Journalism has a harassment problem. The space in which journalists physically and digitally work is often hostile. This can take the form of sexual harassment, threats, and even physical violence from sources, strangers, readers, and viewers. But none of this is new. Journalists have always held the metaphoric football, and as a result, sometimes they get tackled.
However, this sports analogy has become less analogous. Journalists are mentally and literally being tackled while doing their jobs. Jeff German, a Las Vegas Review-Journal staff writer, he was killed on the front law of his home. In this murder, police charged Robert Richard Telles, a public administrator who was the focus of several investigative pieces by German that were critical of his managerial conduct. While this level of violence is currently limited here in the U.S. setting, general hostility is anything but rare.
For example, there is the increase in assaults on journalists as they take to the streets to cover the growing number of protests in the U.S. This is of course in addition to the deluge of messages they receive online, though this is even more pointed for women journalists compared to men.
This “harassment problem” is not getting better. In fact, the increasing discussions around it have appeared to empower many journalists to start sharing their stories even louder on the injustice they experience in a field that says this abuse is a “badge of honor.” Many are starting to push back against abusers by reporting them or highlighting them on social media platforms. Others are pushing back against management when they feel they are being put in an unsafe position. However, in a field that has seen shrinking staff sizes for years and near constant predictions of their demise, news managers are apprehensive to shift a model that would eliminate solo reporting or the hiring of staff to monitor online vitriol, leaving it very much up to the journalists to deal with themselves.
Nevertheless, the industry is changing — and somewhat in favor of the journalists. A recent conversation with a recruiter from a large media group revealed that the company is raising its minimum wage across the board and beginning to offer free health insurance to its journalists. Recruiters from news organizations are reaching out to colleges more than ever, allowing fresh-from-school journalists to begin their careers by reporting in cities and markets once reserved for veteran journalists.
As journalists begin to speak up about journalism’s harassment problem and push back against the toll it takes on them, they are similarly empowered to make choices that focus more on their personal well-being, and less on simply landing any job with a paycheck. I predict that we will see a push in the industry from journalists for more newsrooms and news organizations to start prioritizing their reporters’ mental and physical health.
As more journalists speak out, and more news organizations grow hungry for motivated and talented reporters, they will have to begin adjusting the norms that have historically ignored abuse as a sign that you are “doing good journalism” and shift more to a model that prioritizes the journalists over the stories. This includes a focus on the well-being of their journalists through growing resources and changes to norms on how abuse and mental health repercussions are handled.
Harassment and fear are causing many journalists to leave the industry, and the industry must do what it can to keep them reporting — both for the spread of important information, and for the health of a democracy that depends on that information to inform citizens.
Kaitlin C. Miller is an assistant professor in the journalism and creative media department at the University of Alabama.
Journalism has a harassment problem. The space in which journalists physically and digitally work is often hostile. This can take the form of sexual harassment, threats, and even physical violence from sources, strangers, readers, and viewers. But none of this is new. Journalists have always held the metaphoric football, and as a result, sometimes they get tackled.
However, this sports analogy has become less analogous. Journalists are mentally and literally being tackled while doing their jobs. Jeff German, a Las Vegas Review-Journal staff writer, he was killed on the front law of his home. In this murder, police charged Robert Richard Telles, a public administrator who was the focus of several investigative pieces by German that were critical of his managerial conduct. While this level of violence is currently limited here in the U.S. setting, general hostility is anything but rare.
For example, there is the increase in assaults on journalists as they take to the streets to cover the growing number of protests in the U.S. This is of course in addition to the deluge of messages they receive online, though this is even more pointed for women journalists compared to men.
This “harassment problem” is not getting better. In fact, the increasing discussions around it have appeared to empower many journalists to start sharing their stories even louder on the injustice they experience in a field that says this abuse is a “badge of honor.” Many are starting to push back against abusers by reporting them or highlighting them on social media platforms. Others are pushing back against management when they feel they are being put in an unsafe position. However, in a field that has seen shrinking staff sizes for years and near constant predictions of their demise, news managers are apprehensive to shift a model that would eliminate solo reporting or the hiring of staff to monitor online vitriol, leaving it very much up to the journalists to deal with themselves.
Nevertheless, the industry is changing — and somewhat in favor of the journalists. A recent conversation with a recruiter from a large media group revealed that the company is raising its minimum wage across the board and beginning to offer free health insurance to its journalists. Recruiters from news organizations are reaching out to colleges more than ever, allowing fresh-from-school journalists to begin their careers by reporting in cities and markets once reserved for veteran journalists.
As journalists begin to speak up about journalism’s harassment problem and push back against the toll it takes on them, they are similarly empowered to make choices that focus more on their personal well-being, and less on simply landing any job with a paycheck. I predict that we will see a push in the industry from journalists for more newsrooms and news organizations to start prioritizing their reporters’ mental and physical health.
As more journalists speak out, and more news organizations grow hungry for motivated and talented reporters, they will have to begin adjusting the norms that have historically ignored abuse as a sign that you are “doing good journalism” and shift more to a model that prioritizes the journalists over the stories. This includes a focus on the well-being of their journalists through growing resources and changes to norms on how abuse and mental health repercussions are handled.
Harassment and fear are causing many journalists to leave the industry, and the industry must do what it can to keep them reporting — both for the spread of important information, and for the health of a democracy that depends on that information to inform citizens.
Kaitlin C. Miller is an assistant professor in the journalism and creative media department at the University of Alabama.
Matt Rasnic More newsroom workers turn to organized labor
Basile Simon Towards supporting criminal accountability
Ståle Grut Your newsroom experiences a Midjourney-gate, too
Moreno Cruz Osório Brazilian journalism turns wounds into action
Jenna Weiss-Berman The economic downturn benefits the podcasting industry. (No, really!)
Eric Thurm Journalists think of themselves as workers
Cassandra Etienne Local news fellowships will help fight newsroom inequities
Peter Sterne AI enters the newsroom
Ayala Panievsky It’s time for PR for journalism
Cari Nazeer and Emily Goligoski News organizations step up their support for caregivers
Kaitlyn Wells We’ll prioritize media literacy for children
Dominic-Madori Davis Everyone finally realizes the need for diverse voices in tech reporting
Anita Varma Journalism prioritizes the basic need for survival
Stefanie Murray The year U.S. media stops screwing around and becomes pro-democracy
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Well-being will become a core tenet of journalism
Alexandra Borchardt The year of the climate journalism strategy
Al Lucca Digital news design gets interesting again
Tamar Charney Flux is the new stability
Joshua P. Darr Local to live, wire to wither
Larry Ryckman We’ll work together with our competitors
Jonas Kaiser Rejecting the “free speech” frame
Joni Deutsch Podcast collaboration — not competition — breeds excellence
Doris Truong Workers demand to be paid what the job is worth
Ryan Kellett Airline-like loyalty programs try to tie down news readers
Khushbu Shah Global reporting will suffer
Bill Grueskin Local news will come to rely on AI
Juleyka Lantigua Newsrooms recognize women of color as the canaries in the coal mine
Jim Friedlich Local journalism steps up to the challenge of civic coverage
Don Day The news about the news is bad. I’m optimistic.
Simon Galperin Philanthropy stops investing in corporate media
A.J. Bauer Covering the right wrong
Andrew Losowsky Journalism realizes the replacement for Twitter is not a new Twitter
David Skok Renewed interest in human-powered reporting
Nicholas Jackson There will be launches — and we’ll keep doing the work
Ryan Gantz “I’m sorry, but I’m a large language model”
Emily Nonko Incarcerated reporters get more bylines
Gordon Crovitz The year advertisers stop funding misinformation
Jody Brannon We’ll embrace policy remedies
Brian Stelter Finding new ways to reach news avoiders
Victor Pickard The year journalism and capitalism finally divorce
Emma Carew Grovum The year to resist forgetting about diversity
Jarrad Henderson Video editing will help people understand the media they consume
Wilson Liévano Diaspora journalism takes the next step
Gina Chua The traditional story structure gets deconstructed
Daniel Trielli Trust in news will continue to fall. Just look at Brazil.
Tim Carmody Newsletter writers need a new ethics
Cindy Royal Yes, journalists should learn to code, but…
Esther Kezia Thorpe Subscription pressures force product innovation
Pia Frey Publishers start polling their users at scale
Bill Adair The year of the fact-check (no, really!)
Taylor Lorenz The “creator economy” will be astroturfed
Jennifer Choi and Jonathan Jackson Funders finally bet on next-generation news entrepreneurs
Felicitas Carrique and Becca Aaronson News product goes from trend to standard
Elite Truong In platform collapse, an opportunity for community
S. Mitra Kalita “Everything sucks. Good luck to you.”
David Cohn AI made this prediction
Sarah Alvarez Dream bigger or lose out
Lisa Heyamoto The independent news industry gets a roadmap to sustainability
Anna Nirmala News organizations get new structures
Christina Shih Shared values move from nice-to-haves to essentials
Jim VandeHei There is no “peak newsletter”
Kirstin McCudden We’ll codify protection of journalism and newsgathering
Amy Schmitz Weiss Journalism education faces a crossroads
Peter Bale Rising costs force more digital innovation
Mael Vallejo More threats to press freedom across the Americas
Anika Anand Independent news businesses lead the way on healthy work cultures
Susan Chira Equipping local journalism
Amethyst J. Davis The slight of the great contraction
Michael Schudson Journalism gets more and more difficult
Eric Nuzum A focus on people instead of power
An Xiao Mina Journalism in a time of permacrisis
Rodney Gibbs Recalibrating how we work apart
Parker Molloy We’ll reach new heights of moral panic
Sue Schardt Toward a new poetics of journalism
Sarabeth Berman Nonprofit local news shows that it can scale
Errin Haines Journalists on the campaign trail mend trust with the public
Nicholas Diakopoulos Journalists productively harness generative AI tools
Paul Cheung More news organizations will realize they are in the business of impact, not eyeballs
Karina Montoya More reporters on the antitrust beat
Ariel Zirulnick Journalism doubles down on user needs
Josh Schwartz The AI spammers are coming
Walter Frick Journalists wake up to the power of prediction markets
Johannes Klingebiel The innovation team, R.I.P.
Laura E. Davis The year we embrace the robots — and ourselves
Sam Gregory Synthetic media forces us to understand how media gets made
Dana Lacey Tech will screw publishers over
Sarah Marshall A web channel strategy won’t be enough
Tre'vell Anderson Continued culpability in anti-trans campaigns
Burt Herman The year AI truly arrives — and with it the reckoning
Mauricio Cabrera It’s no longer about audiences, it’s about communities
Kathy Lu We need emotionally agile newsroom leaders
Mary Walter-Brown and Tristan Loper Mission-driven metrics become our North Star
Raney Aronson-Rath Journalists will band together to fight intimidation
Danielle K. Brown and Kathleen Searles DEI efforts must consider mental health and online abuse
Kaitlin C. Miller Harassment in journalism won’t get better, but we’ll talk about it more openly
Snigdha Sur Newsrooms get nimble in a recession
Eric Holthaus As social media fragments, marginalized voices gain more power
Kavya Sukumar Belling the cat: The rise of independent fact-checking at scale
Alex Sujong Laughlin Credit where it’s due
Megan Lucero and Shirish Kulkarni The future of journalism is not you
Christoph Mergerson The rot at the core of the news business
Janelle Salanga Journalists work from a place of harm reduction
Masuma Ahuja Journalism starts working for and with its communities
Joe Amditis AI throws a lifeline to local publishers
Mariana Moura Santos A woman who speaks is a woman who changes the world
Martina Efeyini Talk to Gen Z. They’re the experts of Gen Z.
Jessica Maddox Journalists keep getting manipulated by internet culture
Hillary Frey Death to the labor-intensive memo for prospective hires
Zizi Papacharissi Platforms are over
Ryan Nave Citizen journalism, but make it equitable
J. Siguru Wahutu American journalism reckons with its colonialist tendencies
Jaden Amos TikTok personality journalists continue to rise
Leezel Tanglao Community partnerships drive better reporting
Sue Cross Thinking and acting collectively to save the news
Sam Guzik AI will start fact-checking. We may not like the results.
Cory Bergman The AI content flood
Priyanjana Bengani Partisan local news networks will collaborate
Jesse Holcomb Buffeted, whipped, bullied, pulled
Sarah Stonbely Growth in public funding for news and information at the state and local levels
Richard Tofel The press might get better at vetting presidential candidates
Molly de Aguiar and Mandy Van Deven Narrative change trend brings new money to journalism
Dannagal G. Young Stop rewarding elite performances of identity threat
Upasna Gautam Technology that performs at the speed of news
Janet Haven ChatGPT and the future of trust
Jacob L. Nelson Despite it all, people will still want to be journalists
Surya Mattu Data journalists learn from photojournalists
Alan Henry A reckoning with why trust in news is so low
Sue Robinson Engagement journalism will have to confront a tougher reality
Anthony Nadler Confronting media gerrymandering
Julia Angwin Democracies will get serious about saving journalism
Rachel Glickhouse Humanizing newsrooms will be a badge of honor
John Davidow A year of intergenerational learning
Julia Beizer News fatigue shows us a clear path forward
Barbara Raab More journalism funders will take more risks
Eric Ulken Generative AI brings wrongness at scale
Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau More of the same
Shanté Cosme The answer to “quiet quitting” is radical empathy
Brian Moritz Rebuilding the news bundle
Kerri Hoffman Podcasting goes local
Alex Perry New paths to transparency without Twitter
Delano Massey The industry shakes its imposter syndrome
Andrew Donohue We’ll find out whether journalism can, indeed, save democracy
Francesco Zaffarano There is no end of “social media”
Michael W. Wagner The backlash against pro-democracy reporting is coming
Joanne McNeil Facebook and the media kiss and make up
Ben Werdmuller The internet is up for grabs again
Jessica Clark Open discourse retrenches
Alexandra Svokos Working harder to reach audiences where they are
Nikki Usher This is the year of the RSS reader. (Really!)
Mario García More newsrooms go mobile-first
Laxmi Parthasarathy Unlocking the silent demand for international journalism
Mar Cabra The inevitable mental health revolution
Nicholas Thompson The year AI actually changes the media business
Jennifer Brandel AI couldn’t care less. Journalists will care more.
Sumi Aggarwal Smart newsrooms will prioritize board development