Opinion: Gleaning facts can be a 'slippery' business. Even when the truth is messy, 'good journalism offers a way.'

Getting the facts right may sound like Journalism 110 class, but gathering and verifying a story can be like walking on shifting sands, writes Fergus McIntosh of The New Yorker. "Journalists put more stress on accuracy than ever before. The problem is, accuracy is a slippery idea."

Like many professions, journalism has a before and after social media story. Before Americans became absorbed in Facebook, Twitch, TikTok and podcasts, they listened to and read mainstream media. But once social media siphoned huge audiences, "people stopped paying attention to the news, or decided that they didn’t believe it anymore," McIntosh adds. "This story is not unsupported. Trust in many institutions has fallen over the years, but in journalism, it has plummeted."

Examining how little journalists are trusted, makes "fake news"and the harm it does to the news-consumer trust equation that much more worrisome. "'Many Americans now register displeasure with inaccurate or unverified information on social media, and a majority now think that somebody . . .should do something about it," McIntosh explains. "Despite endemic skepticism and distraction, there is an enduring thirst for reliable information. The question is, where can it be found, and how can its purveyors make themselves heard amid the noise?"

CBS and BBC have branded themselves as singular "purveyors" of the facts using an "'only we can provide accuracy' model," McIntosh writes. "For the first Presidential debate of 2024, The New York Times tasked 29 staffers with combing through the candidates’ statements in real time." Even with aggressive fact-checking, "the provision of facts does not, in itself, engender trust. . . . What is more certain is that, from time to time, every journalist, no matter how well-meaning, gets something wrong, or misses the point."

"Because The New Yorker, like many publications, trades on its reputation for accuracy, readers can easily feel cheated, even betrayed, when an error slips in," McIntosh explains. "In such circumstances, it becomes difficult to know what is true, and, consequently, to make decisions. Good journalism offers a way through, but only if readers are willing to follow. . . . Gaining and holding that trust is hard. But failure is not inevitable. . . . Any solution must acknowledge the messiness of truth, the requirements of attention, the way we squint to see more clearly. It must tell you to say what you mean, and know that you mean it."