US local news outlets need tax breaks to help save democracy, says advocate [theguardian.com]

We, society, shouldn't support the mainstream news-media unconditionally, at least not those operating in Canada and the U.S. Big media companies allow their journalism to be compromised, to put it mildly.

Many reporters and editors nevertheless continue to reply to their critics with, ‘Who, me? I’m just the messenger.’ Whatever the news media may be, they are not ‘just the messenger’; nor are they just a reflection of the community — or their products’ consumers, necessarily — in which they circulate.

Maybe there also is an informal/unspoken agreement amongst the largest mainstream news-media: ‘Don’t dump on me, and I won’t dump on you.’

Meantime, Canadian newspapers are being government subsidized. That includes those operated/owned by media conglomerate Postmedia, which is on record allying itself with Canada’s fossil fuel industry, including the mass extraction and export of bitumen, the dirtiest and most polluting crude oil.

A few years ago, Postmedia had acquired a lobbying firm with close ties to Alberta Premier Jason Kenney in order to participate in his government’s $30 million PR “war room” in promoting the fossil fuel industry’s interests.

Furthermore, in May of 2021, Postmedia refused to run paid ads by Leadnow, a social and environmental justice organization, that exposed the Royal Bank of Canada as the largest financer of the nation’s fossil fuel extraction. ...

Many news consumers would say mainstream journalism has largely become a profession motivated more by a buck and a byline — i.e. a regular company paycheck and a frequently published name with stories — than a genuine strive to challenge the powers-that-be in order to truly comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable in an increasingly unjust global existence.