<!-- wp:image {"id":199852,"sizeSlug":"large","linkDestination":"none"} --> <p>For <a href="https://usa.inquirer.net/category/fil-am">Filipino Americans</a>, paying attention to the news isn’t a hobby.</p> <!-- /wp:image --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>It’s survival.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>We come from a people who know what propaganda looks like.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>We know what happens when power controls the story.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>We know colonialism wasn’t just guns and soldiers. It was newspapers, schools, churches and official narratives telling us who we were supposed to be.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>That’s why what’s happening in American journalism right now should concern all of us.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:heading --> <h2 id="h-scott-pelley-is-not-heroic" class="wp-block-heading">Scott Pelley is not a hero</h2> <!-- /wp:heading --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>This week, many defenders of democracy found a new hero in Scott Pelley.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The longtime <em>60 Minutes</em> correspondent <a href="https://apnews.com/article/cbs-news-60-minutes-pelley-fired-db75daea29a1996f9db5e7951e6f5064">publicly criticized</a> the corporate direction of CBS News and the people now running it. He suggested journalism was being sacrificed to business interests and political pressure.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>A lot of journalists cheered.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Social media practically nominated him for Mount Rushmore.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Forgive me if I don’t join the parade.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>I knew Scott Pelley years ago when we both worked in Dallas television.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>He’s smart. Ambitious. Talented.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>He’s also very good at playing the game.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>That’s how television news works.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The people who rise to the top aren’t usually rebels. They’re survivors.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>They’re climbers.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>They understand power.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Pelley understood it better than most.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>So while many see his comments as an act of courage, I see something more complicated.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>He didn’t stop the train.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>He simply announced that the train was heading somewhere dangerous.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Important? Yes.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Heroic? Maybe not.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Let’s remember that Pelley spoke after decades of success, multimillion-dollar contracts and a career already secured.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>He risked something.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>But not everything.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:heading --> <h2 id="h-the-business-model" class="wp-block-heading">The business model</h2> <!-- /wp:heading --> <!-- wp:image {"id":199855,"sizeSlug":"large","linkDestination":"none"} /--> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Real courage in journalism often comes from people who don’t have pensions, prestige or a network protecting them.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>It comes from reporters who can actually lose their jobs.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>It comes from independent journalists who can be erased with a phone call.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>And let’s be honest.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>If an Asian American reporter, a <a href="https://usa.inquirer.net/192338/maria-ressa-to-be-honored-with-la-press-clubs-daniel-pearl-award">Filipino American</a> journalist or some young reporter of color had made the same stand years ago, would America have listened?</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Or would they have been labeled “difficult,” “angry” or “not a team player”?</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>That’s the part of this story that gets overlooked.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Because what Pelley described isn’t just a CBS problem.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>It’s an industry problem.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Corporate interests increasingly outweigh journalistic values.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>News divisions used to exist partly as a public service.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Today they’re expected to perform like entertainment properties.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>If outrage sells, produce outrage.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>If fear sells, produce fear.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>If division sells, produce division.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The business model isn’t democracy.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The business model is attention.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:heading --> <h2 id="h-market-propaganda" class="wp-block-heading">Market propaganda</h2> <!-- /wp:heading --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>And once ratings become the goal, journalism slowly starts looking like propaganda.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Not government propaganda.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Market propaganda.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Whatever keeps viewers watching.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Whatever keeps shareholders happy.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>If a certain cable network can make billions feeding viewers exactly what they want to hear, every media company notices.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The lesson becomes simple: Be more like Fox.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Maybe not politically.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>But financially.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>That’s good for profits.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>It’s terrible for democracy.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>And that’s what Filipino Americans should be paying attention to.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Not whether Scott Pelley is a hero.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Not whether one executive wins or loses a power struggle.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The bigger question is whether Americans still have institutions willing to tell uncomfortable truths when those truths cost money.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Because once journalism becomes just another product, the public becomes just another market.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Citizens become consumers.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Facts become content.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>And news becomes something closer to propaganda.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Pelley didn’t create that alarm.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>He just rang the bell a little louder.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The real question is whether anyone is listening.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Before the ringing becomes the soundtrack of American democracy’s decline.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><em>Emil Guillermo is an award-winning journalist, news analyst, comic stage performer and former host of NPR’s “All Things Considered.” He writes for the Inquirer.net’s US Channel. He has written a weekly “Amok” column on Asian American, race and social justice issues for more than 30 years. Find him on </em><a href="https://youtube.com/@emilamok1"><em>YouTube</em></a><em>, </em><a href="http://www.patreon.com/emilamok"><em>patreon</em></a><em> and substack. </em></p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p><em>Get tickets to his live show <a href="https://sdfringe.org/events/69-emil-amok-anchorman-the-news-made-me-do-it/">here</a>.</em></p> <!-- /wp:paragraph -->