By Calder Stenn, Associate Editor
On Feb. 16, about 50 people packed into The Hardware Store Restaurant for a panel discussion with four journalists from Vashon and Seattle, one of them a retired editor of The Wall Street Journal. The purpose of this event was to raise money for a group of young newspaper and yearbook journalists from Vashon High School to go to New York City for the Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s spring conference.
More significantly, it gave locals a forum to discuss a very prominent topic in our country: the use of “alternative facts” in the government and how the media is dealing with it.
The night began at 4:30 p.m. with a dinner that allowed students and parents to converse with panelists before the main discussion. Panelists commended the student publications, while students looked to expand their understanding of journalism.
During the dinner, students visited tables, selling raffle tickets, which was one of the primary ways they raised money for their trip that night. They also collected donations at the door and received 10 percent of drink sales. In total, the team attending the conference raised almost $2,000.
The main event began at about 6:30 p.m. in a back room of the restaurant. The event was broadcast on the island’s radio station, the Voice of Vashon (see link below).
The group of panelists consisted of four journalists — some active and some retired.
Leslie Brown, the one panelist from Vashon, is the former Editor-in-Chief of The Beachcomber and now the communications manager for the King County Department of Public Defense.
From Seattle, there was Mary Bruno, the former Editor-in-Chief of Crosscut, an independent, non-profit electronic journal in Seattle; longtime Crosscut columnist Knute Berger (Berger has also contributed to Seattle Weekly and Seattle Magazine); and Eugene Carlson, who is most notable for his contributions as an editor and reporter to The Wall Street Journal. While with the publication, Carlson created an Asian installment of the journal. He’s also currently working at Crosscut.
The panel brought a combined 100 years of journalistic experience to the evening’s discussion. Their experience allowed them to talk in great depth about covering the news in an “alternative facts” environment. One of the most prominent topics during the discussion was how the media is changing the way it covers the White House and politics.
“I think [there is] a lot of recalibrating going on, and as journalists, we are going through what everybody else going through,” Berger said. “The silver lining is that this is the best thing to happen to journalism in the past 15 years. This is re-energizing reporters, writers [and] editors. It’s re-energizing readers [and] audiences,
“I think journalistic organizations are beginning to look at ways in which they can be more effective in a number of ways,” Berger said.
Other panelists mentioned how this drastic change in media coverage is also overshadowing the rest of national and international news.
“[Reporters are] living … in this surreal world where everything is hanging on the latest wild thing … to come out of the White House,” Brown said.
At the end of the discussion, panelists took questions for about a half-hour, which involved further dialogue on how to cover fake news or alternative facts, as well as some reflections on the presidential election.