Neuzil's View of Environmental Journalism

Neuzil, Mark. The Environment and the Press: From Adventure Writing to Advocacy. 2008. Evenston: Northwestern University Press.

In this book, Neuzil offers a creative take on the relationship between journalism and environmental subjects. I say creative because he starts further back in the past they I would have expected. But more on that later.

The majority of the book traces our American history of environmental journalism. As Neuzil says, “environmental journalism, as a routine component of the mainstream American press, emerged as a consequential factor in how citizens and their governments view, manage, preserve, and exploit their natural surroundings” (184-185). The status today? The environment is a legitimate beat in many of the American newspapers for about 40 years. However, the beat is still fairly young comparative to many of journalistic areas (204). And often environmental reporting in mass media is lacks "depth and context" (206).

However, the chapter on outdoor adventure writing seemed to focus more on the formation of different groups, as did the chapter about early environmental concerns. I do see the connection, though, between the need for an audience for the environmental reporting, and these groups not only make a great audience but also provide a lot of content for stories.

My idea of outdoor adventure writing has more to do with John Krakauer and Outside magazine. Neuzil writes beyond adventure enthusiast activities of backpackers today, and more about organizational development of early hunting and fishing groups. On his chapter on nature writing, he sought to inform the reader about the past writers of nature in American history—although he did write significantly about Isaac Walton, who I didn’t know of. Then he covered basic outdoor writers such as the Thoreau, Borroughs (who I didn’t know much about), and John Muir.

I greatly appreciated Neuzil’s writing about Sigurd Olson. I’ve read The Singing Wilderness and I knew of Olson’s advocacy work. I didn’t know that he had/has a national following. Because of his relationship with the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, I expected his fanbase to be more localized. I was wrong—he was voted one of the most popular nature writers by the Sierra Club magazine. When I read that Olson died with his snowshoes on, I teared up. If only all of us can find that place in life to do what we love until the moment of our death, I thought.

With Neuzil’s take, it was easy to see how environmental writing, or nature writing, changed as society progresses. And its impact depends on proximity to population. As Neuzil mentions, “Small newspapers are more likely to be consensus oriented rather than conflict oriented” (174).

Objective journalism in America did not show up until the 1890s (131). Around that time, people advocated against the use of birds in fashion. During this time it's estimated that 5 million birds were killed annually for their use in the fashion industry—although no one's really sure of an accurate count (134). The outraged bird lovers formed a new movement, the Audubon movement. It gained steam as they fought the women's fashion industry, which had plenty of it’s own ammunition to protect it’s causes. The press attempted to cover both sides getting information from the industry and the group’s spokespersons in local areas. The debate got so heated that volunteer Audubon wardens were killed trying to protect the birds (144) which is hard to imagine happening today. It does remind me Jnathan Franzen’s piece in The New Yorker called “Emptying the Skies.” It describes a similar problem around Italy and Cyprus. The area is a hotspot for migrating birds and many meet their fate from hunters who blast them out of the sky illegally. Even songbirds are prey; they are caught on poles covered in glue so they can be sold to restaurants. These practices are illegal, but the enforcement is light, so few have any fear of reprimand. Franzen tags along with rangers and finds real challenges to their authority—they have reason to fear for their life if they push enforcement too far.

As Neuzil observed, the pattern that forms with environmental conservation is this: a threat attempts to disturb the natural environment; then a social coalition forms to protect the environment from the threat. He describes a similar situation with dam building forces out west. The coalitions were key to pushing back a dam in Dinosaur National Monument. He states, "As in the movement against the Millners, the formation of coalitions is critical to any success of the anti-damn forces” (147).

This book was full of great stories from times past. For instance, when the industrial revolution was in full swing, he public held a fascination with the “back to nature” movement. One journalist in Boston ran into the Maine woods with only his undies on, and supposedly survived for several weeks, emerging a hero. Neuzil makes a daft point about the whole matter.

In journalism history one common assumption is that the content of the press tells the something about the audience, even if, in the end, the nature man stories were more like the moon hoax of 1835 – which claim the existence of intelligent life on the moon – then Nellie Bly's adventures and 1880s. (173)

That was a sensationalistic story. Another story represented the theme of the media as the government watchdog. It dealt with Taft, a reclusive president. The office of the president has held regular press briefings since the Administration in the early 1900s. Taft did not hold press briefings because he didn't believe in bringing information to the public media. As a result, the press got information from critics (including Gifford Pinchot, the founder of the National Forest Service). Eventually, Taft was implicated in the press for a land grab in Alaska, due to the muckraking press (165).

Although the trend is been moving away from superficial environmental reporting from the early 1900s (like the sensational “nature man” story), national attention is paid to the reactionary stories like that of the Sago mine disaster in 2006. Today in modern journalism, environmental writing is institutionalized with a few professional associations, such as the Society of Environmental Journalists.

In modern journalism, the real trouble with environmental writing and media is that it can be difficult to tell where advocacy begins in fact reporting ends. Michael Frome, an advocacy journalist, urges environmental journalists to follow Rachel Carson and write with “a desire to advance the cause of a better world” (130). The debate continues today, although the SEJ keeps advocates out of the primary membership of the group. Still, even the more objective national media plays a critical role in drawing attention to environmental concerns, especially when policy is about to be made (194-195). It seems that the idea of objectivity does drift further from us (in Neuzil’s view) and journalism moves closer to the advocacy of some early journalism. However, today’s writing is much more steeped in peer-mediated science (232). Several modern examples were given.

Living on Earth was an environmental radio show that ran on National Public Radio in the 1990s. It was hosted by Steve Kerwood and provided more in-depth reporting on environmental matters (207-208).

The book describes Discovery Channel and Outdoors Life Network channel's growth and development but later diversification into various programming not concentrated on animal or environmental or conservation areas. In fact, OLN network grew and became versus in 2006 (218).

The complexity of environmental reporting can be difficult to report and broadcast news because it's time and advertising constraints. One researcher Andrew Kendall found that the coverage of environmental reporting consisted of only 2% of all broadcast networks newscasts from 1998 to 2005 (220).

Neuzil also listed some websites I’d like to explore more: Environmental Health News, worldchanging.com, dateline.com, earth.com, gristmill.com.