The abuse of BBC journalist Sarah Smith is a reminder that a great many folk believe they are experts at someone else’s job these days – even if they haven’t a clue what it actually entails.
There are those who pontificate pompously about police tactics – despite never themselves having had to go through a front door in the middle of the night, not knowing if there’s a knife or a gun or a dead body lying in wait on the other side.
Others think they know better than the virologists and scientists who’ve tried to advise the public, often while working with incomplete information, during the grim years of Covid.
And now we can add those “experts” castigating the reporting of Sarah Smith, the departing Scotland editor of the BBC, into the category.
Smith has attracted the ire and venom of many independence supporters for her perceived bias towards the union and its preservation.
Bias, of course, is notoriously subjective and like notions of beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.
It’s instructive that some critics appeared to base their opinions on her supposed political views on inferences from her body language, facial expressions, or who her father was.
I have news for them.
I know this won’t make me popular with some but there is undoubtedly a culture of bile, hatred & misogyny in Scottish politics. Across the board & it’s at its height when women speak up for their rights. It needs called out & tackled. https://t.co/qD8MptsokM
— Joanna Cherry QC (@joannaccherry) February 17, 2022
None of those methods is close to being a precise science, or indeed actual corroborating evidence of her position. Assuming she even has one.
Skills under pressure – the TV reporter’s lot
I’ve worked as a broadcaster for the BBC for 30 years now, on the staff and as a freelancer.
So I do know a bit about the job Smith was employed to do.
And I know it would have involved myriad elements, before she even uttered a word to a television audience.
Such as trying to do a live piece to camera while some bloke, and it usually is a bloke (often attached to a half-empty bottle of bevvy) is shouting abuse in the background.
Or the car driver who thinks it’s a jolly jape to blast his horn full pelt right in the middle of your report.
For those unfamiliar with the world of TV reporting it can come as a shock to discover that it’s often both as exciting as next day’s reheated kebab.
Yet it’s also usually a fly by the seat of the pants, it’ll be alright on the night affair, because half a dozen balls are being juggled in the air at any one time, often with broken communication with the studio.
Sarah Smith is well paid for her skills under pressure.
And yes I know it’s not like being a doctor and no one dies if she fluffs her lines.
But each job brings its own distinctive demands.
And TV reporting – particularly the live kind – is often a potentially combustible situation.
The world of media now brings extra demands from TV, radio, online, and podcasting.
So a reporter like Smith is often serving many masters, all hungry for content and all wanting it yesterday and exclusive.
Rehashed and reheated cauld kale won’t satisfy producers and editors of those various elements.
They want fresh and new top lines constantly.
Sarah Smith put in the hard graft
As a starting point Sarah Smith is in the job because she has a plethora of contacts and sources gathered from her years in the trade.
That’s a basic requirement for a top broadcaster and reporter.
These don’t fall into your lap, no matter who your father is.
But even if they did, they’d tumble out quickly if you lost their trust.
They come from the hard graft and long hours of cultivating contacts and winning their confidence by never revealing them as sources.
From editorial meetings in the morning to deciding which stories to pursue, then being across all the different elements and strands, Smith’s mobile would be constantly glued to her ear, sometimes seconds before she goes live on air.
The skill comes in gathering and trying to comprehend often conflicting and complex information, which she then has to convey in snappy sound bites for a live audience.
She may well have an easier time than some journalists in grabbing edit suite time for pre-recorded packages. But it’ll still be a battle against the clock as live demands encroach on her.
Walter Scott quotes at Waverly Station. Apt for our times pic.twitter.com/2yhC74XRxh
— sarah smith (@BBCsarahsmith) March 5, 2021
Meanwhile there’s that constantly trilling mobile, as contacts and PR hustlers try to pressure her and soft soap her in equal measure.
Trying to relay complex and sensitive information on your feet, often with just seconds to digest it before you go to air, can try the patience of a saint.
Telling the story while walking the tightrope between reporting and editorialising isn’t an exact formula and Smith has made mistakes. Which of us hasn’t?
But those throwing abuse at her might have stopped to consider the actual realities of her job before leaping to accusations of bias as their first port of call.
