I'm not used to writing about this

But it needs to be said right now. [Mother Jones]( MoJo Reader, I was sitting in the corner of my living room, which is now my pandemic workstation, about a month ago when my phone buzzed. It was a notification that a women's news site invited a Trump administration bigwig, Kellyanne Conway, to join an event on women and the election, and it got me thinking. I'm not used to writing media criticism. I was a reporter for 15 years, but now that I'm chief operating officer at Mother Jones, part of my job is to think about the broader media, political, and economic systems we operate in and how our work can have the biggest impact. And for my turn to ask you to [support our team's work with a year-end donation to help us hit our big $350,000 goal this month](, I wanted to write you about false equivalency and how some of journalism's traditions can be exploited to muddle the notion of truth, and ought to be reckoned with. Now that President-elect Joe Biden is headed to the Oval Office, Trump's inner circle of advisers and appointees are boxing up their White House office suites and plotting their [post-Trump careers](. They will be [penning political memoirs]( (Conway, who coined the phrase "alternative facts," [has reportedly]( inked a multimillion-dollar deal), scoring consultant gigs, and shortlisted for [cozy posts]( in academia. These appearances are a powerful reminder that, while Donald J. Trump's quest to win the 2020 election is dead, another equally alarming campaign is underway. And many well-meaning media outlets will be complicit in presenting his team's full-on attack on democracy as merely the Republican "side" in a bipartisan debate. It was hard to miss former national security adviser [John Bolton's media blitz]( to sell his new book, earlier this summer, after he made headlines for refusing to testify before congressional investigators during Trump's impeachment hearings (which my colleague Dan Friedman covers in "[Say It Under Oath, Asshole]("). Other Trump loyalists made the rounds at media festivals and live events, albeit with mixed results. Former Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was slated to be featured at the Atlantic Festival but [was later forced to drop out]( after public backlash. In 2018, [Steve Bannon got an invitation]( to headline the New Yorker Festival (though the appearance was later canceled). Earlier this month, it was Conway and former Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett talking about women voters and the presidential election. And for the record, I support all of these media organizations and they do great, important work—and I used to work for Condé Nast, the New Yorker's parent company. But false equivalency—you can even call it "bothsidesism"—is a systemic problem. No one person or publication invented the practice of presenting what opposing sides are saying in politics or giving outgoing officials ample airtime. And there is a reasonable argument for it: Allowing journalists to engage with officials in a high-profile forum gives reporters the opportunity to ask tough questions without their sources going off the record. But it's inevitable, and unfortunate, that soon-to-be-former Trump officials will most certainly use these media invitations as opportunities to soften and normalize their [overt bigotry](, the [imprisonment of migrant children](, and [deadly COVID indifference]( that has defined the Trump administration. Reporting on Trump’s [norm-shattering]( and [disinformation-spreading]( presidency isn't something traditional media outlets had a playbook for—and treating it as normal allowed our field's norms to be manipulated. When 45 took office, many media outlets were slow to shake off the deeply entrenched deference to the presidency and [reflexive "both sides" false equivalency](, even if that meant giving a national audience to empathetic words for white supremacists and disinformation aimed at undermining democratic norms and even clear-cut election results. It wasn't until the tail end of Trump's presidency that major broadcast outlets became more aggressive about cutting away from his fact-free press conferences and rallies and pushing back when pundits lied in interviews. There will be a strong urge among some of the most powerful players in media, now that Trump's made-for-TV presidency is ending, to go back to the knee-jerk version of "both sides" journalism. I know that urge well because, years ago, I was a young Black queer reporter who worked in many local newsrooms. I knew I had to seek out "the other side" for almost every topic, even if that meant I might be giving a platform to people who advocated in favor of racist policies or who openly questioned the humanity of the LGBTQ community. I am not advocating for one-sided stories here. What we need is more nuanced storytelling that doesn't give every viewpoint the same weight and legitimacy. We now know that this false equivalency, which has been part of mainstream journalism for decades, is rooted in white privilege. "Since American journalism's pivot many decades ago from an openly partisan press to a model of professed objectivity, the mainstream has allowed what it considers objective truth to be decided almost exclusively by white reporters and their mostly white bosses," wrote Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist [Wesley Lowery](. Meanwhile, for many years the lived experiences of journalists who belong to marginalized groups was not seen as expertise. It meant that they were falsely assumed to be "too close to the story," writes Lewis Raven Wallace, co-founder of the Southern journalism collective Press On, in his book, The View From Somewhere. That's why I'm thrilled to help lead Mother Jones at a moment like this, when our newsroom can help shape a better way forward. Our team of journalists knows that this simplistic "both sides" reflex gives oxygen and legitimacy to bunk science, homophobia, white supremacy, and xenophobia. Instead, our journalists talk to experts—seeking out different viewpoints, but not uncritically airing lies or hate—pore over documents, and share their hard-earned expertise with you. They scrutinize political operators and follow the money, whether it's examining Joe Biden's cozy relationship with [the banking industry]( or Conway's [support of Trump's racist tweets]( and her [blatant violation]( of the Hatch Act. When [I wrote you over the summer]( to introduce myself and ask the Mother Jones community what draws you to our work, you said that's what you want: "I trust MJ to present fact-checked information behind every article, and provide context and background that help me properly frame events in contexts that I feel are accurate." "Your contributors do not take off the sharp edges of reality to make their analyses more palatable to some sectors of the economy." "Your style of journalism is refreshing in an era of regurgitated party line 'news.'" "I just want to say congratulations! I'm excited to see a person of color leading a news organization, especially as I believe that white legacy media fails to cover nuanced issues of race in all their complexity. From the presidential primary to police brutality, the voices and views of BIPOC are often missing." That nuanced approach is going to matter as we track the social justice movements that are starting a new, post-Trump chapter. That includes election victories for [progressive prosecutors](who want to reform the criminal justice system as well as the scientists and epidemiologists who want to help the United States prepare for the next pandemic, but face backlash from pundits and politicians who refuse to acknowledge the facts. Reporting that gets at the truth will always require journalists to be fair and factual, but it doesn't mean we should offer deference or a platform to those who built a presidency on being neither. And a big reason Mother Jones can is because we don't have to worry about offending risk-averse billionaire investors or advertisers. But we do have to worry about earning support from enough of you a few times a year, and this month we have a big $350,000 fundraising goal. Your fellow readers have pitched in about $125,000 so far, which is great, but it doesn't put us on track to get there in the next 11 days. If you can right now, [please consider a year-end donation to support our team's truth-telling journalism and help us close that significant gap before we close the books on 2020](. As our country begins this new political chapter, it is more important than ever that independent voices speak truth to power—and tell stories that are more complex than two falsely equivalent sides. [I'd be grateful if you can help us do it with a donation today](. Thanks for reading, and for looking to our team's journalism to help you make sense of the world. This is the first fundraising email I've written, and I hope I got it right! Jahna Berry, Chief Operating Officer Mother Jones P.S. If you recently made a donation, thank you! And please accept our apologies for sending you this reminder—our systems take a little while to catch up. [Donate]( [Mother Jones]( [Donate]( [Subscribe]( This message was sent to {EMAIL}. To change the messages you receive from us, you can [edit your email preferences]( or [unsubscribe from all mailings.]( For advertising opportunities see our online [media kit.]( Were you forwarded this email? [Sign up for Mother Jones' newsletters today.]( [www.MotherJones.com]( PO Box 8539, Big Sandy, TX 75755