, quality became secondary.
How does Slow Journalism solve the problem, then, and should it replace all other practices? The movement tries to ensure that not only the current happenings are covered, but so are the consequences (short and long-term), as more and more information becomes available. Since the “first to it” element is gone, the journalists can obtain a more in-depth range of quotes and corroborate any claims, as opposed to plagiarising press releases without attribution (crediting the true author) – another surprisingly common issue with the mainstream media. Pioneering media channels like Tortoise or publications like Delayed Gratification that I mentioned at the beginning are usually subscription-based, reinvesting profits into reliable information sourced by experienced professionals, who aren’t on demanding deadlines and quotas. All this helps form an in-depth knowledgeable analysis of the event, and not “churnalism” – merely a regurgitation.
In conclusion, though, however holistic Slow Journalism has the potential to be, it shouldn’t become the main way we stay on top of current affairs. We need both the instant facts (for example the regular updates on the invasion of Ukraine), but also the contextual case studies (like a retrospective look on the development and the consequences of the Afghanistan war). To an extent, it is our responsibility as readers to hold such influential organisations accountable, but it is also our responsibility vary our sources, and to always question the news that we consume.
