Occupy Wall Street coverage shows biz journalists don’t represent people

St. Petersburg Times media critic Eric Deggans writes Monday that the coverage of the Occupy Wall Street movement by business journalists shows that they have forgotten how to represent the people instead of big-time business.

Deggans writes, “Turns out, there is a list of demands developed by some organizers of the protests, which has been online since late last month. And one consistent theme of the protests is the complaint that insitutions which are supposed to serve the people — like government and, ahem, the news media — have instead been co-opted by the wealthy and big business insitutions. Could such coverage be proving them right?

“The real problem is that these journalists, who are supposed to be watchdogs themselves of the financial world, seem to have internalized Wall Street’s perspective so much, they’re having a hard time standing apart. This seemed to be one reason why journalists didn’t tumble to the risks of credit default swaps and overleveraged banks until the system came crashing down; if Wall Street culture accepts the practice, then they are swept along.

“I’m hoping, after a week of media bashing that our leading financial journalists take a lesson and try to hold the Street’s culture at arm’s length occasionally. I think their journalism would benefit.”

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