Profs & Pints DC: Rethinking the American Journalist

Profs and Pints DC presents: “Rethinking the American Journalist,” on a radical proposal to use licensing requirements to buttress our nation’s unsteady Fourth Estate, with John C. Watson, associate professor of communication law and journalism ethics at American University and author of Journalism Ethics by Court Decree.

The tagline beneath the logo of The Washington Post says, “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” encapsulating journalists’ claim that our democracy is nourished by the light they shed. In many ways, however, traditional journalism itself has been dying. Newspapers are going by the wayside, and the news coverage they provide is being drowned out by a torrent of information, misinformation, and disinformation produced online by a new form of journalist, the content provider—basically anyone with an internet connection and a keyboard.

Wait a minute, you might be saying, it’s a stretch to call any content provider a “journalist” on the same footing as those…