Can Journalism Survive? Trust, Truth and the Future of Canadian Media

And today I want to talk about something really close to my heart, which is the future of mainstream media, which frankly is kind of circling the drain right now.

I hate to tell you this.

I mean, I've worked in the media for, God, well over three decades.

I am a total newshound.

I am deeply curious about my world, my community, my country, my province.

And I'm I have loved so much of my career, don't tell my old bosses, but I probably would have done it for free because it was like having a front row seat to history.

I mean, I actually flew to Ukraine in the tail of the world's largest plane that was built to carry the Russian space shuttle.

That plane actually got bombed by the Russians during the Ukrainian war last year.

But I have covered so many elections and interviewed prime ministers and premiers and covered major disasters and wildfires and floods and tornadoes.

And I've done medical breakthroughs.

I've gone with police on drug raids.

I mean, I've ridden in the back of an ambulance all night long doing a healthcare series.

Honestly, it has been an amazing career with a thousand amazing experiences.

And remember, this was back when the media was trusted and respected, when there was money, when there were resources and there were a lot of people watching the news, so the newsroom was robust and busy and exciting, and you had time to work on long-form journalism, investigations, documentaries.

That almost never happens anymore.

Now the job has changed so much, these young TV reporters, I feel so badly for them.

Not only are they doing the research and the interviews, but they have to shoot their own stories, and they have to edit their own stories, and they have to drive themselves to location, which you may think, oh, who cares about that? It's a big deal because those were your moments to be working the phones and your sources and writing your stand-ups and your intros and what have you.

You needed that time.

Now these reporters don't have time.

They don't have time to do a proper job.

They don't have time to have lunch, to go to the bathroom.

They're like they're in a circus spinning plates on the tops of sticks.

It's really, really challenging and that can create an atmosphere where you can make mistakes because you're asking people to do way too much with way too many deadlines.

So you can say to yourself, like, what the heck is going on? Part of it is that the audience is deeply polarized these days.

Thank you very much, Donald Trump, and your bullshit fake news narrative that you've been spewing for the last decade.