New York Times and MSNBC resignations
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Ariana Pekary, producer of the Lawrence O'Donnell show on MSNBC
“Just quit.”
That’s the advice Alec gave a year and a half ago when I expressed concerns about my job.
“You just quit. It’s that simple.”
“Stay at MSNBC at least until the midterms,” Jeffrey said a couple years back. He advised to watch and see what happens.
“Hang in there… you’re needed,” Elizabeth recommended last winter. “I was in your shoes when I was younger but I stuck it out.”
A year and a half ago, simply quitting my job without knowing my next step sounded pretty radical. So I stuck it out a bit longer until we were in the middle of a pandemic to make a truly radical move.
July 24th was my last day at MSNBC. I don’t know what I’m going to do next exactly but I simply couldn’t stay there anymore. My colleagues are very smart people with good intentions. The problem is the job itself. It forces skilled journalists to make bad decisions on a daily basis.
You may not watch MSNBC but just know that this problem still affects you, too. All the commercial networks function the same – and no doubt that content seeps into your social media feed, one way or the other.
It’s possible that I’m more sensitive to the editorial process due to my background in public radio, where no decision I ever witnessed was predicated on how a topic or guest would “rate.” The longer I was at MSNBC, the more I saw such choices — it’s practically baked in to the editorial process – and those decisions affect news content every day. Likewise, it’s taboo to discuss how the ratings scheme distorts content, or it’s simply taken for granted, because everyone in the commercial broadcast news industry is doing the exact same thing.
But behind closed doors, industry leaders will admit the damage that’s being done.
“We are a cancer and there is no cure,” a successful and insightful TV veteran said to me. “But if you could find a cure, it would change the world.”
As it is, this cancer stokes national division, even in the middle of a civil rights crisis. The model blocks diversity of thought and content because the networks have incentive to amplify fringe voices and events, at the expense of others… all because it pumps up the ratings.
This cancer risks human lives, even in the middle of a pandemic. The primary focus quickly became what Donald Trump was doing (poorly) to address the crisis, rather than the science itself. As new details have become available about antibodies, a vaccine, or how COVID actually spreads, producers still want to focus on the politics. Important facts or studies get buried.
This cancer risks our democracy, even in the middle of a presidential election. Any discussion about the election usually focuses on Donald Trump, not Joe Biden, a repeat offense from 2016 (Trump smothers out all other coverage). Also important is to ensure citizens can vote by mail this year, but I’ve watched that topic get ignored or “killed” numerous times.
Context and factual data are often considered too cumbersome for the audience. There may be some truth to that (our education system really should improve the critical thinking skills of Americans) – but another hard truth is that it is the job of journalists to teach and inform, which means they might need to figure out a better way to do that. They could contemplate more creative methods for captivating an audience. Just about anything would improve the current process, which can be pretty rudimentary (think basing today’s content on whatever rated well yesterday, or look to see what’s trending online today).
Occasionally, the producers will choose to do a topic or story without regard for how they think it will rate, but that is the exception, not the rule. Due to the simple structure of the industry – the desire to charge more money for commercials, as well as the ratings bonuses that top-tier decision-makers earn – they always relapse into their old profitable programming habits.
I understand that the journalistic process is largely subjective and any group of individuals may justify a different set of priorities on any given day. Therefore, it’s particularly notable to me, for one, that nearly every rundown at the network basically is the same, hour after hour. And two, they use this subjective nature of the news to justify economically beneficial decisions. I’ve even heard producers deny their role as journalists. A very capable senior producer once said: “Our viewers don’t really consider us the news. They come to us for comfort.”
Again, personally, I don’t think the people need to change. I think the job itself needs to change. There is a better way to do this. I’m not so cynical to think that we are absolutely doomed (though we are on that path). I know we can find a cure. If we can figure how to send a man to the moon, if Alex Trebek can defy the odds with stage 4 pancreatic cancer, and if Harry Reid can actually overcome pancreatic cancer (he’s now cancer free), then we can fix this, too.
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
I know James Baldwin wasn’t thinking about MSNBC when he wrote that line in 1962, but those words spoke loudly to me in the summer of 2020. Unfortunately, many of the same ailments are still at stake today. Now maybe we can’t really change the inherently broken structure of broadcast news, but I know for certain that it won’t change unless we actually face it, in public, and at least try to change it.
Through this pandemic and the surreal, alienating lockdown, I’ve witnessed many people question their lives and what they’re doing with their time on this planet. I reckon I’m one of those people, looking for greater meaning and truth. As much as I love my life in New York City and really don’t want to leave, I feel fortunate to be able to return to Virginia in the near term to reconnect with family, friends, and a community of independent journalists. I’m both nervous and excited about this change. Thanks to COVID-19, I’m learning to live with uncertainty.
And so very soon, I’m going to be seeking you out, any one of you who also may sense that the news is fundamentally flawed and is frustrated by it. This effort will start informally but I hope to crystallize a plan for when better, safer days are upon us. On that front, feel free to reach out anytime if you would like to discuss any of this – whether in agreement or not. More than ever, I’m craving a full and civil discourse.
Until next time, thank you for reading. I wish you all well.
Ariana
https://www.arianapekary.net/post/personal-news-why-i-m-now-leaving-msnbc
Pearl Jam bootlegs:
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Comments
Bari Weiss, Op-Ed editor and writer for the New York Times
Dear A.G.,
It is with sadness that I write to tell you that I am resigning from The New York Times.
I joined the paper with gratitude and optimism three years ago. I was hired with the goal of bringing in voices that would not otherwise appear in your pages: first-time writers, centrists, conservatives and others who would not naturally think of The Times as their home. The reason for this effort was clear: The paper’s failure to anticipate the outcome of the 2016 election meant that it didn’t have a firm grasp of the country it covers. Dean Baquet and others have admitted as much on various occasions. The priority in Opinion was to help redress that critical shortcoming.
I was honored to be part of that effort, led by James Bennet. I am proud of my work as a writer and as an editor. Among those I helped bring to our pages: the Venezuelan dissident Wuilly Arteaga; the Iranian chess champion Dorsa Derakhshani; and the Hong Kong Christian democrat Derek Lam. Also: Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Masih Alinejad, Zaina Arafat, Elna Baker, Rachael Denhollander, Matti Friedman, Nick Gillespie, Heather Heying, Randall Kennedy, Julius Krein, Monica Lewinsky, Glenn Loury, Jesse Singal, Ali Soufan, Chloe Valdary, Thomas Chatterton Williams, Wesley Yang, and many others.
But the lessons that ought to have followed the election—lessons about the importance of understanding other Americans, the necessity of resisting tribalism, and the centrality of the free exchange of ideas to a democratic society—have not been learned. Instead, a new consensus has emerged in the press, but perhaps especially at this paper: that truth isn’t a process of collective discovery, but an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else.
Twitter is not on the masthead of The New York Times. But Twitter has become its ultimate editor. As the ethics and mores of that platform have become those of the paper, the paper itself has increasingly become a kind of performance space. Stories are chosen and told in a way to satisfy the narrowest of audiences, rather than to allow a curious public to read about the world and then draw their own conclusions. I was always taught that journalists were charged with writing the first rough draft of history. Now, history itself is one more ephemeral thing molded to fit the needs of a predetermined narrative.
My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist; I have learned to brush off comments about how I’m “writing about the Jews again.” Several colleagues perceived to be friendly with me were badgered by coworkers. My work and my character are openly demeaned on company-wide Slack channels where masthead editors regularly weigh in. There, some coworkers insist I need to be rooted out if this company is to be a truly “inclusive” one, while others post ax emojis next to my name. Still other New York Times employees publicly smear me as a liar and a bigot on Twitter with no fear that harassing me will be met with appropriate action. They never are.
There are terms for all of this: unlawful discrimination, hostile work environment, and constructive discharge. I’m no legal expert. But I know that this is wrong.
I do not understand how you have allowed this kind of behavior to go on inside your company in full view of the paper’s entire staff and the public. And I certainly can’t square how you and other Times leaders have stood by while simultaneously praising me in private for my courage. Showing up for work as a centrist at an American newspaper should not require bravery.
Part of me wishes I could say that my experience was unique. But the truth is that intellectual curiosity—let alone risk-taking—is now a liability at The Times. Why edit something challenging to our readers, or write something bold only to go through the numbing process of making it ideologically kosher, when we can assure ourselves of job security (and clicks) by publishing our 4000th op-ed arguing that Donald Trump is a unique danger to the country and the world? And so self-censorship has become the norm.
What rules that remain at The Times are applied with extreme selectivity. If a person’s ideology is in keeping with the new orthodoxy, they and their work remain unscrutinized. Everyone else lives in fear of the digital thunderdome. Online venom is excused so long as it is directed at the proper targets.
Op-eds that would have easily been published just two years ago would now get an editor or a writer in serious trouble, if not fired. If a piece is perceived as likely to inspire backlash internally or on social media, the editor or writer avoids pitching it. If she feels strongly enough to suggest it, she is quickly steered to safer ground. And if, every now and then, she succeeds in getting a piece published that does not explicitly promote progressive causes, it happens only after every line is carefully massaged, negotiated and caveated.
It took the paper two days and two jobs to say that the Tom Cotton op-ed “fell short of our standards.” We attached an editor’s note on a travel story about Jaffa shortly after it was published because it “failed to touch on important aspects of Jaffa’s makeup and its history.” But there is still none appended to Cheryl Strayed’s fawning interview with the writer Alice Walker, a proud anti-Semite who believes in lizard Illuminati.
The paper of record is, more and more, the record of those living in a distant galaxy, one whose concerns are profoundly removed from the lives of most people. This is a galaxy in which, to choose just a few recent examples, the Soviet space program is lauded for its “diversity”; the doxxing of teenagers in the name of justice is condoned; and the worst caste systems in human history includes the United States alongside Nazi Germany.
Even now, I am confident that most people at The Times do not hold these views. Yet they are cowed by those who do. Why? Perhaps because they believe the ultimate goal is righteous. Perhaps because they believe that they will be granted protection if they nod along as the coin of our realm—language—is degraded in service to an ever-shifting laundry list of right causes. Perhaps because there are millions of unemployed people in this country and they feel lucky to have a job in a contracting industry.
Or perhaps it is because they know that, nowadays, standing up for principle at the paper does not win plaudits. It puts a target on your back. Too wise to post on Slack, they write to me privately about the “new McCarthyism” that has taken root at the paper of record.
All this bodes ill, especially for independent-minded young writers and editors paying close attention to what they’ll have to do to advance in their careers. Rule One: Speak your mind at your own peril. Rule Two: Never risk commissioning a story that goes against the narrative. Rule Three: Never believe an editor or publisher who urges you to go against the grain. Eventually, the publisher will cave to the mob, the editor will get fired or reassigned, and you’ll be hung out to dry.
For these young writers and editors, there is one consolation. As places like The Times and other once-great journalistic institutions betray their standards and lose sight of their principles, Americans still hunger for news that is accurate, opinions that are vital, and debate that is sincere. I hear from these people every day. “An independent press is not a liberal ideal or a progressive ideal or a democratic ideal. It’s an American ideal,” you said a few years ago. I couldn’t agree more. America is a great country that deserves a great newspaper.
None of this means that some of the most talented journalists in the world don’t still labor for this newspaper. They do, which is what makes the illiberal environment especially heartbreaking. I will be, as ever, a dedicated reader of their work. But I can no longer do the work that you brought me here to do—the work that Adolph Ochs described in that famous 1896 statement: “to make of the columns of The New York Times a forum for the consideration of all questions of public importance, and to that end to invite intelligent discussion from all shades of opinion.”
Ochs’s idea is one of the best I’ve encountered. And I’ve always comforted myself with the notion that the best ideas win out. But ideas cannot win on their own. They need a voice. They need a hearing. Above all, they must be backed by people willing to live by them.
Sincerely,
Bari
https://www.bariweiss.com/resignation-letter
Pearl Jam bootlegs:
http://wegotshit.blogspot.com
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
You and me (and a lot of us here) as well. But the average American? I do wonder!
This is a big deal. I think it is clear the role that 24 hour cable news has played in the deterioration of U.S. politics. The country is more polarized. People get their news from soundbites and pundits instead of reading the newspapers (that had separate editorial sections) and watching the 30 minute evening news. It isn't like politics was civil prior, but it is just so much worse. The U.S. is heading down a terrible path where it will not be possible to be able to be in the middle or neutral on anything. If you are against statues being torn down then you are automatically a racist, or if you support the right to choice you are a murderer.
he blathered on about the usual fox news talking points: you can protest but you can't go to church, sanctuary cities, voting without ID, open borders, etc. i told him something similar as you folks above: do your own fucking research and stop taking the bait of the news media and all the hysteria they sell you. the 24 hour "breaking news" cycle is the direct cause of all of this polarization. the for profit news organizations. no one wants state run media, but at least with government funded, not government controlled, public news, you are more likely to get the actual facts, not opinions and sensationalized stories meant to make you choose between the news and your favourite drama, because the lines are being blurred.
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"The news" has become "The Jerry Springer Show" with a side of political speak.
And especially on medical and science topics. I don't really understand this. I guess it comes mostly down to people no longer believing what they hear in the mainstream (which they believe is mind control instead of just the most common beliefs based on current science) is less truthful than what Egrinera234x says on the internet.
I love politics, always have. But it is frustrating that every subject is looked at through a political angle. The news, as far as I can remember, never really did a good job of informing viewers about policy related stuff. So I'm not sure how this msnbc producer is suddenly realizing this fact in 2020. Seems like an attention grab to me, especially in wake of the Bari Weiss thing which a lot of people think was the same thing. But I think you have to go back to CNN's early days, like 30 years ago when they didn't have much competition, to find examples of a lot of in depth coverage.
Even with the bias that exists on CNN and MSNBC, the general public is much more informed by watching those channels than by FOX or OAN which are, other than a few examples, just mouthpieces for the president. He was supposed to be on Fox and Friends this morning. I didn't watch it, but I can imagine that it was essentially a campaign ad for him. That is more damaging than anything, in my opinion.
The News Hour on PBS is the best place for people to get their news on tv. I have it dvr'd every day. I just wish I remembered to watch it more often!
i think the media and social media are in part responsible for this, but it is real.
www.headstonesband.com
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I watch CNN generally for my news on what's happening in the States. But even years and years ago I knew to always double check things especially if they're relevant. And every so often check Fox to see what their discussing. It's awful that the public now has to find their way through the weeds to see clear waters.
I find that what's happened with television news is that it's become a huge driver for ad money and ratings, not journalism. And this applies to all aspects of the political spectrum. News and politics in America have become like sports. (Please feel free to discuss that) I see ads on CNN promoting town hall debates being promoted like it's the super bowl. The music, the design, the "Wow!" factor all play like a Hollywood movie trailer. And from what I can see, Fox News and the rest are no different.
Much like sports too, once you have a team it just becomes so hard to cheer for it's rival... which is insane... because it's news, not sports. One would think.
It's neat to see the contrast with most Canadian news shows but not all. They're mostly boring. Which I think is good. They'll say "Stuff got discussed in the House of Commons today" ... and then show the idiots discussing the stuff like children. They don't add their own flare or opinion to it, they just tell you what's going on and move on to the next thing.
That said... it shouldn't go without mentioning that politicians are worse. Just like the media outlets they BOTH criticize, they conveniently forget or leave out any information that makes their party or political leader look bad whether it's the truth or not. (Trudeau) But the very worst of all is Trump himself. In my opinion, he obviously knew what the landscape looked like before taking office and he pretty much put it on steroids. Wishful thinking, but it would be nice if a POTUS put the burning bag of shit out, instead of dousing gasoline on it. Trump being the one with the gasoline... but to be honest, nothing has convinced me that a guy like Biden would be the one to put out the fire or call out ALL of these corporate controlled "News" organizations. But I feel he won't douse gas, which is nice.
As a few of you on here have suggested... the problem with America is that nobody seems to know who or what to believe. Start trusting yourself. Do your own homework. Watch or read as many outlets as you can. And figure out who the journalists are and who the pundits are... and understand that yes there is a difference. Read the Pearl Jam forum but every once in a while check out Kid Rock's as well... you never know what you might find and odds are, you'll probably be entertained and slightly frightened but at least you'll know you tried!
Lately this Jonathan Swan fellow and Chris Wallace seem to be of good character. Why? Because they ask questions that people want to know the answers to and bite back a bit when a greasy politician like Trump tries to weasel his way around the question.
I highly recommend the following Jack Johnson songs for delightful reference as well:
Cookie Jar
News (or Bad News)
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I contend the polarization problem is more to do with independents, who should easily know by now what each party is about. But every four years they are unsure what each candidate would do with their most significant of policies. They swing back and forth under the silliest of reasons, generally speaking (“Obama and Clinton have charisma, let’s vote for them...Bush has a presidential pedigree because of his dad...trump is a successful businessman, let’s give him a chance”). Obama and Clinton raises taxes on the wealthy, inherited bad economies and turned it around. Bush and trump were more interested in giving their cronies large tax cuts. 30 years of politics, in 2 sentences. Guns, abortions, the parties make it easier for us, we know what each would do.
In all cases independents should have known exactly what each party is about and what the presidents would do. The democrats want to make sure there is a safety net, republicans want you to tough it out and figure it out on your own (unless you are wealthy donor, then you get big tax cuts for your donation). If more independents were more certain which path is best, we would be a much better country. It’s almost absurd to think a party can have a lasting impact in the course a country takes in 4 or 8 year terms.
Had independents over the last 30 years done their research, they’d know exactly the political purpose of tax cuts and who it’s intended to hurt. There is zero reason to swing back and forth. Either you agree with that policy or you vote against it for what it is...racism.
Any doubt, read Lee Atwaters comments on race and tax cuts
What if they all decided to just blindly vote republican? You think that's going to make the country better? Or even if they all went democrat?
I see it differently. I think Independents are like the swing vote on the Supreme Court. They're important because they, in theory, are there to draw both parties more to the center and it forces more bipartisan efforts. I think our country is better when the center has more control rather than one far right or far left agenda being slammed through.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14