A good weekend to you. We often talk about the disappearance of local news. Public stations across the country try to fill that need, but I hadn’t realized until this week that the number of local reporters has actually fallen by 57% since 2004.
There are lots of news platforms, but there are far fewer reporters working out of police stations and emergency rooms, city council press rooms, zoning and school board hearings, community meetings, and criminal courts where you see life-and-death stories that can stay with you for life.
I’m convinced that all the crimes scenes, corruption, court cases and everyday acts of kindness and courage I covered in the neighborhoods of Chicago gave me invaluable grounding when I began to rove around the world to report wars, uprisings, and world events.
As I often tell students who ask: Nothing upsets your view of the world more than real reporting. Looking up-close at events and the people they affect, not just sampling strident reactions and self-confirming analysis from pundits and advocates, can shake everything you thought you knew. Certainties dissolve and what you learn, and begin to feel, grows. So many of us today are choosing to get the “news” that supports our certainties. But only the work of real reporters can give us not only the courage of our convictions, but of our skepticism and doubts.
This week, I talk about how Chinese censors changing the ending of a Minions movie might suggest new endings for some classic films. Also, Owen Kline’s debut movie, Funny Pages, is set in the rumpled world of his first artistic passion, cartooning. And science writer Gaia Vince’s new book, Nomad Century, has a blunt, urgent warning. To survive, civilization must do what it has always done: Get a move on.
Scott Simon is one of NPR's most renowned news anchors. He is the host of Weekend Edition Saturday and one of the hosts of the morning news podcast Up First. Be sure to listen to him every Saturday on your local NPR station, and follow him on Twitter.
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