How Journalism Works

I’m very grateful to David Martin for this posting

 

‘ As a long-term subscriber to 'Private Eye', for some time I've started with the letters pages which are often the best part of the magazine. I'll therefore look forward to reading Mr Hitchens's response in a fortnight's time. However, to some extent this will be to discover what Mr Hitchens finds to complain about in what seem to me to be four factual paragraphs. Perhaps the suggestion that 'What the Papers Say' always give the quotations in mocking voices. Similarly, the BBC email reads to me like an explanation and not a justification. To paraphrase Wodehouse, having a sense of grievance appears to make Mr Hitchens as happy as a ray of sunshine.’

 

While I’m not sure that’s a paraphrase ( so far as I recall, Wodehouse wrote, roughly, that it was ‘never difficult to distinguish a Scotsman with a grievance from ray of sunshine’). Whereas there is no doubt that I greatly enjoy these occasions, where the BBC allow their bias to cross the line from the subtle and insinuating to the demonstrably factual. But I am very taken by his statement that the Private Eye article seemed to him to be ‘four factual paragraphs’.

 

I can’t reproduce the whole thing here, but he has just demonstrated, unwittingly, the truth of a favourite proposition of mine; that openly-expressed opinion has little impact on anyone who doesn’t already agree with it , except to confirm and strengthen him in his belief – but that those who wish to influence the minds of readers, listeners and viewers do it in ostensibly factual material, by:

Selection of facts and quotations, leaving some important material out entirely.

The ordering and relative prominence of the material that *is* selected

Nuances of expression often to be found in verbs and nouns rather than in adjectives or adverbs (where the reader might more readily spot an attempt to push a particular line).

 

In many cases, the writer is as unconscious of this process as is the reader, as he or she will naturally give an account which corresponds to his or her idea of what is going on.

 

In broadcast material, other powerful subconscious means can be brought to bear , such as the order in which guests are interviewed, the extent to which they are interrupted, the tone of voice and register in which they are questioned. Those the presenter favours are brought in first treated respectfully, interrupted less or not at all, are never asked questions beginning ‘Are you seriously suggesting…?’ and are given the last word.

 

Conscious methods (well, those who deploy them are conscious of them, but the viewer isn’t) , such as unflattering lighting and angles, can also be used, but we are here dealing with what people do while they genuinely imagine themselves to be acting impartially.

 

So, to the article in ‘Private Eye’. To read it in full, you will need to buy the magazine, and turn to page 12, and the right hand column, under the headline :

‘Media News’.

 

But what follows is a brief analysis of some of the more interesting bits of it:

 

In its description of my dispute with ‘What the Papers Say’, the article notes that the BBC ‘admitted the programme should not have edited one of his[my] sentences.’  

 

Edited? That sounds innocent. Isn’t that what editors do? To omit the fact that it had been so edited *as to alter its meaning* seems to me to fall well short of ‘factual’.  It makes it seem rather odd that they apologized at all, or admitted any wrongdoing. The same could be said of its description of my point about the ‘extreme, mocking and derisive parody’ of my voice. My complaint was precisely not that this had been done to me, but that this had been done *selectively* to me and to me alone. The other voices on that programme (and indeed in the series as a whole) were in some (but not all) cases caricatured and parodied, but not in the hostile manner applied to mine. My incessant point, that they would never have parodied my brother’s very similar voice in the same way, if quoting an article by him, is an objective test of the hostility of this particular caricature. But people don’t see this simple point because they don’t wish to.

 

Though the writer leaves out much of this detail, and ignores completely the fact that I pursued the case because I believed it was evidence of institutional bias against me and my opinions, he is careful to include Ofcom’s swift dismissal of my complaint as ‘frivolous’. Well, I expected nothing else, but so what? This is not the Oracle at Delphi speaking.  Who thinks Ofcom is any more inclined to be fair to conservatives than is the BBC?

 

I might add that the article also leaves out the fact that this is the *third time* my words have now been misrepresented on air on BBC programmes, and does not mention the relevant fact of the show trial of me, in my absence, on 'Feedback'. 

 

 

Then, after casually and impartially (and, as it happens, incorrectly)  describing me as an ‘insomniac’,  which I somehow think is not intended to be sympathetic, it describes my complaint about ‘News Briefing’ as that the programme ‘did not fully contextualise a quote’ from my column.

 

‘Did not fully contextualise’? This is the sort of English used by the Emperor Hirohito when he announced on 15th August 1945 that ‘the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan’s advantage’.

 

Is this ‘factual’? Or is it, as George Orwell might have said, the roundabout, Latinate words falling over the facts like a blanket of soft snow? The quotation was profoundly misleading (by omission) about the general tenor of the article, and further formed part of a failure to give a balanced selection of opinions about UKIP, in the period immediately before an election in which UKIP's performance was of great significance. Surely that is not adequately expressed by saying the programme ‘did not fully contextualise a quote’ from my column.

 

There are other little twists and tugs. The fact that the clip involved lasted eight seconds (the author must have timed it) is mentioned, as if bad, unfair journalism is excusable if it’s brief. There’s also a sarcastic reference to ‘this particular offence taking place at the prime time of …5.40 on a Sunday morning’.

 

Just in case any reader doesn’t get the sarcasm of ‘prime time’, the three dots rub it in. Honestly, hasn’t Hitchens anything better to do than complain about his work being misrepresented ( and eight seconds hardly counts at all) at a time when no London metropolitan person would dream of being awake?

 

I am tempted to say that anyone who thinks these techniques are ‘factual’ is immensely naïve. But I won’t. The sad truth is that most people are very trusting, as they ought to be entitled to be, and that this kind of thing works precisely because they are so trusting. Which is why it’s so wrong.

 

But anyone who wants to go more deeply into the subtle but easily-understood (once you know the code) way in which certain ideas become current in the media should read my book ‘The Cameron Delusion’, which I am currently recording as an audio book (nearly finished) . After that, I hope to record ‘The Abolition of Britain’. ‘The Rage Against God’ is already available in that form.