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Selling the environment to an unreceptive audience
A tipsheet by Anisa Abid, graduate student,
Knight Center for Environmental Journalism
Sometimes reporters have a hard time getting stories about the environment published or broadcast because they are faced with a less than open-minded audience or even editors. That shouldn’t stop you from reporting.
A panel of journalists discussed reporting in the face of such obstacles at the 2007 Society of Environmental Journalists national conference. They included Laura Forbes, Reporter, KXRM-TV FOX21, Colorado Springs, CO, John Daley, Reporter, KSL-TV, Salt Lake City, UT, Nancy Gaarder, Reporter, Omaha World-Herald, Bruce Ritchie, Growth and Environment Reporter, The Tallahassee Democrat. Among their tips:
In the workplace:
- Don’t follow an editor’s advice to the point that it improperly guides your coverage. If there is an environmental disaster and your editor tells you not to make it another global warming story, ignore that advice if it is fair to say that global warming could be a factor.
- List people who have expressed concern for environmental issues. They will be good to go back to when you need a different perspective.
- Your job title doesn’t have to contain the word ‘environmental’ for you to report on the environment. Use whatever title allows you to cover that niche. Good reporting on the environment is done by business and development reporters and others.
- Balanced isn’t always fair. If you’re told to insert an opinion of an opposing side, you shouldn’t have to if it is false, misleading or irrelevant.
- Consider leaving if your superiors cause you to do bad journalism.
- Register as an independent and quit activist organizations that cause people to question you as an objective professional reporter.
- If your story gets pushed to the back of the paper, find out why. Don’t jump to conclusions until you know.
- If your co-workers get promotions and their reporting style is popular, watch how they work and apply those techniques to the environment beat
Covering stories
- Be persistent. If you know you are right, be a bulldog.
- Look for opportunities to do local stories and interview local researchers.
- Don’t differentiate coverage of an environmental story from other subjects. The term ‘environmental’ tends to typecast you and send away your audience.
- However, when your coverage is solid, the political associations of “environmental” tend to vanish and the story is heard.
- Use small stories about the environment to remind readers of broader issues. A feature on a local farmer’s market can remind people of the environmental benefits of purchasing locally grown products.
- Watch the agendas of industry and report what they are saying/doing and the opposing views.
- Don’t hesitate to say, “Prove it!” You’ll get through a lot of sticky areas and editors will respect you.
- To overcome an apathetic audience, try piggy-backing on popular stories. Consider placing a story about the shrinking arctic ice caps after a movie review of Happy Feet.
- Get to know your audience. The environmental story may be on the inside, but first and foremost it’s a people story.
- Don’t conclude your story at the beginning. Organize it with the description first, explanation second, and analysis third.
