Hunter's gone, but 'Gonzo journalism' remains

Thompson's send-off
Thompson's obit

As a journalism student, I had a professor who adored Hunter Thompson. I had three more who despised him.

Learning he was a fellow Kentuckian ("I haven't had a milkman since I was 10 years old. I used to ride the route with him, back in Louisville."--Fear and Loathing in the Bunker), I was interested in how this fellow's break-all-the-rules style of journalism helped shape--and was shaped by--the cultural changes of the 1960s and 1970s. He even found a place in the 1980s and beyond, though I think he resonated differently with my generation--the kids who grew up with Reagan's jelly beans and Rocky vs. the big cold-war Soviet guy. We're the flag-waving generation (sandwiched between bell-bottoms and grunge), and darn proud of it.

I suppose what unsettled those journalism profs and journalism purists--and me, too-- most about Thompson, was his seamless mingling of opinion and fact. As a journalist, I strove to be impartial. It was a lesson I learned in particular from one of those college professors who warned us against the evils of the Gonzo journalist. If your personal feelings lean to the right, try to write as if you agree with the folks on the left, and your story should come out somewhere in the middle. Not exactly a carefully measured, scientific way to balance a story, but over the years, I found it worked. It forced me to pick up the phone and call or go visit people I ordinarily would prefer to avoid, people whose points of view made me cringe. But I tried to be fair and balanced, long before Fox News or Al Franken. I avoided the ad hominem attack, Thompson's favorite method of arguing a case (i.e., Thompson's main argument against Nixon seemed to boil down to this: Nixon was evil, so everything he said or did was wrong, and anyone who defended him was evil, too.)

What I learned from Hunter Thompson, though, was storytelling. The man knew how to take you there, though the journey was often difficult, sometimes distasteful. I learned to look for those subtle elements and weave them into the fabric of the story in descriptive detail. (I avoided some of Thompson's favorite adjectives, however.)

I am concerned about his legacy, however, and how it has been misapplied within the ranks of journalism. I see this across the Bluegrass as well as the national news outlets. It seems that increasingly, reporters are no longer separate from commentators, which is what Thompson was. He never claimed to be an impartial news source. One never questioned where he stood on an issue.

It is dangerous when those lines are not clearly drawn. One of the roles of a journalist is to be a watchdog--not an attack dog. In the rush to shed light on the dark corners, or, in some cases, merely to be first with the story, or present some new angle, journalists should stop to consider whether they are casting a particular tone on the issue. In the effort to stand out, to write with flair, to compete in the marketplace, it's easy to slip a little "Gonzo" into "journalism."

Granted, a journalist isn't a robot or a scribe. He or she is a person with a set of values and experiences. It is not the job of a journalist to simply regurgitate the facts as spoonfed to him or her. That's where you have to be smart. Use your head. Know how to balance a story--and to be fair. The two aren't always the same.

It makes me extremely uncomfortable when reporters write editorials about the subject they are assigned to cover. Makes me wonder how many impartial facts I'm getting. Leave the pontificating to the editorial board (and the countless bloggers and talking heads) and the authors.

And what's the point of my little speck on the floor of the court of public opinion? I suppose it is this: There's a place for the Hunter Thompsons of the world, and it isn't the front page.

Even if I don't like what he had to say, by gosh, I'm glad he could say it. We should all be so bold as to fearlessly ask questions of the world (though one might argue that Thompson's interrogations were more fearsome than fearless). Let's just make sure we are able to clearly define where "journalism" ends and "Gonzo" begins.

A taste of Thompson