The dean of Northwestern issues an apology for the apology!

For those of you unaware, the Northwestern student newspaper editorial board issued an apology for their coverage of the recent Jeff Sessions visit. And by issue an apology for their coverage, that was pretty much the apology.

"We are sorry we covered it"

The issue, of course, is that the triggered snowflake crybaby children going to school at Northwestern were upset because some of them were seen in pictures from the paper as being part of the protest, some of the people who were quoted were named, and apparently these reporters went so far as to actually ask students questions. Not only that, but apparently the reporters in question went so far a to report on "all" of the student activity, when they should have only reported on the activities of the students that they relate to (eg: White reporters should only report on white students, male reporters should only report on male students).

No wonder these students were upset. The paper took their jobs more seriously than the collective "feelings" of the student body. Ahem.

After much serious backlash from the snowflake whiners, the student editorial board wrote a long apology about how insensitive that they were to actually report the news, not taking into consideration that certain feelings might be hurt by doing so.

Here is how the Dean reacted:

I patently reject the notion that our students have no right to report on communities other than those from which they hail, and I will never affirm that students who do not come from marginalized communities cannot understand or accurately convey the struggles of those populations. And, unlike our young charges at The Daily, who in a heartfelt, though not well-considered editorial, apologized for their work on the Sessions story, I absolutely will not apologize for encouraging our students to take on the much-needed and very difficult task of reporting on our life and times at Northwestern and beyond.

I understand why The Daily editors felt the need to issue their mea culpa. They were beat into submission by the vitriol and relentless public shaming they have been subjected to since the Sessions stories appeared. I think it is a testament to their sensitivity and sense of community responsibility that they convinced themselves that an apology would affect a measure of community healing.

I might offer, however, that their well-intentioned gesture sends a chilling message about journalism and its role in society. It suggests that we are not independent authors of the community narrative, but are prone to bowing to the loudest and most influential voices in our orbit. To be sure, journalism has often bowed to the whim and will of the rich and powerful, so some might argue that it is only fair that those who feel dispossessed and disenfranchised have their turn at calling the journalistic shots. But that is not the solution. We need more diversity among our student journalists (and in journalism writ large). We need more voices from different backgrounds in our newsrooms helping to provide perspective on our coverage. But regardless of their own identities, our student journalists must be allowed — and must have the courage — to cover our community freely and unfettered by harassment each time members of the community feel they have been wronged.

I am pretty sure that this apology for the apology will be rejected out of hand by the student body as being provided by an out of touch boomer who is just too insensitive to understand how journalism in the year 2019 is supposed to work. Because obviously just reporting the news is a tired old concept that almost nobody is willing to follow anymore.