OPINION --

So when I started BrowardPost, I thought it was for the best to get out of the complaint writing business. See, I wanted to be more like the main stream media. Old school journalism. Credibility. Not be part of the story. That sort of thing.

Read: We just filed a complaint against CM Jonathan Allen.

I cannot discount the importance of an impartial press. But what about Fox News? Or MSNBC? Are they really fair and balanced?

Such thoughts forced me to consider the entire Sylvia Poitier affair, imaging a scenario where I did every single thing EXCEPT for filing the complaints. I then paused to reflect
on the question – “would she have been removed office”.

As I often wonder — if not me, then who, especially important here since no one seemed to be joining the fray. Bitching from the sidelines only…

Personally, I’d be in for good money betting she’d still be blathering from the dais.

Which has me now contemplating… Was I in the right? Was I that ahead of the curve? Was that the new media? Am I the new media?

A noted member of the local press told me that a journalist affects change by choosing what stories to write. But is that enough? Does the responsibility end there? Poitier was arrested not because of the stories I wrote, but because of the complaints I filed.

Many folks in the press speak about “the new media”. A term, I opine, that is still being defined. Maybe to understand exactly what this is, we need a new set of rules. A new perspective. A new way of doing business.

The Sun-Sentinel or Herald cannot devote the resources to digging through the Lauderdale Lakes story like we do here. That isn’t a slight, but rather an acknowledgment of their financially limited resources.

We, on the other hand, get to pick and choose our projects, and for those projects we take on, considerable amounts of personal time and treasure are invested.

So what happens when we find the bad guys and gals? What then? Do we walk away, hoping that someone else will rise to the challenge? Is there no civic responsibility?

Interesting questions right?

Might make for an interesting Master’s thesis for a Journalism degree… Which, coincidentally enough, formed the basis of our Purpose of Study statement submitted to a local university for acceptance in their Fall program.