Three ways to think about journalism layoffs; plus, Aaron Bushnell's self-immolation

It's Been a Minute

NPR

News Commentary, Society & Culture, News, Spirituality, Religion & Spirituality

4.6 • 8.8K Ratings

🗓️ 1 March 2024

⏱️ 38 minutes

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Summary

The American journalism industry is in crisis - layoffs, strikes, and site shutdowns have some people talking about the potential extinction of the the news industry as we know it. Just last week, VICE Media announced their plans to layoff hundreds of employees and halt website operations. Taylor Lorenz, the Washington Post online culture and technology columnist, joins the show to unpack what is at stake with the continued media closures and layoffs.

Then, Brittany is joined by Deva Woodly, a professor of Political Science at Brown University. They discuss Aaron Bushnell's self-immolation outside the Israeli embassy in DC. They look at how this extreme act of protest is unique and how it might impact the ongoing conflict in Gaza.

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Transcript

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0:20.3	Hello hello I'm Brittany Loose, and you're listening to It's Been a Minute from NPR, a show about
0:27.8	what's going on in culture and why it doesn't happen by accident.
0:37.0	The American journalism industry is in crisis. More than 2,600 journalism jobs were
0:46.6	eliminated in 2023, and 2024 isn't looking so good either. In January, the LA Times let go of 20% of their new staff. That
0:56.6	same month, Sports Illustrated all but shuttered, laying off nearly all of its employees.
1:02.4	And they weren't an anomaly.
1:03.9	When you tally the layoffs from companies like Forbes,
1:06.2	Time, NBC News, and more, a total of over 500 journalists
1:11.8	lost their jobs in January 2024 alone.
1:15.0	Since then, we've seen even more job cuts from news organizations like the Wall Street Journal,
1:20.8	CBS News, and massive layoffs at Vice Media.
1:25.0	Last month, Vice halted publishing on its website
1:28.0	and announced it would layoff several hundred employees,
1:31.0	effectively gutting its news operations. Full disclosure, my husband is a
1:34.9	former employee of Vice Media but left the company five years ago. As a journalist and
1:39.7	as a person who wants to stay well informed, this is unsettling for many reasons.
1:45.4	And there are implications here that reverberate much wider than the journalism industry.
	...

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