Last week, Charissa Thompson opened her yap on the podcast Pardon My Take and, for causes nonetheless largely not understood by the remainder of us, thought it was super-cute to confess that she has, previously, made up sideline experiences. How lovable!
“I’ve said this before, so I haven’t been fired for saying it, but I’ll say it again. I would make up the report sometimes because A, the coach wouldn’t come out at halftime or it was too late and I was like, ‘I didn’t want to screw up the report,’ so I was like, ‘I’m just going to make this up,’” Thompson stated on the podcast.
“First of all no coach is going to get mad if I say, ‘Hey, we need to stop hurting ourselves, we need to be better on third down, we need to stop turning the ball over and do a better job of getting off the field.’ Like, they’re not going to correct me on that,” she defined. “So I’m like it’s fine, I’m just going to make up the report.”
After a big quantity of backlash on social media from journalists who A, take their jobs critically and B, discover it offensive to deceive the general public, Thompson put out a press release half-heartedly strolling her feedback again, however the harm was already finished.
“When on a podcast this week, I said I would make up reports early in my career when I worked as a sideline reporter before I transitioned to my current host role,” Thompson stated. “Working in the media I understand how important words are and I chose wrong words to describe the situation. I’m sorry. I have never lied about anything or been unethical during my time as a sports broadcaster,” she wrote.
So the place to even begin with this?
First off, what’s Charissa Thompson doing on a Barstool-affiliated podcast, contemplating that Barstool made their identify, largely, off misogyny, harassing ladies, and assuring the “cool girls” that they’re, actually, cool, and it’s the individuals declaring their document of sexism which might be truly the issue? Thompson calls different sideline reporters “some of her best friends,” however Tracy Wolfson has been focused by Barstool earlier than. So has Sam Ponder. So have dozens of different ladies working in sports activities media. (Full disclosure: I’ve additionally been focused by Barstool for years.)
Pour one out for the sisterhood, I assume.
But secondly, there are such a lot of issues ethically incorrect with Thompson admitting that she made up experiences that she then disseminated to a mass viewers. Your job as a journalist is to not discover one thing, something, to say, however to report what is definitely happening. Looking at reporting as filling air time or having to must say one thing when the digital camera is on you isn’t the job. The job is to get info to the viewers, and veteran sideline reporter Laura Okmin defined superbly methods to deal with coaches that gained’t communicate or be interviewed through the sport, blowing Thompson’s “Sometimes they won’t talk to me!” protection proper out of the water.
Okmin has informed me previously that she, and most sideline reporters, just do as a lot prep through the week for the sport because the group within the broadcast sales space. She pours over the identical stat sheets, sits in on the identical conferences, does the identical interviews. Yet she has to determine methods to get large quantities of details about, not simply the sport however the group and its gamers, to an viewers, in an simply digestible format in lower than a minute. That is a job that takes actual talent, dedication and hustle. By method of exposition, please get pleasure from this video of ESPN’s Molly McGrath completely hauling ass (in heels) to get the post-game interview:
“But so what? We never get any info from sideline reporters anyway. Who cares?” Such was the chorus from a sure faction of the fanbase following Thompson’s feedback. I’m unsure methods to clarify to folks that reporters mendacity to the general public is one thing they need to care about, however right here we’re. Secondly, you want solely suppose again to Kaylie Hartung’s reporting on Joe Burrow’s season-ending harm on Thursday night time or Lisa Salters on the sphere throughout Damar Hamlin’s collapse on nationwide tv to know that’s not true.
Thompson justifying her faux reporting by claiming that “no one will get mad at me” for it’s so revealing of how she views sports activities journalism that she ought to in all probability lose her job over it. How can anybody belief any info she imparts to the viewers once more? A journalist’s job is to not stay within the good graces of these she covers, particularly not NFL head coaches and gamers, although I’ll acknowledge the incestuous relationship between professional sports activities and broadcast “partners” nowadays. But the truth that Thompson appears to suppose the first downside with making up false experiences is a coach being mad at her is revelatory.
I’m not going to take us down the street of “broadcasters” versus “journalists.” We all know that sports activities media way back made the calculation that girls on the airwaves must be engaging, along with working twice as laborious as their male counterparts to be taken critically, and that dedication has led to lots of people who don’t essentially care in regards to the ethics of reporting entering into the sphere. It’s clear that girls in sports activities media nonetheless must work more durable than their male colleagues so as even get a foot within the door, a lot much less a first-rate function in an NFL broadcast. Thompson popping out and admitting how unseriously she takes her job, a job hundreds of ladies would kill to have, seems like a slap within the face to each single girl working in sports activities media — from highschool sports activities to the professionals, it doesn’t matter what medium they work in.
There’s a battle on journalists taking place throughout our nation and world wide. So far in 2023, 60 journalists have been killed on the job. T-shirts advocating the killing of journalists are in mainstream circulation and obtainable for buy as we communicate. Elon Musk, the proprietor of X, has frequently denigrated precise journalists and promoted “citizen journalism,” which isn’t fact-checked, sourced, edited, or corroborated. A big portion of the American public thinks journalists lie and make up info, although anybody who has labored for a authentic outlet will inform you is just not true. Yes, the media does get tales incorrect every now and then. But failure and fabrication aren’t the identical issues. Charissa Thompson simply gave all those that imagine journalists are liars and fabulists a whole podcast to hold their hats on.
So right here’s to the Laura Okmins, Suzy Kolbers, and Tracy Wolfsons. Here’s to the Pam Olivers and Andrea Kremers and Lesley Vissers. Here’s to the Lisa Salters and Kristina Pinks and Molly McGraths, the Kaylee Hartungs, Karthryn Tappens, and Melissa Starks. To all the ladies working in sports activities media who do their (too typically thankless) jobs with integrity and tenacity and poise — thanks.
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