Newsworthiness Beyond Humans: Reporting on Animals as a Journalistic Duty

Journalists produce news for human audiences. Why, then, should issues that primarily affect nonhuman animals be considered newsworthy? In this article, we articulate two lines of reasoning that justify a general journalistic duty to report on animal issues. The first line comprises three democracy-based arguments. The partisanship argument appeals to the interests of animal advocates in being adequately informed, so that they can defend their views. The competence argument claims that reporting on animal issues enhances citizens’ political capacity to make well-grounded political choices. The voice-to-the-voiceless argument suggests that animals have their own politically-relevant interests, which ought to be represented in the news. The second line of reasoning comprises two justice-based arguments. The first appeals directly to duties of justice toward animals, the fulfillment of which would require adequate information about their fates. The second, in turn, holds that informing citizens about animal issues helps correct injustices suffered by humans.