Just Trust Me Journalism
investigative journalism predicated upon anonymous sources creates some obvious problems and it’s lazy—could journalists make more of an effort to include authorised sources in their reporting?
“Which, while I used hyperbole to make the point, is what the nation’s reporters are increasingly asking the public to do.
The once rare use of unnamed sources in the new “just trust me” world of Canadian journalism is getting out of control.” — Peter Menzies, The Media Must End its Obsession with Unnamed Sources, The Hub
Reader, how do you feel about the flood of unnamed sources journalism that’s come to dominate our news media in Canada?
Personally I think it’s a bit lazy and sloppy. I also think it makes journalistic accountability more difficult, and it compromises the fourth estate role that the news media plays in a democratic society.
How can a journo account for their writing in any particular article when they can’t name one source they used to write said article? They really can’t, can they, reader?
So, where does that leave us, the consumer of news media?
Good question.
I don’t feel too charitable when it comes to doling out my trust to journalists in Canada these days. Sorry, I really don’t. Journalists earn my trust, they oughtn’t expect me to oblige them with my trust. Maybe Robert Fife and Sam Cooper get some leeway that others don’t. Reader, track records speak for themselves.
The recent story that Juno News broke about the WRDSB got me thinking about this today. A reader commented on the essay I wrote in response to that story about family as a concept being harmful to “racialised students” because of its supposed roots in white supremacy. This story created quite a stir, understandably triggered much anger amongst the public. My diligent reader commented that she contacted the school board and spoke to the superintendent, who claimed that the position expressed in the training materials contradicts the official WRDSB position on the family.
I called the Waterloo District School Board and the Superintendent of the Board said that in no way do they define or train their staff to define family the way this article depicts nor [do they] discourage the use of that word family because of a negative connotation. He said they only speak about the term family in a positive way.
Please provide further links to how this negative view by the Board came into play.
Immediately I felt a bit bristly at the tone of the demand made in the comment, and then I felt annoyed at the story itself. Reader, I appreciate the Juno News story and what it represents. I didn’t appreciate what I saw as a failure to show the investigative work by mentioning authorised sources to corroborate the claim made by the unnamed source.
Did the investigative journalist consult the Waterloo Oxford District Secondary School and the Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation to corroborate or explain the training materials they received from an unnamed source? It’s unclear, based on the story itself.
When I read an investigative report I trust that the reporter actually did do the investigating. Reader, taking a document an unnamed source gave you and printing it doesn’t investigative journalism make. A statement to the effect we reached out to so and so for a comment and they didn’t return our calls would suffice. It would demonstrate due diligence.
Show don’t tell. As in, show your work.
This incident gave me pause to think about How I consume information, as a citizen, and as a researcher and writer. How much do I trust the media outlet in question? Already we live in a very weird culture in Canada, when it comes to news media. Trust in the news media has waned considerably. Many outlets set up shop and call themselves independent media. Not all of these organisations have ethical reporting as their top priority, many have an obvious anti-progressive anti-DEI bias that can and does compromise their ability to report on the news on an objective and neutral manner. Rage farming features prominently in a lot of independent media outlets.
How do we navigate the news media landscape, reader?
In The Hub piece I’ve quoted above, Menzies writes that “… it was not that long ago when, if a reporter came to his editor to pitch a story like that, they would have been laughed out of the newsroom or, at the very least, instructed to include comments from people who are authorized. Because they exist.” Authorised sources exist, reader. Imagine that! Sorry the sarcasm snark slipped out, oops. Anyway.
Reader, I don’t think it’s expecting too much for any journalists to try to corroborate an anonymous tip they’ve received. Investigative journalism demands corroboration. Investigative, being the qualifier here.
According to Cambridge Dictionary the word investigate means to examine something carefully, esp. to discover the truth about it. Examine carefully, discover truth about. Examine means to test. Discover means to find out during a search. This denotes actively seeking, it implies testing the information against other sources and comparing. Investigative journalism means doing these activities in the course of your research and showing your work, like working out a math problem.
No journalist or non fiction writer should expect the grace of unearned trust from their readers. Reader, It’s arrogant and presuming. And sadly in Canada it’s become a dominant methodology journalists have come to rely upon to produce their reportage work. Why? What happened to good old fashioned investigative reporting?
As Menzies writes, unnamed sources are only a valuable tool in journalism, provided they are telling the (independently verified) truth and their motivations are not self-serving. Otherwise, if there’s any chance sources are just spilling gossip to enhance their own career prospects and damage their rivals—something that happens every 30 seconds or so in politics—they should be avoided.
Menzies refers to the Arthur Kent case, in which Kent won a defamation lawsuit against Don Martin and Post Media for a story based on unnamed sources, two of whom ended up having to testify at the trial.
From the judicial decision, written by Justice J Strekaf:
The overall tenor of the Article is that Arthur Kent is a politically naïve arrogant has-been journalist with a huge ego whose election campaign is in disarray and who is doomed to become an ineffective MLA if elected. It is markedly different than the other articles published about Mr. Kent and his campaign in the preceding couple of days, which were more balanced and focused on differences between Mr. Kent and the PC Party. None of the prior articles contained the harshly critical personal tone used in the Article or focused on the three new issues raised in the Article. Justice Strekaf ruled that Arthur Kent suffered substantial distress as a result of the statements made in the article.
For context, the background involves provincial PC candidate Arthur Kent taking some public positions inconsistent with the party position, and at one point refusing to attend an event that the premier wanted all Calgary PC candidates to attend. Some party faithful had concerns about Kent’s performance as a team player. This included Kristine Robidoux, legal advisor to Kent’s campaign and a PC Party insider and faithful, and also one of the unnamed sources for the Don Martin article.
Also from the judicial decision:
Mr. Martin emailed Kristine Robidoux on February 12, 2008, at 8:24 a.m. stating: “I see the death spiral for AK continues. Any more dirt? Column runs tomorrow.” She responded: “OMG it’s all bad. I am dealing at this very moment with his official/financial agent who is resigning today.” She later went on to state: “The premier is making an announcement in an hour – specifically requested Arthur Kent’s attendance there, to have a chat. He ‘declined’. Wowzers. It’s all bad.” — Kent v Martin, 2016 ABQB 314 (CanLII), at para 44, retrieved on 2025-06-07
So, reader, it’s pretty important for journalists to guard against getting unwittingly caught in some kind of interpersonal drama or becoming a tool for the exacting of someone’s personal or political vendetta, wouldn’t you agree?
Incidentally Robidoux, a corporate ethics lawyer, received a four month suspension from the Law Society of Alberta for her role in this sordid affair. The law society found her “… to have breached client confidentiality in 2008 when she was acting as legal counsel to Kent’s campaign team,” according to Canadian Lawyer Magazine. Robidoux resigned her position at Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP.
The moral of the story?
Tread with caution when writing an investigative story based on unnamed sources as a journalist. We can never place too much importance on due diligence and accountability, and ethics, reader. We risk some very costly things when we get sloppy.