Quotes about journalism

A collection of quotes on the topic of journal, journalism, likeness, use.

Quotes about journalism

Johnny Depp photo
George Orwell photo
Frank Zappa photo
Hunter S. Thompson photo
Frank Zappa photo

“Rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, in order to provide articles for people who can't read.”

"Ben Watson interviews Frank Zappa", in MOJO magazine (October 1993).
Variant: Rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, in order to provide articles for people who can't read
Source: The Real Frank Zappa Book

Oscar Wilde photo

“By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part I
Context: There is much to be said in favor of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. By carefully chronicling the current events of contemporary life, it shows us of what very little importance such events really are. By invariably discussing the unnecessary, it makes us understand what things are requisite for culture, and what are not.
Context: Puritans cannot destroy a beautiful thing, yet, by means of their extraordinary prurience, they can almost taint beauty for a moment. It is chiefly, I regret to say, through journalism that such people find expression. I regret it because there is much to be said in favour of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community.
Context: It is chiefly, I regret to say, through journalism that such people find expression. I regret it because there is much to be said in favour of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. By carefully chronicling the current events of contemporary life, it shows us of what very little importance such events really are. By invariably discussing the unnecessary, it makes us understand what things are requisite for culture, and what are not.

Oscar Wilde photo
Oscar Wilde photo

“The difference between literature and journalism is that journalism is unreadable and literature is not read.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Source: Miscellaneous Aphorisms; The Soul of Man

Rainer Maria Rilke photo
Oscar Wilde photo

“Oh! journalism is unreadable, and literature is not read.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part I

Julian Assange photo

“It is the media that controls the boundaries of what is politically permissible, so better to change the media. Profit motives work against it, but if we can have the audience understand that most other forms of journalism are not credible, then it may be a forced move.”

Julian Assange (1971) Australian editor, activist, publisher and journalist

Source: [Peter, Farquhar, http://www.news.com.au/technology/ipad/wikileaks-founder-julian-assange-adamant-his-site-broke-collateral-murder-encryption/story-fn5knrwy-1225868870785, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange adamant his site broke Collateral Murder encryption, News.com.au, May 19, 2010, 2010-06-17]

Oscar Wilde photo

“The fact is, that the public have an insatiable curiosity to know everything, except what is worth knowing. Journalism, conscious of this, and having tradesmanlike habits, supplies their demands”

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)
Source: Wilde, Oscar, (1891 / 1912) The Soul of Man Under Socialism, London, Arthur L. Humphreys. Retrieved from University of California Libraries Archive.org https://archive.org 26 February 2018 https://archive.org/details/soulofmanunderso00wildiala

Hannes Alfvén photo

“I have no trouble publishing in Soviet astrophysical journals, but my work is unacceptable to the American astrophysical journals.”

Hannes Alfvén (1908–1995) Swedish electrical engineer and plasma physicist

Source: Dean of the Plasma Dissidents (1988), p. 197.

Hugo Ball photo
Elinor Ostrom photo
Bertrand Russell photo

“What a monstrous thing that a University should teach journalism! I thought that was only done at Oxford. This respect for the filthy multitude is ruining civilisation.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Letter to Lucy Martin Donnely, July 6, 1902
1900s

Barack Obama photo
Frances Burney photo
Oscar Wilde photo
Julian Assange photo

“You can’t publish a paper on physics without the full experimental data and results; that should be the standard in journalism.”

Julian Assange (1971) Australian editor, activist, publisher and journalist

[‘A real free press for the first time in history’: Wikileaks editor speaks out in London, Journalism.co.uk, 2007-08-12, 2010-08-01, http://blogs.journalism.co.uk/editors/2010/07/12/a-real-free-press-for-the-first-time-in-history-wikileaks-editor-speaks-out-in-london/]

Oscar Wilde photo
Jean-François Revel photo
Abraham Lincoln photo

“The "Journal" and "Globe" also show him voting that the war was unnecessarily and unconstitutionally begun by the President of the United States.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

1860s, A Short Autobiography (1860)
Context: In 1846 he was elected to the lower House of Congress, and served one term only, commencing in December, 1847, and ending with the inauguration of General Taylor, in March, 1849. All the battles of the Mexican war had been fought before Mr. Lincoln took his seat in Congress but the American army was still in Mexico, and the treaty of peace was not fully and formally ratified till the June afterwards.... he voted for all the supply measures that came up, and for all the measures in any way favorable to the officers, soldiers, and their families, who conducted the war through: with the exception that some of these measures passed without yeas and nays, leaving no record as to how particular men voted. The "Journal" and "Globe" also show him voting that the war was unnecessarily and unconstitutionally begun by the President of the United States.

Hunter S. Thompson photo

“Some people will say that words like scum and rotten are wrong for Objective Journalism — which is true, but they miss the point. It was the built-in blind spots of the Objective rules and dogma that allowed Nixon to slither into the White House in the first place.”

Hunter S. Thompson (1937–2005) American journalist and author

1990s, He Was A Crook (1994)
Context: Some people will say that words like scum and rotten are wrong for Objective Journalism — which is true, but they miss the point. It was the built-in blind spots of the Objective rules and dogma that allowed Nixon to slither into the White House in the first place. He looked so good on paper that you could almost vote for him sight unseen. He seemed so all-American, so much like Horatio Alger, that he was able to slip through the cracks of Objective Journalism. You had to get Subjective to see Nixon clearly, and the shock of recognition was often painful.

Oscar Wilde photo
Oscar Wilde photo
Oscar Wilde photo
H.L. Mencken photo
Hunter S. Thompson photo
Jon Stewart photo

“When did fact checking and journalism go their separate ways?”

Jon Stewart (1962) American political satirist, writer, television host, actor, media critic and stand-up comedian
Warren Ellis photo

“Journalism is just a gun. It’s only got one bullet in it, but if you aim right, that’s all you need. Aim it right, and you can blow a kneecap off the world.”

Warren Ellis (1968) English comics and fiction writer

Source: Transmetropolitan, Vol. 1: Back on the Street

Tom Robbins photo
Eoin Colfer photo
Jane Yolen photo
Joseph Campbell photo
William Faulkner photo
John Hersey photo
Cyril Connolly photo

“Literature is the art of writing something that will be read twice; journalism what will be grasped at once, and they require separate techniques.”

Source: Enemies of Promise (1938), Part 1: Predicament, Ch. 3: The Challenge of the Mandarins (p. 19)

Julia Quinn photo
Matthew Arnold photo

“Journalism is literature in a hurry.”

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools

“I call it "cut and paste journalism." It's very convenient, very easy, very useful. And very dishonest.”

Cut and Paste Journalism http://www.hicsuntleones.co.uk/2006/01/cut-and-paste-journalism.html, Hic Sunt Leones, 16/01/2006

John Lancaster Spalding photo
Lloyd deMause photo

“But until my Journal of Psychoanalytical Anthropology began to be published and until my book The Emotional Life of Nations came out, few realized how much anthropologists distorted mothering in their tribes.”

Lloyd deMause (1931) American thinker

Source: The Origins of War in Child Abuse (2010), Ch. 1, JP, Vol. 34. No. 4, p. 299 (each chapter of deMause's book has been published first in his Journal of Psychohistory).

“In journalism, there has always been a tension between getting it first and getting it right.”

Ellen Goodman (1941) American journalist and writer

Attributed

Reinhard Selten photo

“A man´s study reflects himself as he wishes to be seen publicly, but his journal, if he is honest, reflects something else.”

John Brooks (writer) (1920–1993) American writer

Business Adventures: Twelve Classic Tales from the World of Wall Street

Janeane Garofalo photo
Richard Rodríguez photo
Asger Jorn photo
Ed Bradley photo

“In addition to valuable contributions to journalism, Bradley's reporting also spurred social activism, but also spurred change with his reporting on AIDS in Africa, Death by Denial, which helped influence drug companies into discounting and donating AIDS drugs to Africa.”

Ed Bradley (1941–2006) News correspondent

[Congressman Bob Brady, Congressional Record, http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2006-12-06/html/CREC-2006-12-06-pt2-PgH8798-3.htm, Honoring the Contributions and Life of Edward R. Bradley, H8798-H8800; Volume 152, Number 133, December 6, 2006, United States House of Representatives , printed by the United States Government Printing Office]
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Gabriel García Márquez photo
Alan Blinder photo
Walter Cronkite photo
Howard S. Becker photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Jimmy Wales photo

“Real people are involved, and they can be hurt by your words. We are not tabloid journalism, we are an encyclopedia.”

Jimmy Wales (1966) Wikipedia co-founder and American Internet entrepreneur

Jimmy Wales on Biographies of living persons article

Anita Sarkeesian photo

“[On the GamerGate Controversy]: Ethics in journalism is not what's happening, in any way.”

Anita Sarkeesian (1983) American blogger

The Colbert Report (Comedy Central, 2014)

Upton Sinclair photo
Fred W. Friendly photo

“A composite is a euphemism for a lie. It's disorderly. It's dishonest and it's not journalism.”

Fred W. Friendly (1915–1998) President of CBS News

Commenting on New Yorker staff writer Alastair Reid's use of composite characters.
p. 65, The interplay of influence: mass media and their publics in news, advertising, politics, Wadsworth series in mass communication, Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Karlyn Kohrs Campbell, Edition 2, Wadsworth, 1988.

Jonathan Stroud photo
Tom Stoppard photo
Colin Wilson photo
Alan Rusbridger photo
Warren Farrell photo
Robert Kraft (astronomer) photo
Khushwant Singh photo
Lee Kuan Yew photo
Gerhard Richter photo
Julian Assange photo

“That’s arguably what spy agencies do — high-tech investigative journalism. It’s time that the media upgraded its capabilities along those lines.”

Julian Assange (1971) Australian editor, activist, publisher and journalist

[Noam, Cohen, Noam Cohen, Brian Stelter, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/07/world/07wikileaks.html?src=mv, Iraq Video Brings Notice to a Web Site, The New York Times, The New York Times Company, April 6, 2010, 2010-06-17]

Koenraad Elst photo

“…H. K. Srivastava, made a proposal to attack the problem of communal friction at what he apparently considered its roots. He wanted all press writing about the historical origins of temples and mosques to be banned. And it is true : the discussion of the origins of some mosques is fundamental to this whole issue. For, it reveals the actual workings of an ideology that, more than anything else, has caused countless violent confrontations between the religious communities. However, after the news of this proposal came, nothing was heard of it anymore. I surmise that the proposal was found to be juridically indefensible in that it effectively would prohibit history-writing, a recognized academic discipline of which journalism makes use routinely. And I surmise that it was judged politically undesirable because it would counterproductively draw attention to this explosive topic. The real target of this proposal was the book Hindu Temples : What Happened to Them (A Preliminary Survey) by Arun Shourie and others. In the same period, there has been a proposal in the Rajya Sabha by Congress MP Mrs. Aliya to get this book banned,… The really hard part of the book is a list of some two thousand Muslim buildings that have been built on places of previous Hindu worship (and for which many more than two thousand temples have been demolished). In spite of the threat of a ban on raking up this discussion, on November 18 the U. P. daily Pioneer has published a review of this book, by Vimal Yogi Tiwari,…. "History is not just an exercise in collection of facts though, of course, facts have to be carefully sifted and authenticated as Mr. Sita Ram Goel has done in this case. History is primarily an exercise in self-awareness and reinforcement of that self-awareness. Such a historical assessment has by and large been missing in our country. This at once gives special significance to this book."”

Koenraad Elst (1959) orientalist, writer

1990s, Ayodhya and After: Issues Before Hindu Society (1991)

David Cross photo
Ed Bradley photo

“Known best for his investigative reports on the CBS news program 60 Minutes, Ed Bradley won 19 Emmy Awards throughout his journalism career, including one for lifetime achievement in 2003.”

Ed Bradley (1941–2006) News correspondent

[Congressman Steve LaTourette, Congressional Record, http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2006-12-06/html/CREC-2006-12-06-pt2-PgH8798-3.htm, Honoring the Contributions and Life of Edward R. Bradley, H8798-H8800; Volume 152, Number 133, December 6, 2006, United States House of Representatives , printed by the United States Government Printing Office]
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Donald Barthelme photo
Caitlín R. Kiernan photo
Keshub Chunder Sen photo
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh photo
Jonathan Stroud photo
Donald J. Trump photo

“I am extremely pleased to see that @CNN has finally been exposed as #FakeNews and garbage journalism. It's about time!”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

Tweet published by @realdonaldtrump https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/881138485905772549 (1 July 2017)
2010s, 2017, July

Louis C.K. photo
Leonid Kantorovich photo

“The university immediately published my pamphlet, and it was sent to fifty People’s Commissariats. It was distributed only in the Soviet Union, since in the days just before the start of the World War it came out in an edition of one thousand copies in all.
Soviet Union, since in the days just before the start of the World War it came out in an edition of one thousand copies in all. The number of responses was not very large. There was quite an interesting reference from the People’s Commissariat of Transportation in which some optimization problems directed at decreasing the mileage of wagons was considered, and a good review of the pamphlet appeared in the journal "The Timber Industry."
At the beginning of 1940 I published a purely mathematical version of this work in Doklady Akad. Nauk [76], expressed in terms of functional analysis and algebra. However, I did not even put in it a reference to my published pamphlet—taking into account the circumstances I did not want my practical work to be used outside the country
In the spring of 1939 I gave some more reports—at the Polytechnic Institute and the House of Scientists, but several times met with the objection that the work used mathematical methods, and in the West the mathematical school in economics was an anti-Marxist school and mathematics in economics was a means for apologists of capitalism. This forced me when writing a pamphlet to avoid the term "economic" as much as possible and talk about the organization and planning of production; the role and meaning of the Lagrange multipliers had to be given somewhere in the outskirts of the second appendix and in the semi Aesopian language.”

Leonid Kantorovich (1912–1986) Russian mathematician

L.V. Kantorovich (1996) Descriptive Theory of Sets and Functions. p. 41; As cited in: K. Aardal, ‎George L. Nemhauser, ‎R. Weismantel (2005) Handbooks in Operations Research and Management Science, p. 19-20

Alan Rusbridger photo

“In the days when we could take it for granted that journalism mattered, we could only share assumptions about what it was, how it was delivered and funded, but this is not the case any more.”

Alan Rusbridger (1953) British newspaper editor

Attributed to Alan Rusbridger (2008) in: David Kang (2013) " Essay: Do the cultural industries make money or art? http://forewords.tumblr.com/post/653245658" forewords.tumblr.com.
2000s

James O'Keefe photo