Media Coverage of Occupy Wall Street: Bigger Stories Obscured

The media has nothing to be ashamed of in its coverage of the Occupy movement.  The question now is whether they will start digging into the complex issues that have been obscured by the headline-grabbing civil disobedience.

Sunday’s New York Times "Media & Advertising" section featured not one but two different articles about the difficulties of satisfying everyone when it comes to reporting on the ongoing multi-city, mass sit-in for economic fairness.

Occupy Boston seen from The Fed.

The first story examined criticism at both ends of the political spectrum – and the protestors themselves – of how journalists have portrayed Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and the Occupy nodes active in cities throughout the country. “Lacking a list of demands or recognized leaders, the Occupy movement has at times perplexed the nation’s media outlets,” the story concluded.

Nearby in the same section, Times reporter David Carr analyzed what might lie ahead for the movement once its tent-city encampments are dismantled.  “In addition to the 5 W’s — who, what, when, where and why — the media are obsessed with a sixth: what’s next? Occupy Wall Street, for all its appeal as a story, is very hard to roll forward,” Carr wrote.

Those stories followed a November 13 column in which Times Public Editor Arthur S. Brisbane surveyed journalism experts for ideas about how to improve the paper’s coverage of “the seemingly formless mass of a movement that pointedly eschews leadership and formal demands.”

Brisbane’s best idea was buried amid a lot of hand-wringing: “In its future coverage, The Times should examine how these issues are changing America, giving rise to movements like Occupy Wall Street and its ideological counterpart, the Tea Party.”


(In reality, polling by the University of Massachusetts Lowell has found that supporters of OWS and the Tea Party share an ideological bond in their collective distrust of Wall Street, large corporations and the government in Washington. But that’s a post for another day.)

Media of every type, as well as influential columnists and editorial writers, have given Occupy plenty of white space and air time since the first demonstration on September 17.  But without coordinated activities, spokespeople, a well-defined set of goals or even a common set of concerns, coverage of Occupy has naturally varied from city to city and protestor to protestor. 

The real story – the story audiences could benefit from seeing, hearing and reading – are the many chapters in the book of economic pain that this nation has endured for the last four years. Household income trends.  Profits outstripping salaries. The responsibilities of CEOs. Skyrocketing college tuitions. Pick one, or name your own.

These are not easy stories to report. There is a multitude of indisputable data that needs to be brought to life through the lives of real people coast to coast. But it would be an exceptionally powerful populist news agenda for the media as we approach the 2012 election year.

Covering the protests to date has been like interviewing tailgaters in the parking lot without analyzing the game inside the stadium. Here’s hoping the media realizes that Occupy is less of a movement and more of a symbol of larger issues.