Further to the furore over the Sun‘s handling of the Jamie Janes hand-written (by the Prime Minister) letter saga, I can’t quite believe I have just heard what I think I have just heard.
I was driving down the M40 on my way back from Liverpool to Croydon this evening and listening to BBC Radio 4’s PM news programme. Tom Newton Dunn, the new Political Editor of the Sun, was being interviewed by Eddie Mair. In response to the statement that the Sun was trying to deter voters from voting for Gordon Brown in the next General Election, he said this:
I’m not sure we’ve ever said we don’t want people to vote for Gordon Brown. All we do is offer our readers an opinion. We don’t make or break governments. We simply report what happens and give them the benefit of our opinion, if they want to read it.
I propose a minute’s silence for (a) the death of journalistic integrity (at the Sun) and (b) the scornful mockery in this statement of the readers’/electorate’s intelligence.
I got into a lively debate over the Telegraph‘s handling of the MPs’ expenses business – a debate that ended up quite informative and helpful. One of the sticking points, however, was the difference in perception between the ‘reporter’ and the ‘reported on’. I then responded to James Murdoch’s outrageous speech to the Edinburgh Television Festival – especially his assumption that the ‘Market’ is the only god (especially if dominated by him and run in his interests). This latest stuff leads me to ask the following questions and I invite journalists (many of whom have my deep respect) to respond:
- Does anyone really still think that newspapers simply “report what happens” dispassionately?
- Is it even remotely credible that the Sun would waste a penny of its money publishing a word on anything if its owners and journalists thought they were doing nothing to shape the world, influence debate and change people’s thinking to the extent that they might vote differently?
- Would the Sun retain any journalists if all they did was to offer a casual opinion on the events of the day and not seek to change people’s behaviour?
- If the Political Editor is right, then why did the Sun go to such lengths to advertise its power of persuasion in previous elections and publicise its change of allegiance for the next election?
And an extra question – riding on the back of the Press Complaints Commission’s latest failure in respect of phone-tapping allegations against the News of the World: when will the profession take the lead from the reluctant MPs and propose outside regulation of the media? (In the ‘expenses’ debate on this blog one of the arguments against MPs was – rightly – that they set their own rules and regulate themselves and that this is intolerable. I asked why the same didn’t apply to journalists. I’m still waiting to hear a cry for justice here.)
Go anywhere outside Britain and ‘our’ red-top tabloids are a source of incredulity and embarrassment in media, political and other circles. Why do we tolerate this rubbish?
Nick Baines's Blog 
November 11, 2009 at 8:56 pm
“We don’t make or break governments” there you go, admission that ‘it was the Sun wot won it’ (spot the spelling mistake?) was a lie.
November 11, 2009 at 8:57 pm
Exactly!
November 11, 2009 at 9:03 pm
If the Sun actually did report anything that happened without a veritable tornado of manipulation (spin is too mild a word) then I’d eat any article of clothing you might care to specify. The very idea of that paper having a “political editor” is laughable in itself. What it has is nothing more than a rabble-rouser directed at whichever political objective is for the time being in its proprietor’s best interests.
November 11, 2009 at 11:01 pm
You really ought to be examining this grudge you have against the Sun and News International. It can’t be healthy.
But I think you make too much of these rather defensive remarks on PM. I certainly didn’t hear anything I wouldn’t have expected. And maybe the Sun is now merely facing up to the reality that the media environment has changed to such an extent that they’re unlikely to have the influence they may once have had.
As for your questions:
1. Yes and no. Sometimes an attempt at dispassionate reporting is made and sometimes it isn’t?
2. This is a back-to-front question. The very reason for the Sun’s existence is to publish words which will sell newspapers and attract advertising. Profit motive trumps anything else.
3. I think you’re conflating things here. There is a difference between opinion/features and news. There are also hierarchies and the opinions of journalists are not necessarily reflected in editorial policies.
4. The political editor may have misspoke, or opinions at the Sun might have changed. Things do change you know, for better and worse. But he did say they were offering an opinion, and it follows therefore that they want to influence people with that opinion.
Should the media be able to regulate itself through the PCC? Well it is primarily regulated by the law of the land, which includes some of the toughest libels laws in the free world. But I personally wouldn’t be against opening up the process to outside scrutiny if that didn’t curtail freedom of speech. After all, it would be pretty strange to start curbing press freedom at a time when people can say what they want on their blogs with no editorial restrictions whatsoever.
November 11, 2009 at 11:39 pm
Funny thing is, I daresay Sun readers are incapable of reading anything anyway, so the Journos are really wasting their time.
Of course the big trick here is that although Sun readers just look at the adverts and rude pics, the rest of the literate population is the stooge in a huge publicity stunt which is backfiring rapidly!
November 12, 2009 at 5:59 am
I sometimes thin that Alistair Campbell is writing the Sun’s headlines and stories!
November 12, 2009 at 8:21 am
I’m really surprised that Lord Mandelbrot is responding in kind (Today programme yesterday) and tying in political parties; I think he’s leaving himself open to charges of hypocrisy – as presumably he had some involvement in the Sun love-in last time round.
After all, the Sun has had a thorough kicking from everyone including its own readers; I see no upside for his Lordship in jumping in.
November 12, 2009 at 9:07 am
“Why do we tolerate this rubbish?”
Because human nature means that pictures of semi-naked pretty girls are popular and sell newspapers very effectively, and because people still believe what they read in newspapers (much like the fact that anything that is printed out from a computer is considered 100% true).
I think we need a soft-porn national newspaper, staffed only by journalists with strong ethics and morals! Hmmm… I can see a slight problem…
November 12, 2009 at 9:41 am
I proposed outside regulation of the media in the 60s (since it was evident the PCC was useless) and was regarded as probably insane Actually I was trying to take a cue from Matthew Arnold’s Culture and Anarchy where he implies – daringly no doubt – that there is a lot of difference between one newspaper and another. Robert Graves used to believe some books were better than others and was regarded as a peculiar fellow by his Oxford tutor. Discrimination has never been popular and to act politically to apply standards appears unthinkable.
November 12, 2009 at 10:52 am
Matt, I thought the same about Mandelson’s intervention. Or is there more to it…?
November 12, 2009 at 11:00 am
Sorry to be a pedant, Peter. You may well have proposed outside regulation in the 1960s but not because of the uselessness of the PCC. The PCC was only set up in 1991. It was the Press Council back then – not a very strong body – which did not have a statutory code of practice which the PCC has.
November 12, 2009 at 11:03 am
Andrew, let me explain the difference between a ‘grudge’ and a ‘principled questioning’. A grudge has to do with resentment deriving from personal envy or grievance. I do not have any personal experience of being slighted by the Sun, so resentment or envy do not apply. But I am constantly surprised by your holding onto ‘freedom of speech’ while responding so resentfully whenever I ask a question about journalism. I’m afraid my health is fine – but I make no apology for asking the questions I do.
Would you care to do a theological or moral critique of James Murdoch’s analysis of the world, especially his conclusion: “Above all we must have genuine independence in news media. Genuine independence is a rare thing. …independence is characterised by the absence of the apparatus of supervision and dependency. Independence of faction, industrial or political. Independence of subsidy, gift and patronage. Independence is sustained by true accountability – the accountability owed to customers. People who buy the newspapers, open the application, decide to take out the television subscription – people who deliberately and willingly choose a service which they value. And people value honest, fearless, and above all independent news coverage that challenges the consensus. There is an inescapable conclusion that we must reach if we are to have a better society. The only reliable, durable, and perpetual guarantor of independence is profit.
Or do you actually hold a grudge against bloggers who are subverting the journalistic status quo?
November 12, 2009 at 11:31 am
Nick, I thought robust debate was encouraged on your blog, which is why I respond robustly – not resentfully. This sort of discussion is of interest to journalists and you invited our responses. I welcome the new sort of media environment we have today (I read blogs as well as newspapers, and even used to have a blog myself). There is however a disparity here. Traditional media are already subject to scrutiny but that is minimal for new media. You are much more likely to be libelled online, by some anonymous commenter on a right-wing blog, than in the pages of a newspaper. Bloggers don’t have the lawyers looking over their shoulders, they are largely ignored by the law of the land, and there are few mechanisms of editorial control.
And just in case you accuse me of ignoring your invitation to do a theological or moral critique of James Murchoch. The answer is ‘no‘, because he’s nothing to do with me.
November 12, 2009 at 11:32 am
>Matt, I thought the same about Mandelson’s intervention. Or is there more to it…?
My take is that no one should have touched this at all. My *political* assessment from Lord Mandelson’s position (on the Machavelli scale) is that they were gifted a win over the Sun without any need for politics, so there wasn’t much point – and the Tories have a reasonable counterpoint in the anti-Cameron headlines the Mirror has been running. I don’t think that this is a co-ordinated Tory/Sun operation because of the “blow up in their face” potential.
Most importantly, I don’t think Mr Brown or Mr Cameron would countenance political use of the issue as they have both lost children recently, and there was no politicking about that, and because the tradition of PM personal letters is a cross-party one running since the Falklands and no one has abused it.
For me it’s an issue with more in parallel to the Sun’s Hillsborough misjudgement, and perhaps the NOTW “paediatrician” vigilante campaign.
November 12, 2009 at 11:34 am
>Or do you actually hold a grudge against bloggers who are subverting the journalistic status quo?
I think given a bit more time we may make the general (not specialist) media raise its standards – particularly for fact checking and being original.
November 12, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Andrew Carey’s responses astound me.
How can any Christian offer a defence of the Sun and Murdoch’s empire?
Freedom of speech demands they can say what they like. But to lie outrageously as Nick pointed out in the original piece (we don’t tell people who to vote for!) is devious and wrong.
I defend their right to say nasty stuff about Brown but why can’t you just admit the whole of Newscorp rotten to the core? It’s really baffling.
November 12, 2009 at 3:35 pm
Andrew, I don’t make any ‘accusation’. I merely note that you regard a matter of massive public, social and (yes) theological import as ownership of media, worship of the ‘market’ and business ethics as “nothing to do with me”. Now, where have I heard that before?
November 12, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Matt, you are right. I couldn’t see what Mandelson thought he was doing – unless he has now bought the myth that he is the saviour of New Labour and can change the image/fate of the party singlehandedly.
November 12, 2009 at 4:08 pm
Andy Walton: “Freedom of speech demands they can say what they like.” That’s precisely my point. And why should you construe this point as suggesting I agree with the Sun’s editorial policy? But you’re right I don’t view News International as the ‘evil empire’ – so I must be a bad Christian.
Nick, with the Murdoch quote you were merely setting up a straw man. Murdoch’s view is pretty extreme and rather naïve. Do you seriously think it is representative of my view, given all the conversations we have had on this blog?
November 12, 2009 at 5:47 pm
Yes, Andrew, it was indeed the Press council – I was being journalistic and trying (too hard) to be brief. The fact that as you say the PC was not a very strong body underlines the point I made and I am grateful to you. to the extent that this thread singles out the Sun and Murdoch for special attention, I think it could be a bit unblanced. The so-called “quality” papers worry me much more because it is expected their standards will be higher. However, take the Times. For years we have noticed serious errors of scientific fact in the paper, some of which have been efficiently corrected, only for them to recur. On a number of other occasions the subbing was so bad that paragraphs were wrongly transposed and quotes duplicated. Finally, I wrote to the current editor but failed in my case. When I worked for the Times this sort of incompetence would have led inexorably to eventual if not rapid dismissal. The paper still does not know the difference between a bacterium and a virus and neither does the BBC.
November 13, 2009 at 9:05 am
From Sun’s website Nov 12: “Yesterday on a MY Sun discussion block, the surname of Jacqui Janes, the mother of Guardsman Jamie Janes, was spelled incorrectly. As soon as we became aware of the error it was corrected. We are happy to apologise for the mistake”. Joy in Heaven…?
November 13, 2009 at 11:32 pm
What would an independent yet transparently regulated media look like?
I think that while editorial policies are driven by the need to sell papers rather than the attempt to provide good information, there will be a conflict between entertainment (or sensationalism or whatever you want to call it) and truth.
Telling the truth even when it isn’t pleasant or entertaining is not an easy task. People have this tendency to shoot the messenger. I know that I find some truths hard to stomach, and I can see how easily I might prefer to push them out of my mind and focus on “fun” stuff instead. I find some truths hard to comprehend and I can see how easily I might write them off as too complex to explain, how readily I might give up on trying to understand them if they weren’t presented in a favourable context.
I suspect that the truthful, responsible journalism you seek requires people to treat that work as a vocation rather than a career. It requires people to be committed to providing solid information whether they are paid or not; it requires people who are not in fear of losing their jobs if their editor thinks an article won’t make money. In this, blogging has some strength. Many bloggers are independent and unpaid; web hosting is much cheaper than printing papers and this allows a wider range of opinions to flourish.
But while our dependence on money for our daily bread makes us susceptible to selling out, to doing work we are paid for rather than work we are called to, our human craving for social status or popularity or just plain old ordinary affection can also be a hindrance to truth. Many people who blog find that they love having an audience, and they blog to get a reaction from that audience rather than to further the truth. Sometimes that’s a good thing, but sometimes it’s just another popularity contest, but without being tied into the financial system.
I can’t see an easy a solution to this. What if everyone could find work they love so much that they’d do it for free if they could afford to? That’s still no guarantee that they could afford to give up the day job.
I also don’t see a way to ensure that, if some people tell the truth, the rest of us will listen.
November 14, 2009 at 8:12 am
“I suspect that the truthful, responsible journalism you seek requires people to treat that work as a vocation rather than a career. It requires people to be committed to providing solid information whether they are paid or not; it requires people who are not in fear of losing their jobs”. Song recognises perhaps how idealistic this might be, though there are such people. They are not only to be found (rarely) in journalism but also in academia. I agree that there is a strong vocational element in all this but also a practical one – that if a job is worth doing it’s worth doing properly.
The blog issue is very interesting. The test, surely, is whether the moderator can take reasonable criticism expressed courteously. As to your last sentence, Song, is there any way of ensuring anything?
November 14, 2009 at 6:50 pm
@song
Interesting comments.
There’s a lot of campaigning and excellent writing going on on the edges and in the interstices if you look, but by definition most of it is in niches so does not get wider exposure until the big media pick it up, when it is assumed to be a media story.
There are certain things that blogs are ideally suited to, such as long term focused coverage of particular questions, which would get lost on a million-page newspaper site.
I commented a little on this here:
http://www.mattwardman.com/blog/2009/08/12/opportunities-for-local-news-blogs-trends-in-blogging-matt-wardman/
I also did a case study of one niche campaign here:
http://onlinejournalismblog.com/2009/08/25/the-revenge-of-lilliput-former-spck-bookshop-campaign-blog-passes-150k-visitors/
My view is that specialist blogs may provide a stimulus to improve the distinctly low quality of craft in the work of newspaper general columnists, in fact checking, and in the follow-my-leader process across different papers.
I don’t think that the real challenge facing the national media is that there is actually not much worth putting behind a pay wall.
peter>I agree that there is a strong vocational element in all this but also a practical one – that if a job is worth doing it’s worth doing properly.
Not necessarily worth doing all at once. If I have a limited amount of time and several different things that need covering – such as several different stories of Cease and Desist letter bullying – then to do one thoroughly might involve ignoring the others, while a nod to each might trigger others to pick them up.
We have to deal with the reality that resources are limited, and that there is always too much to do.
>They are not only to be found (rarely) in journalism but also in academia.
That’s a sweeping judgement, and I’d suggest add that there is light and shade in all of us. Are we not are all (whether journalists or bloggers or anybody else) prejudiced and judgemental on some issues and willing to campaign for principle on others.
For bloggers there is perhaps a set of questions where everyone would unite because they are fundamental to the form – a contemptuous reaction to the pre-censorship facilitated by English Defamation Law is perhaps the most ubiquitous at present.
e.g., Bp Nick admits to some views formed by his background from Liverpool.
Similarly I was partially conditioned by Scargill’s flying thugs coming down the M1 in 1984 to prevent Notts miners work when a proper ballot had not been held. That experience, and attendance at a TU national conference, is the foundation on which my views on Trades Unions politically affiliated to a single party are built to this day.
November 14, 2009 at 6:56 pm
The issue of the Sun and News Corp as an entity is ethics.
The demonstration of using their papers and other media to pursue a political end or to bring down an individual is nothing new, however, their use of someone in Mr’s Janes position of grief and vulnerability is an abuse of trust and a gross intrusion into personal grief at the worst time, drags them down into the drain from the gutter.
If a journalist is content to work in and to celebrate this environment (as appears to be Andrew Carey’s view), than there is no hope for the media, where money, greed and self interest take precedence over the greater good and respect for individual privacy and grief.
As a comment on the self regulation of the press, Parliament itself has demonstrated the lack of accountability of such regulation, so what hope is there for the media, self regulating itself.
While I believe in free speech and would hate censorship, without responsibile journalism and respect for others, the press will continue to move further into the gutter
The Press will cease to be a means informing and educating by erudite and informed comment on often confusing and misunderstood topics arising in the news.
News and comment is now available from a vast range of sources, newsprint is dying now, this will only hasten its death.
November 14, 2009 at 10:12 pm
Peter,
I agree that there are people for whom accurate reporting is very much on the level of vocation, and also that there are people who have a commitment to quality or excellence in all that they do which demands that they would also value information over entertainment in journalism. I didn’t mean to overlook the existence of this latter group, but to highlight that where selling papers is at odds with providing good information, the latter is likely to win, at least some of the time and at some papers.
As to your last sentence, Song, is there any way of ensuring anything?
No, not really. Or not for us humans.
Perhaps a more useful question would be whether it is possible to encourage both journalists and their readers to take a responsible, critical, constructive approach with a commitment to truth rather than sensation. I don’t mean to say that this doesn’t happen already in some places, but to me it does not seem widespread.
Matt,
I appreciate that opportunity cost and limited time and resources mean that we can’t all research everything thoroughly! This is one reason why we even have newspapers: I can’t possibly find out everything that’s happening in the world, but I can pay someone to make it their business to find out and to filter that information for me so that I am presented with something accurate and relevant.
I have not yet found a newspaper which I feel does this filtering job adequately: many of the fringe issues I care about don’t turn up in major papers, but I do like to have some idea what is going on in the macro-news world. I do think the internet and the easier access it gives us to certain types of information is changing the world of journalism; whether for the better I cannot say. But being able to aggregate various RSS feeds does allow me to keep abreast of both my own special interests and of larger political issues… now if only I had time to read them all! I need to prioritise my own filters a little differently if I’m going to keep up with the things I can act on.
But that is a different issue to the one of sloppy, inaccurate or even cruel reporting for the sake of selling papers, and to the one of people being unwilling to listen to what they see as bad news (especially if they are offered no way to influence the outcome).
November 16, 2009 at 3:43 pm
According to Ernest, the ethical course is presumably to refuse to publish a grieving mother’s views? This might be a straightforward case of intrusion or it might not. I don’t know enough about who approached who, whether any money changed hands. I’ll be interested in seeing what the PCC have to say about it as I guess it is likely there have been complaints.
Am I content to ‘work in’ and ‘celebrate this environment’? As a freelance journalist I have taken Murdoch’s shilling quite happily. As to celebrating News Corp., well I just don’t happen to see it as any worse than other companies and news outlets. I don’t read The Sun, or have a Sky subscription but I have to admit that The Times is my newspaper of choice. I think this idea that Murdoch or News Corp is wholly bad, totally unethical is quite widespread in Christian circles and needs examining.
November 16, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Andrew,
As far as I can see, the word ethical cannot be applied to the Murdoch Media Empire. I only see evidence of ‘self promotion and self protection’,’market share’ and ‘anything goes’. And a liberal use of the ‘So What’ principle.
Morality is a word that was obviously spiked long ago, by an Mr Murdoch as unusable.
The danger of their monopoly in the media is the their view of their average punter for the Sun, which lowers the level to the lowest common denominator.
The Times might have a different approach, but is controlled by the same editorial machine.
Self Regulation has been shown not to work, and the PCC is a toothless organisation, set up by the press, for the press, to head of formal government legislation to control the press.
I held my view of the Murdoch empire, well before I became a Christian, however, being a Christian, has helped me to focus better on issues that I care about, and to become more active and vocal in voicing my views.
The issue of their misuse of Mrs Janes situation is not one of publishing her views, it is their descent to the levels that they used to intrude into and to make political capital out of a bad situation.
I hold no brief for Gordon Brown, but the way this story was used and blown up was ill judged and just plain wrong.