Compassion...journalist style

About a month ago, news about the Justice Department's official report on the Newtown, Connecticut, shooting was released. Survivors and victims' families were given the opportunity to view the government's final report. It was entirely voluntary, and no one was required to read the findings.

At the time, NBC "Today Show" co-host Matt Lauer reported that the network had made the decision not to air the findings out of respect for the victims' families. Then, in his next breath, Lauer commented that NBC made this decision because there was nothing new in the report. Because there was nothing new, it wasn't worth revealing publicly, and better to respect the feelings of the survivors and victims' families.

So, ultimately, NBC's decision was not made out of a measure of compassion toward those most directly affected by the massacre. Rather, it was made for pragmatic, practical reasons. There wasn't anything new, exciting or revealing in the report to waste NBC's precious air time with; so why bother? Instead, let's respect the victims' families and the survivors by not airing the details of the report.

However, if there had been something new in the report, then the victims' families and survivors be damned. The media would have aired these details despite any feelings about it, and irrespective of compassion toward those most affected by the event.

In my experience, journalists can be among the most callous and desensitized professionals in the business world. More ruthless than a commodities buyer or speculator. More heartless than a corporate executive whose company runs a sweat shop. More inhuman than a software engineer who talks to computers all day.

I know this, because I was a journalist for a decade. I saw first-hand just how separated from reality these people can be.

I remember my first year working in a news room. It was around 11 p.m., and one reporter was listening intently to traffic on a police scanner. The night had been a very slow one as news was concerned. Editors were worried about what their lead front-page story would be. Maybe coverage of a local quilt show? A high school sporting event? Something soft and not very intriguing.

Then, a few minutes later, traffic over the scanner indicated an automobile accident on the highway outside of town. The dispatcher reported to the responding officers that there may be a fatality.

Suddenly, the reporter came alive and with wide eyes and a smile on his face, he exclaimed, "Yes! There's our front page!"

I couldn't believe my ears. He was cheering over a fatal car accident? Who, in their right mind, would do such a thing?

The answer: A journalist.

I resolved at that moment not to ever let myself get so desensitized by my work that I would come to regard human beings and the things that happen to them as just words on a page, a headline, a tag line, a photograph that sells newspapers, magazines and air time.

The NBC decision not to air the final report on Newtown was equally as callous as the reporter rejoicing over a car accident. There wasn't anything new to report, so we will respect the feelings of survivors and families. But that wouldn't be the case if there was something new to report.

In other words, feelings and compassion are only important when it doesn't compete with "journalistic responsibility." I call this journalistic zeal; not responsibility.

Responsibility is acting on and exercising conscience. Something the news media rarely, if ever, does when ethics compete with a juicy story.

I'm just a little bit tired of the phony "compassion" displayed by news journalists. They relish in making themselves appear compassionate, tolerant and empathetic. But this ruse lasts only as long as there isn't something "new" to report on. Then these bastions of humanity become barricudas.

It is a frighteningly quick transformation, because a journalist can turn from a warm-blooded human being into a cold-blooded viper faster than Clark Kent stripped to his Superman suit in the telephone booth.

I struggle daily to respect news journalists because of their disingenuousness. I was too honest, too real, and didn't have enough onion layers on me to survive long enough as a news professional. I was too human, and not zealous enough.

Thank God for that.