Just a few of us have been weighing in on the chief executive of NPR explaining you can’t, like, define a word like “truth,” man.

She actually gave that Ted Talk a couple years ago, but it’s getting a lot of attention now that their business editor is resigning.

The basics of her talk are plausible: people are more skeptical because there are more sources for information that may or may not be true. She actually stole that idea from my blog, which I, of course, stole from one of my professors 20 years ago. He told us with so many cable networks and websites, people were no longer just getting a rundown of events of the day, they could seek out an organization that would back up what they already believe.

But her position that truth is not, like, the right place to start, man, runs contradictory to a news organization. Our job isn’t to tell you what’s good or bad. Our job is to tell you what’s happening, then you can decide on your own if it’s good or bad.

My first job was at an NPR station when I was in college. My news director was also my academic adviser. I had gone into his office to explain I wanted to change my major to print journalism because the folks at the campus TV station seemed to spend more time worrying about their clothes and catch phrase than the content they were producing.

I suspect now he just needed a part-timer, but I like to think of his response as an adviser providing sage advice. He suggested I join them anchoring newscasts on Saturday mornings.

My experience didn’t involve any activist reporters or a pretentious newsroom. We never had any debates about the truth. When I started reporting during the week, he just sent me to Muncie school board meetings, come back and, in a shocking display, tell people what happened at the school board meeting.

He helped me start down a road toward being a reporter. Of course, given how often this blog links to radio layoffs, that may not have been the right avenue.

But not every NPR station works like a partisan bunker [Bill Maher compared their CEO to a Portlandia character].

I still keep in touch with people at Indiana Public Radio. A few years ago, an associate and I took the time to break Ball State’s communications building one night to take a look around.

I was discussing this NPR issue with some associates. One called her terrifying, citing her description of us having this “reverence” for the truth, and how the truth has become a distraction. We’re struggling with a truth fetish, if you will.

One way to find common ground might be to acknowledge not every NPR newsroom considers the truth, like, something we just can’t know, man. Similarly, we can acknowledge commercial stations often seek out the most sensational, scariest thing to tell listeners because focus groups apparently tell us they want to be afraid to miss it.

Reporters know there’s a time and place for analysis, but our job is just to tell you what happened, keep the news and analysis separate, and let you analyze what happened on your own.

Except in this blog. Here, I’ll tell you exactly what I think even though most of you haven’t asked.

As someone with some experience in public radio, I’d be happy to join NPR as their chief malcontent.