The recent firings of Democratic officials at the FTC by the President ignited a debate about journalistic rigor and language use in reporting. News outlets adopted cautious phrasing, leading to criticism from readers who deemed it insufficiently assertive regarding the legality of the actions. This incident illustrates the tension between journalistic ethics and the need for directness in the face of clear legal violations, revealing how media often modulates its language in contentious situations, which can undermine public understanding of serious issues.
This is a pretty typical dynamic when the news hedges, equivocates, or neuters its language in the face of an ongoing legal dispute or uncertain outcome.
We also caught flack for our own headline, which put 'illegal' in quotation marks, attributing it to the Democratic commissioners.
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