“ANNOUNCER: Ladies and gentlemen, I have a grave announcement to make. Incredible as it may seem, both the observations of science and the evidence of our eyes lead to the inescapable assumption that those strange beings who landed in the Jersey farmlands tonight are the vanguard of an invading army from the planet Mars.”
The famous 1938 radio broadcast of Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds,” excerpted above, is remembered for causing widespread panic among listeners. After all, the thousands who tuned in widely assumed they were hearing live news bulletins about an alien invasion, right?
Not exactly.
Leading U.S. newspapers of the day show little evidence that the radio show caused hysteria. Instead, the accounts talk about a small group of people who didn’t understand they were listening to a radio play and set about spreading fear to thousands who hadn’t heard a single moment of the broadcast. Yet, this small but influential group isn’t part of our collective memory of the event.
Journalism professor W. Joseph Campbell takes on “War of the Worlds” and nine other legendary stories of media power — stories he’s convinced are media-driven myths — in “Getting it Wrong: Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism.”
According to Campbell, media-driven myths are well-known stories about or by the news media that are widely believed and often retold but which, on close examination, prove apocryphal or widely exaggerated. In other words, the “junk food of journalism.”
In a fascinating and detailed exploration of these cases, including Woodward and Bernstein’s role in taking down President Richard Nixon, Edward R. Murrow’s exposés of Joseph McCarthy and the Red Scare, and the effects of much-exaggerated Hurricane Katrina coverage, Campbell helps define the role media actually played.
While Campbell acknowledges that most people believe two young and ambitious Washington Post reporters brought down a corrupt president, he deftly shows how journalism’s contribution to Nixon’s fall was modest at best.
The president’s decline, he explains, was the consequence of his criminal conduct, which was exposed in the convergence of many forces. But it’s far easier to focus on two heroic journalists, says Campbell, than it is to grapple with the complexities of the Watergate scandal.
Therein lies one of the reasons we are so likely to believe media myths — they offer simplistic answers to complex issues. They also lead us to believe the news media are very powerful and sometimes even dangerous forces in society.
Campbell, who now teaches journalism at American University in Washington, D.C., is well-positioned to critique the news media. He spent 20 years as a newspaper and wire service reporter working around the globe. Campbell’s objective in taking on media-driven myths certainly is not to beat up the media for past failings (he believes journalists are scorned enough as it is). He’s just out to do what good journalism does — pique our interest, challenge our assumptions and set the record straight.
Campbell manages to piece together fascinating new details about events of the past, and lays out a convincing case for how we often draw hasty conclusions about significant moments and make heroes and villains out of those who have little to do with their outcome. The myths he identifies are worth revisiting, and not just to set the record straight. Doing so offers important lessons on being discerning consumers of what we read and hear in the news.
Bob Kustra is president of Boise State University and host of Reader’s Corner, a weekly radio show on Boise State Public Radio. Reader’s Corner airs Fridays at 5:30 p.m. and repeats Sundays at 11 a.m. on KBSX 91.5 FM. Previous shows, including an interview with Campbell, are online and available for podcast at http://radio.boisestate.edu/readerscorner.
