According to “fake new” expert Claire Wardle, satire or parody is one of the less harmful forms of fake news. So we shouldn’t be too hard on the pranksters who decided to publish an issue of Not the New York Times in October of 1978, nearly two months into a strike by pressmen that shut down the paper. According to the “real” New York Times,
The parody featured three full sections, 24 joke advertisements, 73 spoof articles and 155 fake news briefs, all meticulously edited to mimic The Times’s style. Even the thick curls of the font used on the front page and the neat spacing of the headlines exactly replicates those of the real paper.
While the “fake” newspaper mimicked the real newspaper in almost every way, there were plenty of cues that all was not right. For example, the slogan in the upper left corner was slightly modified to read, “All the News Not Fit to Print.”
It just goes to show that parody and satire have always been a way to blow off a little steam, and even make a point. Hopefully we can have a good laugh now and then, and not loose our sense of humor when the joke’s on us!
If you’re the richest man in the world you would think that you could afford the highest level of security for your personal data and information. And if you’re Jeff Bezos, you would hope that your phone would be safe from hacking by enemies wanting to expose your secret affairs.
According to allegations by United Nations investigators, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman may be behind the hack of Bezos’ iPhone gaining access through the WhatsApp messaging service. Possible motivation for the hack is the fact that Bezos owns the Washington Post newspaper, who employed writer and columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a staunch critic of the Crown Prince. Despite denials by the Saudi Prince, the alleged murder of Khashoggi in October of 2018 is believed to have been carried out by hit men employed by bin Salman.
There are multiple stories and plot lines of interest to Hollywood producers, but also for those of us interested in the intersection of media, politics, and technology. As our phones become more and more intertwined with our moment-by-moment activities and our most private and intimate actions, they leave us vulnerable to commercial manipulations and privacy violations. No one is safe. WhatsApp, one of the most popular encrypted messaging apps in the world, prides itself in a high level of security. According to their website, “Privacy and security is in our DNA.”
According to Vox, “The alleged hack shows that security online is never guaranteed, even on this very popular Facebook-owned encrypted messaging app. And that’s something to keep in mind even if you aren’t a billionaire.”
In a stunning display of poor editorial choices last weekend, the New York Times appears to have done serious harm to the integrity of their own brand, and of journalism at-large. In a tweet and a piece published on Sunday, the NYT managed to offend both defenders of Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh and his most ardent critics.
The controversy over recently nominated justice Kavanaugh is well known, as is the political angst felt by many on the left over the current administration’s success in appointing conservative justices at all levels of the judiciary. The fact that two NYT journalists found evidence of new accusations against Kavanaugh and published a book about their research was not surprising to many who believed that Kavanaugh’s appointment over the objections of Christine Blasey Ford was a miscarriage of justice.
But what was surprising, even to fans of the New York Times, is that the recently published review of the book failed to disclose that the woman at the center of the new allegations denies any knowledge of the event and was unwilling to talk to the reporters. And another controversial matter that was ignored was that the person bringing the accusation was a member of Bill Clinton’s legal defense team when he was accused of sexual misconduct.
None of these facts proves or disproves the accusations, but the failure of the New York Times to disclose these facts to the public goes against every rule designed to protect journalistic integrity and fairness. When a trusted institution like the New York Times makes mistakes of this magnitude, and fails to offer satisfactory explanations that might defuse the appearance of bias, it does harm to journalism and journalists everywhere.
And just to make sure that everyone had something to complain about, a [now deleted] tweet from the New York Times managed to offend the sensibilities of everyone who thinks that sexual assault is anything but “harmless fun.”
Longtime NPR and ABC News reporter and correspondent Cokie Roberts died last week and her presence will be sorely missed by those who believe in journalism. A woman who rose to prominence in a male-dominated industry, Roberts was an advocate for journalists at large, and for female journalists when their numbers were few.
According to NPR, “Roberts won numerous awards during her long career in journalism, including three Emmys and the Edward R. Murrow award. She was inducted into the Broadcasting and Cable Hall of Fame. She was recognized by the American Women in Radio and Television as one of the 50 greatest women in the history of broadcasting.”
Her advice to young journalists still rings true today…”Don’t get all involved in the politics of your institution, or competition in your institution. Just do your work and get it on the air, and then people will see if you’re good,” she said.
Last month in Colorado Springs, 19-year old De’Von Bailey was shot and killed as he ran from police. Bailey and his cousin were stopped by police after a 911 caller reported an armed robbery in the area. After being stopped (but before being patted down) Bailey fled. According to police, the shooting occurred after Bailey reached for what was later identified as a gun.
Still frame from bodycam footage just before the shooting of De’Von Bailey. Link to video is to the right.
The Gazette newspaper in Colorado Springs published edited and condensed body camera footage of the incident. You can see it here, but be warned that the footage is graphic and disturbing.
Bailey’s death is a tragic outcome of a very unfortunate event and it is critically important to understand how and why the shooting occurred if we are to understand how to prevent similar incidents in the future. According to the Gazette, 5 of 7 police-involved shootings in Colorado Springs in 2019 have resulted in fatalities. Community activists in Colorado Springs point to a number of similar events around the country in recent years where police use of deadly force resulted in the death of minority suspects. Other names you might recognize include Michael Brown of Ferguson and Eric Garner of New York City.
The highly-respected journal Nature recently published an article calling attention to the shortage of scientific data on the topic of police use of lethal force. According to the article, “In the United States, police officers fatally shoot about three people per day on average.” And while it is essential that objective research be gathered, analyzed and published it is also critically important that journalistic investigations continue to shine a spotlight on any sign of injustice and abuse of power. This is why local journalism exists and why it matters.
To carry out their duty journalists must be dogged and relentless in their pursuit of truth. And once they find truth, they must present it to their readers/listeners/viewers in a way that is informative, compelling, and unbiased. Anything less is an abdication of their purpose and mission.
I’m being honest when I say that I don’t know enough about this tragic event to have formed a strong opinion on whether this shooting was justified. I hope that investigative journalism, and an independent investigation, will step up to provide the necessary context to help us process this tragedy. Without that we will be left to our own biases and interpretations of what happened on that evening of August 3rd in the 2400 block of East Fountain Blvd. in Colorado Springs.
Additional links to media coverage of the shooting
Journalists are struggling to figure out how to cover President Trump, and more specifically his recent tweets about four democratic representatives who also happen to be persons-of-color. The President’s Twitter stream, and his public comments made at campaign events and press conferences, have crossed a line for some reporters and editors who are now grappling with how to talk about the President who is accused of saying things that they interpret as racist.
The New York Times has taken heat recently from politicians and other media outlets for not calling out the President as a racist. According to critics, the NYT’s failure to call Trump a racist is enabling and promoting the rise of racism. But according to CNN, Executive Editor Dean Baquet, “has opted to explain what Trump has said, allowing readers to decide for themselves whether they consider his comments racist.” This approach has been the standard approach to non-partisan and objective journalism over the years, but one that leaves more progressive advocates calling for a change.
In a related issue, the NYT was criticized for a headline published, and then changed, in the aftermath of the El Paso and Dayton shootings. According to The Independent, “The first headline read, “TRUMP URGES UNITY VS RACISM”, but was changed to, “ASSAILING HATE BUT NOT GUNS” following outrage as the portrayal of the US president as a unifier.” In response, Democrat congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted that the NYT’s initial take was a reminder that “white supremacy is aided by – and often relies upon – the cowardice of mainstream institutions”.
What do you think? Should journalists call out racism by naming it, or should they report on what was said or done and let the readers decide for themselves? And, if you’re a working journalists, take a survey to let them know what you think about the debate.
I’ve been asking students in the Media & Society class to think about the future of newspapers/journalism/truth…in an age of smart phones and social media. As suspected, few read a newspaper and most get their news from their phones. That’s to be expected and there are many reasons why newspapers are fading into obscurity. But I’m constantly reminded that news reporting and journalism can not, and must not, die alongside newspapers. Here’s why…
Wondering about the future of journalism…
Without journalists we wouldn’t know that celebrities and wealthy business executives were involved in a scam to get their kids into elite universities. Fake test scores, made-up athletic achievements, and even photoshopped pictures of these kids were used to bribe coaches and administrators, and in so doing deprive worthy students of their seat at the table.
Without journalists we wouldn’t know what happened when a group of kids from a Catholic high school were confronted by a group of Black Hebrew Israelites and Native American protesters on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. We might have heard a rumor or one person’s interpretation of what happened, but we wouldn’t have found out how it really went down.
Without journalists we wouldn’t know that Michael Jackson and R. Kelly have dark pasts and that swirling allegations of child sexual abuse may finally be brought to light and justice may finally be served.
Without journalists we wouldn’t know about the opioid epidemic, the risk that black mothers face in childbirth, and the horrific rise of teen suicide among Native Americans.
Without journalists we would only know what people in power want us to know…and that is a recipe for…disaster/dictatorship/destruction.
But we’re in a strange place where we know that we need journalists and journalism, but we can’t figure out how to pay for it. We’ve been free-riding on the backs of legacy media systems that are failing…and the rising role of digital platforms like Google and Facebook has not held out much reason for hope. But one thing is certain…we need to figure it out soon, or we’re going to pay a much steeper price in the future. If you think gaining knowledge is expensive, wait until you see how much ignorance costs!
The job outlook for journalists has been rather depressing lately with recent layoffs at major newspapers and news websites such as Buzzfeed and Vice. But a new report in Recode, using data from LinkedIn, suggests it may depend on how you define a journalists.
Using more expansive definitions of journalism, the data suggest that job titles have morphed in such a way that the journalism skill set is sometimes applied in the service of jobs that fall outside of traditional journalistic categories.
According to the Recode article, “LinkedIn’s data includes anyone whose title was journalist — or a wide range of related titles like newsletter editor, news director, reporter — regardless of where they work. Common skills emerging among these journalists include data analysis, digital marketing, and Adobe Premiere and Illustrator.”
While the outlook is still uncertain, being nimble and willing to work in new and emerging markets using a flexible skillset may be the difference between finding your passion and making passion fruit smoothies at Starbucks.
Jeff Bezos owns Amazon and the Washington Post newspaper (aka the WaPo). The amazing success of the first company allowed Bezos to buy the second one. But all is not rainbows and unicorns for the richest man in the world. Bezos is divorcing his wife of 25 years after engaging in an illicit affair with Lauren Sanchez, a TV news reporter. But wait, there’s more…
NEW YORK, NY – FEBRUARY 08: The New York Post with a headline referring to Jeff Bezos is photographed at a convenience store on February 8, 2019 in New York City. Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon is accusing David J. Pecker, publisher of National Enquirer, the nations leading supermarket tabloid, of extortion and blackmail. (Photo by Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)
Pictures and text messages from the affair were leaked to the National Enquirer, whose CEO, David Pecker, is a long-time friend of President Trump. In case you didn’t know, there is no love lost between the President and Bezos, largely because of the critical coverage of the Trump Presidency by the WaPo.
Now AMI, parent company of the National Enquirer, is being accused by Bezos of blackmail and extortion for threatening to release more lurid photos unless Bezos backed off from going after AMI. If this isn’t all strange enough, there’s even speculation that Sanchez’s brother may have been the one who leaked the photos.
Tabloid newspapers found in supermarket checkout aisles have always trafficked in sensational and unseemly “news” especially those stories involving celebrities, money, and sex…and this story has it all. Add a little political intrigue with the Trump connection and you have a perfect fire-storm of scandalous gossip masquerading as journalism.
This may not be the kind of journalism that the Founding Fathers wanted to protect when they wrote the First Amendment, but it still benefits from its protections. Media history buffs may recall James Thomson Callender, a scandalmonger whose attacks on our earliest Presidents led to the Sedition Act. According to the Digital History website, “Attacked by his critics as a ‘traitorous and truculent scoundrel,’ Callender defended himself on strikingly modern grounds: that the public had a right to know the moral character of people it elected to public office. Although he has often been dismissed as a ‘pen for hire,’ willing to defame anyone, Callender was much more important than that. His life underscored one of the most radical consequences of the American Revolution. The Revolution ensured that ordinary Americans would be the ultimate arbiters of American politics.”
Last week in class we spent some time laying the groundwork for our study of mass media and the societal effects of modern communications technologies. To understand media you have to understand communication and that begins with the ancient art of rhetoric and the modern study of semiotics and how we share and process symbols.
We discussed how we, as human beings, are born communicators. We like to connect with others and share our experiences. We are constantly communicating even when we’re not aware of it. We cannot NOT communicate. We discussed how everything that we SAY (or don’t say) and DO communicates…including our choice of clothing, our body language, and our use of space.
Covington Catholic High School student Nick Sandmann and Native American Nathan Phillips on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial
These points were illustrated and driven home in a video that circulated over the weekend. You might recognize this frame from a video clip that went viral on social media. The students had participated in the March for Life demonstration earlier in the day and were waiting for their buses to arrive to take them home. As you can see, some of the students (including Sandmann) are wearing MAGA hats. Phillips, an activist and Omaha tribal elder, had participated in The Indigenous Peoples March earlier in the day. A third group, members of the Black Hebrew Israelites sect, were also present and a factor in what transpired.
A real problem here is that many made up their minds about what happened on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on Friday based on very little evidence…and evidence that may have been carefully selected to present a particular narrative. If you are willing to invest a bit of time to dig a little deeper, and are willing to keep an open mind, you may find out that your initial gut reaction is not entirely supported. In fact major news organizations are updating their initial posts and writing new commentaries to include evidence that became available in a number of long, unedited, videos posted to YouTube. You can find links to these videos in a commentary posted at the Reason.com website.
This week we’ll explore issues related to social media including: viral videos, manufactured outrage, public shaming, and doxing. This weekend’s events contains all of these and more. Later in the semester we’ll explore “fake news” and how confirmation bias and uncritical thinking are key factors in how so many are so easily misled by propaganda and biased reporting.
The screen shot on the left includes a tweet from Michael Green, a film and television screen writer. The commentary before and after the tweet is by Rod Dreher, an author and writer. You might consider the fact that Green and Dreher are modern-day storytellers and mass media heavyweights. They are shaping our culture and telling us how to think about the issues of the day. But they clearly see things from very different perspectives.
Former CNN host Reza Aslan appears to be endorsing violence as an appropriate response
On this day set aside to honor the legacy of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., it is important to remember that racial bigotry remains and must be confronted at every opportunity. But as Reverend King reminded us repeatedly, only love drives out hate. Hatred is easy, fast, and decisive. Love is hard, slow, and often unsure. The choice is ours.
