If you call yourself a broadcast journalist should the public know your opinions?

That is the question I have for all of you.  MSNBC’s Katy Tur has written a book titled “Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History”.  In that book she attempts to describe her experiences in covering the 2016 Presidential campaign and what she felt on election night.

In an excerpt from that book she tells us that when she heard that Donald Trump has won the Presidential election she thought:

I’m about to throw up

That brings me back to my question, should a hard news “journalist” express their personal opinions to the world?

My first thought is, if you are a pundit that is understandable but if you claim you are a hard news “journalist” then you should keep your personal opinions to yourself.

I say keep your personal opinions to yourself because how are we to expect that you will cover a political figure honestly if you have such harsh feelings towards them.

On reflection my second thought was, maybe we should know the personal opinions and biases a hard news “journalist” has so we can judge them on their coverage of that political figure.  Or we at least know where their coverage could be coming from.

With knowing their personal opinions and biases then we will know if their coverage is fair or not.

That does not mean that a hard news “journalist” cannot have their own personal opinions and biases, we all do, it is human nature.  It also does not mean that a hard news “journalist” can have very harsh and bad opinions about someone they are covering and still cover them fairly.

I can assume that it would make it harder for the public to believe they are fairly covering someone or not.

Why as a hard news “journalist” would you want to put yourself in that position.
