Active and Passive

[jsburbidge]

 In journalism, the use of the passive voice, usually discouraged elsewhere stylistically, seems to be endemic in headlines.

 

The problem is that the impact of the headline becomes very different when the agent is omitted. The CBC has a headline: "Carney attacked for wanting 'free ride,' 'hiding' from public amid latest campaign break". It would leave a different impression if it said "Leaders of the CPC and Bloc attack Carney for wanting 'free ride,' 'hiding' from public amid latest campaign break", which is in fact what the article is about.

Comments

[dewline]

If I remember right, that's considered a rule. Required as part of the "don't involve yourself directly" editorial advice to all reporters...?

[graydon]

The post-Harper CBC is not in any way politically neutral; they will hew as closely to the CPC agenda as they can.

(Like allowing foreign media ownership, breaking the CBC was part of Harper's job.)

All the other media is owned by a billionaire, and they're not all the same but they do all hate democracy.

[ionelv]

I think even worse than active vs passive is the marshalling of conservative invective without much context. One theory I have is that CBC leads with conservative/PR talking points, but then balances the coverage by the end. For example, in that article, near the end, the author covers PP's duplicity:

As of Thursday, Poilievre had answered around half as many questions during the campaign as Carney, according to Radio-Canada.