I promised I’d stop writing about Cleveland. But as a dishonorable blogger, I honor no promises….
Jay Rosen summed up what I was trying to say in one eloquent line; he has a habit of doing that: “Advice to newsroom people: if you’re caught up in a situation that appears to pit journalists with ethics against bloggers who ain’t got none, you may actually be facing a conflict between one ethic and another, and it would be good to find out what the ‘other’ is before deciding what to do.”
Danny Glover thinks I was tough on Cleveland — we do disagree — but note that inherent in what he says is the bloggers’ ethic of transparency. He says the blogger erred in not disclosing his donation — though I do believe he hadn’t written about the campaign in question yet. And the paper didn’t ask them to disclose all their ties and donations. But note that if the paper had, then it would set a precedent — welcome from my viewpoint — of requiring such disclosure of all its staff members as well. So Danny is operating from the other set of ethics.
Now go to Adrian Monck in London, who is far away from Cleveland, he’ll be happy to tell you, and is writing nothing about it. He’s writing instead about the BBC and its 12 pillars of behavior and ethics, including this one: “Impartiality is no excuse for insipid programming. It allows room for fair-minded, evidence-based judgments by senior journalists and documentary-makers, and for controversial, passionate and polemical arguments by contributors and writers.” Adrian’s response: “Get that? Journalists – fair-minded, evidence-based. Contributors – controversial, passionate and polemical. Helpful, eh?”
This entire tale is not about one tribe having ethics, the other not. That’s what was so grossly insulting, self-centered, and truly self-righteous about the Plain Dealer’s treatment of the bloggers. They thought the other guys didn’t have any. Instead, this should be about one tribe trying to understand — and learn from — the ethics of the other. The Plain Dealer didn’t try. That is its loss.
Enough.
