The Forward had the widest circulation and many of the best writers, including publisher Abraham Cahan, author of the seminal Jewish bildungsroman, “The Rise of David Levinsky.” Isaac Bashevis Singer, the winner of the 1978 Nobel Prize in Literature, published his new stories in The Forward.
The paper had a socialist political orientation that today might be called social democratic in the European context. Tying itself firmly to the Jewish working class, The Forward championed unions and the fight for a living wage and reasonable work hours. It was decidedly anti-communist.
The other competing Jewish newspapers gradually fell by the wayside as the immigrants assimilated and their children became “real Yankees.” But The Forward stayed relevant by starting an English edition which helped to both retain its readership and attract a younger generation which no longer spoke Yiddish.
No other papers had its ambition to cover such a wide array of Jewish life both in America and the world, and The Forward became a national Jewish newspaper almost by default. In the early days and for decades thereafter, it was a daily with a print circulation at its height of 300,000. As its fortunes declined along with its readership, it became a weekly paper. In the past few years, it stopped its print edition entirely and reverted to online-only.
When the State of Israel was established in 1948, the paper became an enthusiastic supporter, given the socialist philosophy of the dominant Labor Party, which was congenial to The Forward. The Israeli Labor Party’s leftist ideology became watered down over time and identified with a more moderate approach called liberal Zionism. The majority of American Jews share this now perhaps nostalgic view of Israel as a humane society based on democratic values, religious tolerance, and ethnic diversity.
For the past few decades, The Forward’s coverage of Israel has hewn to this line. When a two-state solution became de rigueur after the 1992 Oslo Accords, the Forward supported it. Where the Israeli center-left stood, The Forward stood.
The Forward’s reporting has generally been far superior to that of the local Jewish newspapers in major American cities. It assigns journalists to report stories in depth, interviewing sources and doing significant research. It breaks major stories which are later picked up by the mainstream media. At the height of controversy over the Iran nuclear deal, Larry Cohler Esses, The Forward’s assistant managing editor, scored a major coup when he became the first journalist for a Jewish newspaper to secure a travel visa. The result was a masterful portrait of the state of Iran, which included penetrating interviews with senior Ayatollah on questions of relations between Islam and Judaism, and Israel and Iran.
The Forward adheres to an independent line which is supportive of Jewish communal consensus, but willing to challenge it when necessary.
Of course, in-depth reporting that is willing to buck the prevailing wisdom and question accepted norms costs money, lots of it. And it takes time. They say content is king, and in the current climate content doesn’t have to be superior quality, it just has to exist and find its way to the consumer.
The Forward’s fall
The Forward Building in the Lower East Side, New York City.
In its early 20th century heyday, The Forward built as its headquarters the first skyscraper on the Lower East Side, an imposing edifice to rival those of the major dailies like The New York Times, the Daily News and the Post. But as readership declined and revenue decreased, it was forced to sell its 10-story office building in 1974.
But the newspaper’s endowment and financial health was guaranteed (for a time, at least) by the sale of its radio station, WEVD (“The station that speaks your language”), to ABC, which wanted to bring ESPN Radio to New York. The station call letters were the initials of Eugene Victor Debs, the hero of early 20th century American radicalism. The $78 million sale in 2001 resulted in an endowment which is now the only lifeline supporting The Forward.
Over the past few years, the newspaper has violated a key principle of prudent financial stewardship by spending down its endowment significantly. The Forward’s 2014 IRS 990 report places the remaining endowment at just over $50 million, but other sources indicate it may now be as low as $30 million.
Alarmed at this decline, The Forward’s board of directors and editorial leadership under Editor-in-Chief Jane Eisner and President and CEO Sam Norich came to believe that The Forward’s current format was unsustainable. As a result, they hired a new team of social media consultants who are schooled in the latest forms of journalism. One of these approaches is known as “clickbait,” short pieces built around a single compelling idea. This style gravitates toward the sensational and controversial, sometimes even manufactured controversy.
A few examples of the genre are the series, “The Secret Jewish History of…,” which satisfies a perverse Jewish penchant for knowing the most trivial Jewish-related facts on any subject. Among the sizzling topics covered were Pokémon and Game of Thrones. Psst, did you know the hit HBO show features an Israeli-Palestinian actor?
Knowing that the The Forward’s older readership is dying, the leadership has bought into this new model which they believe will ensure the paper’s future by drawing younger millennial readers used to 24-hour news cycles and shorter attention spans.
But in seeking to draw in new, younger readers, The Forward can’t afford to lose the older generation which expects thoughtful, in-depth reporting of the caliber represented by mainstream papers like The New York Times.
Not to mention that in the rush to produce content to fill the maw of the consumer, journalists and editors are often forced to cut corners. Those expected to file multiple stories each day, rather than one each week, are hard-pressed to produce genuinely thoughtful observation. They don’t the luxury of interviewing multiple sources for a story. They may not even have time to consult a single source.
A case study in journalistic failure
With limited opportunities to engage in painstaking research, The Forward has started making mistakes. Last week, Laura Adkins, a young journalist who graduated from New York University this year, made a great one which exemplifies the pitfalls of the assembly line process adopted by the paper’s leadership.
Adkins’ story begins in 2014, when she was vice president of TorchPAC, the pro-Israel student group at NYU. One of her group’s chief opponents was Students for Justice in Palestine, a leading pro-Palestinian group active on American college and university campuses.
Read more: http://www.mintpressnews.com/rise-fall-jewish-forward/219773/
