Why amplify bullies?
The President of Harvard has been bullied into resigning. I think the whole episode stinks. I went into an aspect of it recently here. I might have answered the Congressional questions more forcefully. But, I’m not a very nuanced speaker.
I might have pointed out that the policies of the schools in question, and thus the campus responses to protests, are governed by Title IX. As such, if Congress wanted different things to happen on campus, they could always amend Title IX. Maybe that’s too confrontational? Or I might have responded that a one-state solution in West Asia is preferable, where all therein contained participate fully in a parliamentary democracy akin to that of the European countries - that a free and democratic Palestine can mean a democratic coexistence if the parties so choose … but I’m already digressing.
What really got to me lately is the bullying of the now former president. It seemed to be coming from everywhere all at once. But, the bullying had its source in the far-right. This confused me as to why more main-stream corporate media seemed to pick up on this right-wing bullying campaign. Then the answer popped into my mailbox.
A recent article from Peter Greene makes a rather compelling case that mainstream media outlets are essentially complicit in amplifying the dubious propaganda campaigns of figures like Christopher Rufo, despite his tactics clearly being in bad faith. This is driven by a toxic combination of profit motives, poor journalistic instincts, and bullying from conservative outlets. As Greene puts it, the mainstream media knows Rufo is acting in bad faith, “but cover him anyway for ratings, drama, their own excuses to over-cover stories.” In the process, ideology and journalistic ethics take a back seat.
It’s a rather damning portrayal of the sorry state of the mainstream corporate media. Greene argues outlets like The New York Times are all too keen to inflate “relatively minor issues into major scandals that get lots of coverage” simply because they can point to attack dogs like Rufo making it a big issue on the right. It gives them an excuse to indulge their worst impulses - chasing ratings and clicks through sensationalism and contrived drama. And it lets them avoid tough accusations of liberal bias from conservative media outlets like Fox News.
So in their craven pursuit of profit and ratings, and eagerness to avoid conservative backlash, corporate media outlets engage in what the author calls “the most perverse thing” - taking bad faith actors like Rufo more seriously precisely because they are transparent about their intent to deceive and whip up propaganda campaigns. As Greene notes, “describing himself as untrustworthy was a marketing ploy, and it worked on his intended audience: The nation's leading journalists and editors.”
In this climate, Greene argues, ideals of ethical journalism and devotion to the truth on which the media claims to be founded take a clear back seat when pitted against the drive for ever more clicks and eyeballs. It’s a depressing race to the bottom cloaked in manufactured drama. And citizens hoping for some semblance of insight or truth are left clutching at straws.
Plagiarism claims?
The big fuss is over plagiarism, right? When looking for the details, I found this article from MSN. The concluding paragraph tells me all I need to know about this issue:
“Harvard’s official review of the allegations found that Gay did not reach the standard of “research misconduct,” but was guilty of “a few instances of inadequate citation.” Harvard said Gay would therefore request “four corrections in two articles to insert citations and quotation marks that were omitted from the original publications,” according to a statement.”
They found some errors. The author acknowledged the errors and made plans to fix them. What’s the big deal?
Having now sent my seventh book off to my publisher, I’m well familiar with citations and references. My last book, No Place for Autism?, has about 30 pages of references. About 70% of them are direct citations. The other 30 or so percent are from sources that gave me an inspiration, areas I thought of exploring but didn’t for various reasons (but are still important), as well as sources cited by one of the cited works in the 70% that had really cool things to say tangentially, but weren’t directly cited.
The book before that, a forensic science text book, was a fun editorial experience as well. The company essentially paid me for my 300-level college course on forensic multimedia analysis - and to adapt it to fit their product line. The editor came at me after delivering an almost 700 page tome with fiery accusations of plagiarism. According to Grammerly, they said, there was about 30% of the work that was found in various places online (journals, papers, articles, etc) that wasn’t sourced.
What’s really funny about this story is the editor didn’t look into the sources, just that there was materials that were substantially similar to things found elsewhere that lacked citations. Had she looked, she would have found that I was the source of all of the materials. Essentially, she was accusing me of plagiarizing myself. After a bit of back and forth, I agreed to add the citations to my previous work (I didn’t think I had to as I had a contract that essentially sold the material to the company). But, I guess companies take this sort of thing quite seriously in an age where bullies like Rufo exist.
In the end
In the end, this whole fiasco wasn’t about setting the record straight in a few of Gay’s past works. There was a “correct answer” she was supposed to give in those hearings, and she didn’t deliver. There’s an “approved” position on the issue of Israel / Palestine, and she wasn’t quite there. So, they drummed her out and replaced her with someone who will make the correct sounds. It’s sad really. I don’t think she ever really stood a chance there. I sincerely hope she lands on her feet. I really do not like bullies.