🤔Rethinking traditional Western news values

The modern media landscape is dominated by a constant rush of breaking stories, click-bait, misinformation and deliberate disinformation, leading to a growing conversation around what journalism really is, what it’s for, and how to do it well.

Some say it’s time to go back to ‘un-biased’ and ‘objective’ news reports, while others struggle to curate a coherent world-view based on scattered independent sources that exist within a comfortable bubble of shared political views.

Personally, I hold on to the belief that it’s not an either-or situation. The news of the Walter Cronkite era was just as biased as any news today, but it was challenged less often. There is no golden era to return to.

But mindful journalism offers an alternative to the traditional Western news values that have led us to this point—one that draws from Eastern philosophies and a holistic understanding of our interconnected world.

Traditional journalism has long rested on a set of values that include impact, timeliness, prominence, proximity, conflict, the unusual, currency, and necessity.

These criteria—though not without merit—often lead journalists to prioritize speed and spectacle over deep insight. A headline about a well-known celebrity or a local tragedy will grab your attention, but does it help us understand the intricate web of ongoing factors behind the news?

Mindful journalism challenges that approach and offers an ethical foundation that emphasizes mental cultivation as essential.

Breaking down Western news values

Some sources list five news values, others list seven, and some combine one or more of the points on the following list, but Mindful Journalism and News Ethics in the Digital Era uses a set of eight news values described by Melvin Mencher in a widely used U.S. textbook in 2006:

• Impact/Importance: Events that affect many people.

• Timeliness: The need for immediate reporting so the public can react.

• Prominence: The idea that well-known figures or institutions automatically warrant coverage.

• Proximity: The tendency to cover events that are physically or emotionally close to the audience.

• Conflict: The dramatic framing of events as battles between opposing forces.

• The Unusual: The lure of the bizarre or out-of-the-ordinary.

• Currency: When situations suddenly emerge as the subject of discussion.

• Necessity: Deciding when it’s essential to share or withhold information.

These values helped shape modern journalism, including the best examples of journalistic integrity. But they also inadvertently encourage a focus on immediacy and drama, driven by commercial imperatives and the pressures of ad revenue. When every story must be told at a moment’s notice, the process of understanding the bigger picture is easily sacrificed.

The mindful journalism alternative

Mindful journalism reimagines these values with an emphasis on process rather than outcome. It doesn’t just ask, “What happened?” but also, “How do the underlying factors interact over time?” This approach is deeply influenced by Eastern values, where the understanding of impermanence, interconnectedness, and the absence of a permanent self plays a key role.

Take, for instance, the coverage of tariffs. Traditional reporting might offer a snapshot: tariffs hurting Canada here, causing price hikes there. But mindful journalism digs deeper—it connects the dots between immediate impacts and the ongoing, complex economic interplay. By doing so, it turns what might be a fleeting headline into an evolving narrative that speaks to the continuity of global interdependence.

Say what you like about CBC as a mainstream news outlet, but they recently released an explainer by Andrew Chang that did just that.

Challenging prominence, proximity, and the unusual

The mindful journalism framework takes issue with three news values, starting with prominence. Traditional journalism tends to immortalize well-known figures, sometimes at the cost of nuanced storytelling.

When Britney Spears dramatically changed her look, conventional coverage rehashed the event for shock value. ‘The blonde pop star is now bald,’ was our take away. Clinging to the idea of this permanent self (the idea that Brittney Spears is, and can only be, a long haired blonde woman) only deepens the cycle of suffering for both the subject and the audience. All this, to discover later that it was merely one moment in a long and complicated saga of family control and financial abuse.

Similarly, the conventional emphasis on proximity—whether physical or emotional—falls apart when we consider our global interconnectedness. Our lives are increasingly intertwined. So many seemingly disconnected issues are actually global problems, and the idea that news is only important if it happens nearby is shortsighted. Mindful journalism encourages us to see beyond our immediate surroundings and appreciate the broader human experience.

Then there’s the allure of the unusual. Traditional news values prize the bizarre, sometimes at the expense of stories that are less flashy but far more significant. Mindful journalism pushes us to look past the spectacle. Instead, it focuses on how events tie into larger movements and long-term shifts in society. A great example of this is Martin Bauman’s coverage of an AI-generated news outlet pretending to publish work by human reporters in Halifax.

The infinite timeline

One of the most refreshing aspects of mindful journalism to me, is its rethinking of timeliness. Rather than treating news as a perishable commodity with an expiration date, mindful journalism views stories as part of an infinite timeline. Sure, immediate updates are necessary in certain situations—natural disasters, public service interruptions, weather reports, certain crimes—but a reflective, retrospective approach usually offers more profound insight. Instead of live-tweeting a fleeting moment, a well-crafted narrative that situates an event within its broader context can have a lasting impact.

Mindful journalism and traditional values work together

It’s not that the traditional model is entirely flawed, but that alternative approaches to journalism invite us to pair it with a process-oriented perspective that values depth and education over drama. It doesn’t ask us to discard the tried-and-true methods of news reporting altogether.

Instead, it’s an invitation to balance the immediate with the enduring, the dramatic with the reflective. As mainstream media begins to acknowledge the limitations of conventional news values, there’s real promise in exploring how the mindful journalism framework can better serve our collective need for understanding in an increasingly complex world.

In rethinking what counts as news, we’re not just changing the way stories are told—we’re redefining the role of journalism in fostering a more connected, informed, and compassionate society.

By embracing mindfulness principles in our reporting, we honour the truth that every story is part of a larger tapestry, one that requires thoughtful, ongoing exploration rather than a fleeting glimpse. This is the future of journalism—a future that doesn’t just report events, but seeks to truly understand them.

P.S. If you’re trying to consume media in a more mindful way so you can stay engaged without burning out, my friend and colleague Michael Newman is hosting a four week workshop called Navigating Media in Turbulent Times on Saturdays, starting March 22nd. As a mindful journalist himself, Michael is dedicated to helping people navigate the quickly evolving media landscape we’re dealing with.