From: "David McInerney" <borderlands-AT-optusnet.com.au>
Subject: Re: peter arnett
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2003 10:10:26 +0930


Is this post intended as a work of postmodern irony?
DM

----- Original Message -----
From: "Salil Tripathi" <salil61-AT-hotmail.com>
To: <postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, April 01, 2003 8:21 AM
Subject: Re: peter arnett


>
> Dear Arnab,
>
> One thing I learnt working with editors at both US-owned and UK-owned
> publications is the fundamental difference between US-style reporting and
> European-, or British-style reporting. In US-style reporting, objectivity
is
> paramount. Now I can visualize some of the cynical sneers such a comment
> tends to get, but let me put it this way: in the best American-owned and
> edited publications, great care is taken to prevent conflict of interest,
> and objectivity is sacrosanct. You let the facts speak for themselves; you
> provide interpretative data, statistics, background. But you let the
reader
> decide. Facts, as the adage goes, are sacred; opinion is free. And on
op-ed
> pages, you do find vigorous commentaries by writers, including writers who
> oppose the view of the editors (eg William Safire on NYT's edit pages). To
> maintain the credibility, these newspapers try very hard not to let
> reporters write commentaries, or the other way round.
>
> That's not the case with the British media, and with many other European
> publications. The British correspondents (I'm most familiar with them)
tend
> to "participate" in the story, by turning partisan. Either by supporting
> "our boys" as in the current war, or by siding with the civilians. Many
> times, British reporters repeat as facts assertions made by people without
> placing caveats like "claims" or "alleges", etc. And they express opinions
> about the people they're writing about. Example: they'll say "the
> warmongering Bush administration...." in a news article, something that
> would be deleted (and probably be a sacking offense) in an American
> newspaper. Robert Fisk, for instance, would find place as a commentator in
a
> US newspaper, but not as a reporter.
>
> I think Arnett has every right to say what he did, including providing
> interpretative comments on the war. But I believe, from the perspective of
a
> US publication/editor, he crossed the line when he granted that interview
to
> Iraqi TV and expressed personal opinions. Had he been with a British
> broadcaster, it would have been a different story. He could have expressed
> his views -- because he would have been expressing them on his own
> network/publication, too.
>
> As for NBC/National Geographic: they too are within their rights in
sacking
> Arnett. This has nothing to do with patriotism/jingoism -- those are the
> last refuges of scoundrels, after all. But whether they should have done
so,
> is a separate matter. Should they have stood up to public pressure against
> Arnett, presuming that there is pressure? I suppose they would have found
it
> easier to stand by Arnett, had Arnett been criticized for having reported
> facts. If, for example, Arnett were reporting a story about the bombing of
a
> market, and if Pentagon denied it, and Arnett was defending the facts he
had
> uncovered, that would have been one thing. But by becoming the equivalent
of
> a talk-show pundit, he made a mistake. I'm frankly surprised he did this.
I
> have worked on staff of US-owned publications, and we had signed contracts
> which required us to seek editors' permission before granting interviews,
> writing articles, or making public comments. We were not allowed to own
> stock in companies we wrote about; we were not allowed to be members of a
> political party; we were expected to divulge to editors of every potential
> conflict of interest so that someone else could replace us as reporters
for
> that story; we were not allowed to accept hospitality of companies,
> universities, governments, NGOs, anybody -- no hotel bills, no air fares,
> etc. I was once invited to speak in Hong Kong at a conference, and I lived
> in Singapore then, and my editors said fine, you can go, but we'll pay for
> it, not the university that's inviting you. I do believe that's an
excellent
> system, because it frankly makes you believe that you are loyal only to
the
> story you are covering, in the end. In Arnett's case, nobody would cast
> aspersions on his personal integrity. But I can imagine other
correspondents
> biting their tongues and pursing their lips -- because they don't want to
> appear to be taking sides/interpreting for the readers. That's what
experts,
> and European journalists are, for.
>
> This doesn't mean British journalists have not faced problems for
expressing
> their views (but they've usually hung on to their jobs -- remember Mark
> Tully's criticism of BBC's new management, for example). Nor does it mean
> every American journalist is always objective. There are of course ways of
> injecting bias in the copy -- through selecting the kind of people you
> quote, through selecting the statistics you present (which source, for
> example.... a local social science institute versus the IMF)..... but in a
> story in the serious US media, you are expected to be objective.
Elsewhere,
> you can be partisan. It is of course particularly tough on free-lancers.
>
> Best,
>
> Salil
> -----
>
>
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