File spoon-archives/marxism-international.archive/marxism-international_1998/marxism-international.9803, message 274


Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 12:19:44 +1000
From: Gary MacLennan <g.maclennan-AT-qut.edu.au>
Subject: M-I: Plantinga's reply to Gary



>                          Carl Plantinga
>
>                          A Naive Reply to MacLennan and Raskin
>
>
>I'm happy to see that my book, _Rhetoric and Representation in Nonfiction
>Film_, has generated some discussion in the reviews by Jay Raskin and Gary
>MacLennan at _Film-Philosophy_. Although I'd like to respond to these
>reviews in tandem, they are very different. Both take issue with parts of
>my book and raise issues I wish I had the time to discuss. Raskin's review
>is measured and fair, but MacLennan's at points degenerates into a
>political diatribe. In the interest of brevity, I'm going to limit my
>response to the issue of objectivity in the nonfiction film and to
>MacLennan's claims about my supposed political naivete.
>
>To begin with the latter point, I do not appreciate MacLennan's linking my
>statement that McCarthyism was 'irresponsible red-baiting' with an
>*ostensibly* analogous understatement he proposes about the holocaust in
>Germany: 'the country was depopulated'. My position against McCarthyism is
>clear in my book, despite my not showing the appropriate sense of outrage
>for MacLennan's taste. Second, MacLennan's rhetorical link between my
>statement and that of a Nazi apologist is offensive. If his point is merely
>a logical one, then why compare my statement with that of a Nazi apologist?
>Is it to imply that my views are comparable and my politics similarly
>loathsome? Such rhetorical flatulence is not worthy of someone with the
>impeccable political credentials which MacLennan implies for himself, his
>irritability notwithstanding.
>
>On a related issue, it is hardly politically-naive (as MacLennan says),
>although it is certainly debatable, to suppose that putting on Murrow's
>_Report on Senator McCarthy_ was a courageous act and that Murrow took a
>personal risk in airing it. I raised the issue to claim that institutional
>theories have to account for personal acts such as Murrow's that go against
>many of the institutional constraints in place at the time. Most of
>Murrow's contemporaries think that he took many risks (not just one), if
>you read contemporary accounts. Murrow was going against the wishes of the
>CBS management (risk 1), self-consciously (but temporarily) rejecting the
>conventions of journalistic objectivity (risk 2), and attempting to destroy
>the reputation and power of Joseph McCarthy, who at this time was a famous
>and still-powerful senator (risk 3) with a strong public following (risk
>4). Murrow received harsh criticism for the show from McCarthy supporters,
>from McCarthy himself (who called Murrow 'the cleverest of the jackal pack'
>on national television), and from fellow journalists who thought Murrow had
>stepped beyond the bounds of journalistic objectivity.
>
>How can MacLennan deny that it is risky to make a personal attack against a
>US Senator on national television in a violent and politically-polarized
>country? Granted, it would be riskier to attempt the summit of Everest
>without oxygen, but not much. Or is that also a liberal myth?
>
>Contrary to MacLennan's assertion in his review, Murrow and _See it Now_
>had no salient ties with the US military, at least as far as we know.
>MacLennan confuses Murrow's show _See it Now_ with _The Twentieth Century_
>(which did have ties to the military, but with which Murrow had no
>professional affiliation). Thus MacLennan's implication that Murrow may
>have been involved in some kind of media/military conspiracy is unfounded
>speculation. MacLennan also denies Murrow's courageousness because both
>Murrow and elements of the US military were alarmed by McCarthy's fascistic
>and mind-numbingly horrific activities (there, is that sufficiently
>outraged?) at the same time. This is considered by MacLennan to be a
>revealing discovery, but it is hardly surprising and only of interest if we
>assume some kind of media/military conspiracy for which there is, to
>repeat, no evidence. Moreover, the military could not protect Murrow from
>the kinds of pressures and personal attacks, both actual and conceivable,
>he faced after the broadcast, even if it had take the slightest interest in
>doing so.
>
>On the issue of objectivity in nonfiction film, the reviewers understand my
>project only partially. The fault could lie in part with the presentation
>of my views, since I discuss objectivity in several separate parts of the
>book, some of which they have apparently ignored. Both Raskin and MacLennan
>like my analysis of the CBS documentary program, _The Twentieth Century_,
>in which I demonstrate Stuart Hall's contention that journalistic practices
>having to do with objectivity, fairness, balance, professionalism, and so
>on, can serve to mask biases in favor of the status quo.
>
>Both dislike what I do with this analysis, however. Raskin claims that I go
>on to defend _The Twentieth Century_. In my book I am critical of the
>series and its politics, but I do defend the concept of journalistic
>objectivity, despite its flaws. To make such a defense I introduced the
>concept of 'relative objectivity', a concept both Raskin and MacLennan find
>to be philosophically and politically problematic. But here is my thinking.
>First, we should not completely dispense with objectivity, fairness,
>balance, etc. in journalism and nonfiction because although 'objectivity'
>can mask biases in favor of the status quo, it also creates a standard for
>journalists that can encourage the representation of diverse views. To
>dispense with objectivity altogether would be to invite a journalism
>without constraints, and one even more rigidly-tied to the interests of
>those in power than was _The Twentieth Century_.
>
>On the other hand, to call for absolute objectivity as an attainable
>standard, as both Raskin and MacLennan do, is to ask for pie in the sky.
>Raskin writes that 'a demand for the absolute instantiations of these
>principles [objectivity, fairness, balance] would be the radical demand'.
>MacLennan agrees with Raskin in his review, and argues that the 'correct'
>response to my analysis of objectivity in _The Twentieth Century_ 'is to
>demand proper objectivity, balance, etc. from the media'. By this I take
>MacLennan to mean an absolute objectivity, as Raskin does.
>
>This leaves me to wonder whether either Raskin or MacLennan read my
>analysis of the concept of objectivity (29-32), where I discuss various
>ways of thinking about the concept. Objectivity is not the equivalent of
>truth, but is a characteristic of accounts or representations of the truth;
>thus it is possible to believe in truth while denying that there can be
>'absolutely' objective accounts of it. If absolute objectivity means that a
>representation should be free from a perspective or point of view, then it
>is clearly unattainable. If, on the other hand, absolute objectivity means
>a representation which takes into account every diverse perspective on a
>subject, it is equally impossible. That is why I endorse what I call
>'relative objectivity'. No representation will ever be absolutely objective
>on either of these definitions, but we can nonetheless measure our
>representations against other representations (88) and demand closer
>approximations to absolute objectivity.
>
>Moreover, the fact that all of our representations are necessarily from
>*our* perspective does not require that we abandon all notions of evidence.
>MacLennan writes as though I do not give a description of what I mean by
>relative objectivity, so I would refer him to pages 212-213 of my book, in
>which I invoke Allan Casebier's contention that objectivity is a matter of
>degree rather than an absolute condition, and Steven Lukes's point that an
>objective representation can be perspective-relative, yet constrained by
>''evidence that is as systematic and reliable as possible, and relatable to
>other perspective-relative accounts'' (212). We can judge the relative
>objectivity of nonfiction films in relation to other films and to what we
>imagine the filmmaker might have done to make the film more objective.
>
>MacLennan's ire is not directed merely at me, but at an entire approach to
>the media that MacLennan thinks is insufficiently radical and also
>politically naive. He misleadingly dubs this approach an 'American
>formalism-cognitivism'. (The approach to which he refers is not just
>American but counts among its adherents scholars from many countries.
>Moreover, it might be characterized better as a cognitive/analytic
>approach, since many are not formalists (although we are interested in
>form) and since we are often influenced not only by cognitive psychology
>but also by analytic philosophy. It is also a mistake to assume that those
>who find this approach useful share a common politics.)
>
>Whatever our political persuasion, however, we could all use a political
>education. So for the moment let us be content with interpreting the world.
>Both Raskin and MacLennan put a lot of stock in 'absolute objectivity' as a
>radical media practice. By this I'm not sure if they mean that the
>mainstream media should become truly objective and therefore radical, or
>that radical media makers should employ absolute objectivity as a radical,
>that is, non-mainstream practice. If they propose the latter, that is
>certainly a controversial prescription, since most radical filmmakers
>prefer polemics to the measured sobriety of 'objectivity'. Either
>prescription raises problematic issues.
>
>Leaving that aside, however, let me pose of Raskin and MacLennan (or of
>anyone wishing to reply) four questions. First, what is absolute
>objectivity of the kind you claim would constitute radical media practice?
>Second, how would absolute objectivity be instantiated in a nonfiction film
>or a television news report? (That is, would it take into account all
>possible interpretations of a subject or all possible answers to a
>question, or only those actually made and asked by living persons, or those
>made and asked at any time by persons living or dead?) Third, do you know
>of an actual film or television program which instantiates absolute
>objectivity? (Please let me know because I am dying to see one). Fourth, if
>there *is* no such extant film, may we expect one in the near future? If
>anyone can satisfactorily answer these questions, then I will have been
>enlightened and perhaps, after a few more lessons, can leave the ranks of
>the politically naive.
>
>Hollins College
>March 1998
>
>
>References
>
>Gary MacLennan, 'Beyond Rhetoric (and Scepticism): A Critical Realist
>Perspective on Carl R. Plantinga', _Film-Philosophy: Electronic Salon_, 11
>March 1998
><http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy/files/maclennan5.html>.
>
>Carl Plantinga, _Rhetoric and Representation in Nonfiction Film_
>(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
>
>Jay Raskin, 'The Friction Over the Fiction of Nonfiction Movies',
>_Film-Philosophy: Electronic Salon_, 17 September 1997
><http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy/files/paper.raskin.html>.
>
>                          *********
>
>Carl Plantinga, 'A Naive Reply to MacLennan and Raskin', _Film-Philosophy:
>Electronic Salon_, 16 March 1998
><http://www.mailbase.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy/files/plantinga.html>.
>
>                          *********
>
>Send your thoughts on this reply and its subject to:
>film-philosophy-AT-mailbase.ac.uk
>
>                          ****************************
>
>
>


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