What do you do with an 'almost' story?
- Apr 6
- 2 min read
Wherever I go, I try not to shy away from tough questions. On Tuesday, I almost got these:
“How do we approach journalists who may believe it's OK to have a left-leaning slant (even if they won't even admit it to themselves)?”
“How do you deal with the weaponization of division and mistrust by those in power to discredit the media despite our efforts to be more understanding and curious of different viewpoints?”
“Is it our job to tell both sides of an argument, even when doing so amplifies an argument that is likely untrue or runs counter to science?”
“How do you ‘sell’ your curiosity idea to the newsrooms, given that overselling stories and rage-baiting is how many publishers stay afloat?”
You almost got these? Correct. These were the next four audience questions I would’ve gotten if we hadn’t run out of time during my talk at the Online News Association conference.
Hundreds of journalists turned out for the mainstage session — “How Journalism Can Model Curiosity, Confront Bias, and Reduce Polarization” — which, I know, was always going to be a tall order for just one hour.
So when my brilliant friend and moderator Joy Mayer of the Trusting News Project shared the QR code for submitting questions 45 minutes in, and all those phones came out, I knew we were gonna get some doozies, and there was no way I’d be able to take on more than, like, two.
Which is exactly what happened.
But here’s the beautiful thing about unanswered questions: They breathe. They linger. They wait.
We got a total of 45 audience questions from that session. Really meaningful and thoughtful ones that — I realized as I read through them later — tell their own pretty compelling story: the story of an industry packed with people working their tail off to serve an increasingly polarized, exhausted, and distrustful public… all while managing their own polarization, exhaustion, and distrust.
So before Joy and I left Chicago, we started scheming ways to begin to address these questions.
They’re not the kind that have clean, final answers. They’re the kind that spark shifts, over time, as people wrestle with the tensions they hold.
Stay tuned… and stay curious,
