Aubrey Wieber, a reporter for Salem Reporter.
I’ve always found it puzzling that we journalists get to dive head first into peoples’ indiscretions yet we ourselves remain guarded. We can challenge the factual accuracy of an elected official’s statements yet we so often hide from criticism of our own work.
As a wide-eyed, unexperienced reporter starting my career in rural Idaho, I was troubled by how often the hard work my newspaper published on a daily basis was cast aside as liberal propaganda. I saw the thoughtful, sometimes heated, debates reporters and editors had in the newsroom as they worked to balance a story.
I thought, if only the readers could see this side, they would have more trust in what we do. They would better understand our job.
I told my managing editor we should invite the public to the newsroom to grill us. He made a joke about how we should practice our active shooter drill first. I said we could do it at a café or bar. He reminded me most of our readers were Mormon, and said it sounded like a pain.
That editor remains a mentor of mine to this day, but he was wrong. That attitude has poisoned our industry and fueled the public’s distrust in the media. Media is stubborn, and the inability to evolve is plaguing the industry.
After leaving the Post Register in Idaho Falls, I worked for The Bulletin in Bend and the Salt Lake Tribune. I didn’t have the leadership role in those places like I did in Idaho, and largely kept my company strategy ideas to myself.
When I started at Salem Reporter, I again pitched this idea. This time, my boss agreed with me. He pushed us to have pint nights with the public, to be more engaging on Twitter, to write columns and personal messages to our subscribers. That’s when I realized that while my belief in media transparency is genuine, it’s shrouded in hypocrisy.
I am not an outgoing person. I am not comfortable with strangers or attention. The idea of writing a column gives me heartburn. I would much rather sit at my keyboard than engage with a reader, online or in person.
Two interactions with readers this week made me look more critically at that reclusiveness. One was an email pointing out a grammatical error, the other was someone asking me to cover something I didn’t feel was worth the time. My first inclination was to ignore them, or write a terse response about being too busy. Instead, I responded in an engaging way. I had a constructive conversation with both. They told me how they were subscribers and value Salem Reporter’s work.
It ended up being the inspiration for my dreaded column, and for me to do better.
So bring it on. Send emails. Call me. Talk to me in person or on Twitter. If I write something you don’t like, tell me. If you think I unfairly weighed one source over another, challenge me on it. If you think I’m doing a poor job covering state politics, tell me why. Likewise, let me know when I wrote something you liked.
Reporter Aubrey Wieber: [email protected] or 503-575-1251. Wieber is a reporter for Salem Reporter who works for the Oregon Capital Bureau, a collaboration of EO Media Group, the Pamplin Media Group, and Salem Reporter.
WILL YOU SUBSCRIBE? If you haven’t signed up for a digital subscription to Salem Reporter, please do so to support this kind of local news reporting, brought to you by a team of professional reporters. For $10 a month, you hire that team to work for you all month digging out the news of Salem. Sign up HERE.
