The Nieman Foundation for Journalism was set up at Harvard. Like everything touching old foundations and journalism, it's a toxic disaster. And this one is right up there with In Defense of Looting. This should be the year where we finally abolish the crime beat. Study after study shows how the media’s overemphasis on crime makes people feel less safe than they really are and negatively shapes public policy around the criminal–legal system... For every good police-accountability story, or story covering the root causes and generational pain of violence and harm, there are dozens more crime stories that inflict trauma and make a spectacle of violence, mental illness, poverty, substance abuse, and generational divestment...