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Note: Readers can find an overview of the way fabricated columns in Slate magazine were exposed (and the role this site played in exposing them) by reading this column by James Taranto, in the Wall Street Journal. Here are some other items from the Journal's online presence, OpinionJournal.com, that also refer to the role played by this site. Below is the third of three columns about the Slate fabrications.
by Ken Sanes The story of Jay Forman's fabrications in Slate.com is beginning to turn into a story abut how the media covers up for itself. First, there was Slate Editor Michael Kinsley's misleading piece in which he stood by Forman's columns. In his defense of Forman, Kinsley claimed that a witness had verified one of Forman's accounts about an expedition to fish for monkeys, in a conversation with Slate Deputy Editor Jack Shafer. It later turned out the witness had not verified the details of the account at all. Instead, in what must have been one of the most carefully worded interviews in journalistic history, the witness apparently had only been asked a limited set of questions by Shafer. The witness told the New York Times he had been asked only about "the logistics of the trip, rather than the specifics" and that many of the details described in Forman's column actually didn't happen. Kinsley's piece, claiming the witness confirmed the details of Forman's column, was a journalistic fiasco. Going from bad to worse, after the Forman column was exposed, Kinsley went on the attack against a writer for Inside.com, Seth Mnookin, saying that "Mnookin has a tendency to improve a good story dangerously similar to that of our former writer Jay Forman." Mnookin's crime? He had challenged Kinsley's absurd claim that something that deserves to be described as "monkeyfishing" did take place, even after the New York Times demonstrated the whole thing was a fraud. Now we are seeing another in the growing list of strategies being used to defend Kinsley and Slate. The latest salvo by the Slate defense brigade is a column in The New Republic by self-described Kinsley admirer, Andrew Sullivan. In the column, Sullivan adopts what can only be described as the fall-back position in the effort to defend the indefensible. He suggests the fabrications in the Forman piece about fishing for monkeys were okay because the piece wasn't a serious subject. He also suggests that the Forman column was never intended to be taken as true. I quote Sullivan at length: "I have to say I found the original piece--which conjured up images somewhere between Curious George and Mad Max--highly entertaining. I assumed it was probably a tall tale, but it was told so well I didn't really give a damn. And, since it wasn't addressing earthshaking matters like Republican-sponsored tax breaks for shipbuilders or a patients' bill of rights, I wasn't exactly scouring the prose for evidence of malfeasance. It was a jolly piece of colorful and clearly inebriated reminiscence. So what if it was embroidered a little, or even a lot? How many jolly tales aren't livened up a bit in the retelling, especially when the original expedition was conducted with a fair amount of mental lubrication? "Turns out I was wrong. This was a grave and terrible offense. All the usual journalistic pooh-bahs descended from their pedestals to tsk-tsk. Suddenly, spanking the monkey took on a whole new meaning. The story merited a front-page, above-the-fold 'expose' in the business section of The New York Times and an apologia from one of the most talented journalists around (and a former writer of this column), Michael Kinsley. Now don't get me wrong. I'm not arguing that magazines or newspapers should publish fibs. Kinsley wouldn't either. (Tedious full disclosure: I revere and like Kinsley, and he helped give me my start in American journalism.) But this absurd non-scandal is a symptom of something now sadly endemic in the culture: the forest/trees issue. Or, to put it another way: Can we please get a sense of perspective?" Later in the column, in order to suggest that Forman never intended for the column to be taken as true, Sullivan says: "Consider this line: 'After a long day of eating its own feces, what monkey could resist a tasty orange?' Is the author seriously suggesting that wild monkeys eat their own feces for sustenance? Of course not. The whole piece is written with a wink and a rod." Thus, with a combination of ridicule, journalistic sleight of hand, and his own winks and nods (if not rods), Sullivan tries to explain away an act of journalistic fraud. But notice a few things about Sullivan's account. One thing worth noticing is that, in two qualifiers, Sullivan explains the connections to Kinsley that might lead him to defend Kinsley's publication of Forman's work. In one qualifier, Sullivan says "Tedious full disclosure: I revere and like Kinsley, and he helped give me my start in American journalism." That is no "tedious" disclosure, at least not for the reader. It is an explanation for why Sullivan would try to defend the indefensible. Sullivan also notes that once Kinsley worked for The New Republic, where this defense of him is taking place. When we look at Sullivan's arguments in defense of the Forman column, they turn out to be as flimsy as Kinsley's. First, as noted, Sullivan suggests that the lack of importance in the subject matter made the fabrications okay, which is obviously unacceptable. But Sullivan then basically contradicts himself. Having said, "So what if it (the Forman column) was embroidered a little, or even a lot?" he then says, "Now don't get me wrong. I'm not arguing that magazines or newspapers should publish fibs. Kinsley wouldn't either." So while he doesn't recommend that news organizations use deception, sometimes it is okay if they do. Sullivan's suggestion that the Forman column was "written with a wink and a rod" is equally indefensible. If the Forman column was tongue in cheek, why did Forman defend the truthfulness of the "monkeyfishing" column in an email to me; why did Kinsley initially stand by the Forman columns, and why did Kinsley then apologize after the New York Times definitively revealed the monkeyfishing column was false? Nor does Forman's reference to monkeys eating their own feces demonstrate that the column was intended to be taken as a joke. My best guess is that Forman did intend that one line to be read as a joke. Or maybe it is the one line in his columns in which he strayed so far from verisimilitude that he even more blatantly gave himself away. In that case, it would be a result of a failure to adequately fabricate, not a one liner from someone who knows we know this is all the equivalent of a Saturday Night Live routine. Or (to cover all my bases, and at the risk of ridicule), in the unlikely event that monkeys do take a little taste of their feces (and I hope for their sake they don't), then Forman was using information he believed he could defend. The real issue is why is The New Republic now trying to get us to eat this journalistic waste. Are we really to believe that media standards now dictate that if a column's subject isn't important, it is okay to make things up? If we follow that logic, it won't be long before the news media has all the moral authority of what a monkey leaves in the woods. - - - - - - Note: * The
New Republic became a center of attention some time ago because it ran fabricated pieces by another writer, Stephen Glass, in the second half of the
1990s. |
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