Welcome to another edition of the Tony Awards! Annually since 2002 I've dedicated one column to naming what was, for me, some of the most outstanding journalism and/or commentary of the year. I operate from no automatic set of criteria when deciding what media to honor, but in general I am drawn to:
- insightful works that shed light on some important public issue.
- creative works that deserve a wider audience.
- informative works that provide eye-opening education on a difficult topic.
- courageous works that speak truth to power.
- humorous works that skillfully provoke laughter and thought at the same time.
- local works that promote community and civic engagement.
Though 2020 gave us environmental crises, racial strife, and one of the most contentious presidential elections in history, without question the tragedy of covid-19 will be what the year is remembered for. I'd like to dedicate this year's Tony Awards post to all the global victims of the virus, many of whom had the misfortune of living in places run by incompetent, ignorant, inhumane, pathetic buffoons who privileged politics over people at every turn.
Given that this is a MEDIA rants column, I'd also like to dedicate this column to all of the journalists of integrity who have found themselves furloughed or laid off during this terrible time. Craig Silverman of BuzzFeed News accurately called the coronavirus a "media extinction event."
Journalist Amy Brothers, formerly of the Denver Post, is a good representative of what's happening to thousands of media workers across the country. In April she was laid off while on assignment, and wrote a moving and insightful twitter thread about the experience. Like many local journalists, she made some outstanding videos during her time at the paper, including this one on covid and cannabis dispensaries in Denver.
The Denver Post is owned by Alden Global Capital, a hedge fund with an awful reputation for wrecking newsrooms. The Denver Post continues to get clicks off of Brothers' stories even as they no longer employ her.
Writing about the sick state of journalism, Monika Bauerlein in Mother Jones Magazine argues that "the immune system of democracy is crashing before our eyes." Let's all pledge to do what we can in 2021 to strengthen that immune system. Support journalism, especially quality independent work at the local level.
And now the 2020 Tony Awards. Drum Roll please:
Best Oshkosh Journalist: Miles Maguire, The Oshkosh Examiner. This is the fourth consecutive Tony Award for Maguire, who is unmatched among journalists in Oshkosh for his ability to report "local facts that matter." Every day the Oshkosh Examiner stays true to its mission statement:
The Oshkosh Examiner works to bring you local facts that matter so that you can be smarter about your community.
We want you to know about decisions and events before they happen, which means that you can be involved while there is still time to make a difference.
We focus on scoops—news that hasn’t been reported elsewhere—and on investigative and explanatory stories that go far beyond old headlines to make sense of things you may have already heard. We also follow stories that are still important but may have faded from mainstream coverage . . .
The work that is presented here is based on an approach to journalism that emphasizes careful, methodical fact gathering as a way of assuring a high degree of credibility. Our goal is to give you information that may surprise you but that you can rely on and make decisions on.
If you want to understand what is happening in your community, the Oshkosh Examiner is the way to stay ahead of the news curve.
The Oshkosh Examiner—local facts that matter.
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| Over the summer, anti-mask advocates were showing up in large numbers at local government meetings to bully officials and give off an impression of representing the majority. Miles Maguire did an open records request and found that emails to the Oshkosh Common Council were overwhelmingly in support of a mask ordinance. |
Until now, all Oshkosh Examiner material has been available for free. In 2021 Maguire plans to launch a paywall-protected website. Given the quality of the product Maguire produces daily, I will pay to support his efforts and encourage others to do the same.
Most of this year's Tony Awards are for Covid-19 related works. Here are some that impressed me during the year:
*Best Newspaper Op-Ed: Charlie Warzel, "Open States, Lots of Guns. America is Paying a Heavy Price For Freedom." New York Times, May 5, 2020.
In this piece, written when the number of covid dead in the USA "only" numbered in the five digits, Warzel expressed fear that we would eventually throw up our collective hands and resign ourselves to the deaths, just like we do with gun violence. Tragically, Warzel's fear came to be realized. With hundreds of thousands dead and no clear end in sight, too many respond with "oh well."
*Honorable Mention: Noah Berlatsky's "As Bethany Mandel's Grandma Killer Tweet proves, vice-signaling is the right's newest and most toxic trend" (The Independent, May 7, 2020).
What's been shocking to me during this pandemic is not the lack of compassion for victims and the rejection of medical and scientific expertise--our addiction to bullshit, bluster, and bullying long ago put compassion and expertise on the defensive. What has been shocking is the utter cruelty in some of the right-wing responses to the coronavirus: everything from gross attempts at minimizing the tragedy to explicit announcements of just not giving a flying fuck about anyone. In the London Independent, Noah Berlatsky provided the best explainer of this right wing "vice signaling":
It's startling to see someone boast in public about how they are willing to sacrifice others’ loved ones for a trip to the zoo. But it's not exactly uncommon.
During the pandemic, conservatives have repeatedly and publicly trumpeted their disregard for the lives of the old and the sick. Historian and writer David Perry has called this kind of public callousness "vice-signaling": a public display of immorality, intended to create a community based on cruelty and disregard for others, which is proud of it at the same time. It is, essentially, the polar opposite to “woke” left-wing virtue-signaling.
The right's embrace of vice-signaling, and indeed of vice, is how we got Trump. It's also why his administration has been so unable to deal with a crisis requiring collective civic virtue.
*Best Twitter Feed: Faces of Covid. Created by Alex Goldstein, Faces of Covid is an online archive of news reports and obituaries about covid victims. The feed represents a refusal to minimize the tragedy, and treats victims and their families with the dignity denied them by too many mainstream politicians and corporate media pundits.
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| Alex Goldstein is the founder of the moving Faces of Covid Twitter feed. |
*Local Reporting on Covid: Jen Norden's Facebook Feed. Jen Norden is a front-line health care worker in northeast Wisconsin. Since the beginning of the crisis in March, she has provided no-nonsense updates about what is going on in our hospitals and what we need to do to bend the curve. She also does a wonderful job of forwarding reliable information to contest the mountain or misinformation and disinformation spread by coronavirus denialists, anti-maskers, and anti-vaxxers. Typical Nordenism:
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| Rob Chappell provides invaluable information about covid and other matters every day on madison365.com |
*National Reporting on Covid: Zeynep Tufekci and Ed Yong of the Atlantic Magazine. Zeynep Tufeki is an associate professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina. She studies the interaction between digital technology, artificial intelligence, and society. Ed Yong is a staff writer for the Atlantic, specializing in science issues. Since March, both have written outstanding covid pieces for the magazine. Their pieces are academic yet accessible, blunt yet hopeful, informed by peer-reviewed research yet respectful of personal narratives. Probably my favorite pieces of the year were Tufekci's "It Wasn't Just Trump Who Got It Wrong" (a powerful indictment of corporate media complacency in the early days of the virus), and Yong's "How the Pandemic Defeated America." This paragraph by Yong should be put in a time capsule so that future generations can know how ill-prepared the richest country in the history of the world was for this crisis:
Since the pandemic began, I have spoken with more than 100 experts in a variety of fields. I’ve learned that almost everything that went wrong with America’s response to the pandemic was predictable and preventable. A sluggish response by a government denuded of expertise allowed the coronavirus to gain a foothold. Chronic underfunding of public health neutered the nation’s ability to prevent the pathogen’s spread. A bloated, inefficient health-care system left hospitals ill-prepared for the ensuing wave of sickness. Racist policies that have endured since the days of colonization and slavery left Indigenous and Black Americans especially vulnerable to COVID‑19. The decades-long process of shredding the nation’s social safety net forced millions of essential workers in low-paying jobs to risk their life for their livelihood. The same social-media platforms that sowed partisanship and misinformation during the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Africa and the 2016 U.S. election became vectors for conspiracy theories during the 2020 pandemic.
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| Zeynep Tufekci and Ed Yong have written spectacular pieces for the Atlantic Magazine on the covid crisis. Much to its credit, the Atlantic has kept all coronavirus related journalism in the magazine free for the duration of the crisis. |
*Best Cable Television Commentary: Chris Hayes on "Coronavirus Trutherism."
Chris Hayes "Coronavirus Trutherism," broadcast in April as a response to Fox's Tucker Carlson willfully and shamelessly minimizing the impact of the virus, should be required viewing for all Americans. Money quote: "A tidal wave of grief and trauma has been unleashed upon this nation, in large part because the president and his enablers would not listen. And no amount of cynical whataboutism, or politically expedient wishful thinking, or junk science is going to change that brutal fact." Amen.
That's it for the best written, social media, and cable pieces of the year. I want to close by recognizing some musical accomplishments for 2020.
*Song of the Year: "Thoughts and Prayers" by the Drive By Truckers
The Drive By Truckers are an alternative country band. "Thoughts and Prayers" is from the 2020 album "The Unraveling," and--probably because of the pandemic--did not get the attention it deserves. "Thoughts and Prayers" is the perfect response to the cowardly politicians who refuse to do anything about gun violence except offer insincere "thoughts and prayers" to the victims. The song is really a shout out to the youth who want to tackle the problem:
When my children's eyes look at me and they ask me to explain
It hurts me that I have to look away
The powers that be are in for shame and comeuppance
When Generation Lockdown has their day
They'll throw the bums all out and drain the swamp for real
Perp walk them down the Capitol steps and show them how it feels
Tramp the dirt down, Jesus, you can pray the rod they'll spare
Stick it up your ass with your useless thoughts and prayers
Stick it up your ass with your useless thoughts and prayers
*Song of the Year Honorable Mention: Seasick Steve "Love And Peace". Lots of technical solutions are available that could improve the plight of humanity. But none of that really will matter until more of us pledge allegiance to Seasick Steve's simple message: "Gotta stop the hatred now, get back to love and peace."
*Best Musical Series: Rolling Stone Magazine's "In My Room"
Rolling Stone Magazine's In My Room Series features artists playing music from their homes. For me and many others, the series has been a great way to stay connected to live music without have to leave your home. The series features great diversity in musical styles and performers, from older classic rockers to newer pop, R & B, hip-hop and other genres. Some of my favorites include Boy George's (remember him?) performance of his great 2020 song "Frantic," Warren Haynes' remarkable guitar playing, and Graham Nash's renditions of old CSNY favorites.
