voa慢速英语视频:News Literacy Lesson 2: Verification, Independence, Accountability

News Literacy Lesson 2: Verification, Independence, Accountability

新闻素养第二课：验证、独立、问责

What is legitimate journalism? It is news that has been verified by an independent organization that is accountable for the information.

什么是合法新闻?就是一个对信息负责的独立组织已经核实过的新闻。

Verification, independence and accountability are the characteristics of quality journalism. Let’s examine Verification. It’s the process of establishing that information is truthful and accurate.

验证、独立和问责是高质量新闻工作的特点。我们重点说一下验证，这是建立真实和准确信息的过程。

Journalists collect information with the goal of providing the most accurate version of events. They talk to sources, dig through information, and provide accurate documents to back up their stories.

记者收集信息的目的是提供事件最准确的版本，他们谈论消息来源，挖掘信息，并提供准确的文件来支持他们的故事。

In 2004, the CBS News broadcast 60 Minutes II claimed it had documents critical of the National Guard service of President George W. Bush. But CBS News failed to authenticate the documents and they were, in fact, forgeries.Several journalists, including anchorman Dan Rather, were fired.

2004年，哥伦比亚广播公司的“60分钟(第二季)”节目，声称有批评乔治·W·布什总统国民警卫队的文件，但是CBS新闻没有对这些文件进行验证，事实上，这是伪造的，结果包括主持人丹·拉瑟在内的一些记者都被解雇了。

Independence. It is a freedom from control or influence, combined with impartiality.

独立，是一种不受控制或影响，与公正相结合的自由。

Independence includes objectivity, fairness and balance. But what is fairness? What is balance? And how do we determine that?

独立包括客观性、公平性和平衡性。但什么是公平?什么是平衡?我们怎么确定呢?

Let’s take, for example the myth that the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine is the cause of autism. This claim has been completely discredited, yet several Hollywood celebrities continue to endorse it, some backing an anti-vaccine film made by pseudo-scientists. Should journalists reporting on autism give time to the position of the anti-vaccine believers? No. They are not scientists. Their “opinions” cannot be balanced against scientific knowledge and certainty. Both sides are not equal and it is misleading to treat them equally.

让我们以麻疹、腮腺炎和风疹疫苗是孤独症病因的说法为例。这一说法已完全不可信，但一些好莱坞名人仍在支持它，一些人还支持伪科学家制作的一部反疫苗电影。应该给报道孤独症的记者一些时间来了解抗疫苗信徒的立场吗?不需要，他们不是科学家。他们的“意见”与科学知识和确定性不平衡。两者是不平等的，所以平等对待他们是有误导性的。

Accountability. The process of taking responsibility for the reporting.

问责，是为报告负责的过程。

News organizations should be clearly identified and journalists’ contact information, easily obtainable. But most importantly, any news organization or journalist should be prepared to admit errors when they’ve been made.

应该清楚地识别新闻机构和记者的联系信息，这些信息很容易获得。但最重要的是，任何新闻机构或记者都应该在错误出现的时候准备承认。

In 2005, the New York Times asked veteran reporter Judith Miller to resign after it became clear her reporting about the Iraq war was wrong. The Times wrote an extraordinary critique of its own editorial process. That is also accountability.

2005年，“纽约时报”要求资深记者朱迪思·米勒辞职，因为她对伊拉克战争的报道显然是错误的。“泰晤士报”对自己的编辑过程进行了非同寻常的批评，这也是问责。

Verification, Independence and Accountability. These are the three main elements of journalism and what distinguishes it from other kinds of information.

验证、独立和问责，这是新闻工作的三大要素，也是新闻与其他信息的区别。

In our next lesson, we will look more closely at verification.

在我们的下一课中，我们将更仔细地研究验证问题。

Words in This Story

legitimate - adj. real truthful

accountable – adj. take responsibility for

characteristic – n. a feature of something

accurate – adj. truthful, correct

forgeries – n. something that is created to falsely look real

Impartiality – n. without any interest, seeing both sides equally

myth – n. In our next lesson, we will look more closely at verification.

autism – n. a condition or disorder that begins in childhood and that causes problems in forming relationships and in communicating with other people

mislead – v. to purposely give a false idea to someone

obtain – v. to get, to have

error - n. a mistake, something incorrect

critique – n. a careful judgment about something’s quality