2009.11.03
Tuesday's column: Lessons on journalistic ethics - from Jayson Blair?
If you organized a conference on marital fidelity and made Elliot Spitzer the keynote speaker, that would raise some eyebrows.
The same goes if Wall Street swindler Bernard Madoff gave a lecture about investment fraud at the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Thus, plenty of eyebrows were raised last week after Washington and Lee University announced the keynote speaker for its upcoming seminar on journalism ethics would be Jayson Blair.
Blair, in case you have forgotten, is the disgraced ex-New York Times reporter who lied and plagiarized his way into journalism infamy.
His open-to-the-public speech is Friday evening in Lexington, and the university is paying him $3,000, a sum in line with past keynote speakers.
Read the rest of the column here.
I don't see what the big hoopla is. Blair seems to have been properly indoctrinated into the poltitically correct world where 80+% of the time the viewpoint is "progressive" (liberal). Except at the RTEB where in 2009, NO REPUBLICANS were endorsed for statewide office (not a one, nada, zippo). He is perfectly suited to make a keynote speech on the topics.
All joking aside. Just about every journalist does something close to this. No, not inventing facts or sources, but ignoring facts that don't go along with their perception of things. You see it in polls (which one do we use, the one that supports what position we want to take). You see alot of ignoring of what credible scientists have to say about global warming, evolution,- name your topic.
Not to mention the inordinate amount of time trying to find something that sheds poor light on conservatives when there is plenty out there on liberals too.
Why not wait to criticize after the guy makes his speech?
Comment by Bob H — November 3, 2009 @ 9:32 am
Wow...I could see Columbia, NYU, Harvard, doing this...but W&L, crazy.
Comment by T Witten — November 3, 2009 @ 10:23 am
I know he did not mean to, but Bob H gave the spot on reason why this is so egregious in the first place. This constant equivocating and making excuses for bad behavior. Blair should not be treated like a journalist, he gave that right away. Conservatives are all too willing to let things like this slide because they too live in a glass house, but the bottom line is that we cannot keep on making these kind of judgment calls and allowing the waters to stay muddied and the thinking, writing and choices to remain muddled. This is not a good or acceptable thing IMO. Will Madoff be giving speeches about financial ethics? Will Cheney be giving speeches about political ethics? Will Bush or Tenant be giving speeches about intelligence ethics? Will Geithner be giving a speech about tax ethics? We are on the wrong road and dismissing this as "everybody does it" is the slippery slope to flat out acceptance of propaganda as evidence and reason as truth. Be afraid!
Comment by Sandi Saunders — November 3, 2009 @ 10:57 am
So I guess hiring Kevin Mitnick to speak to a group of IT security professionals would be an idiotic thing to do also?
Wow.
just...wow.
Comment by Rich — November 3, 2009 @ 12:09 pm
Bob H,
Following your logic, I would "ignore" your comments, rather than approve them. But I don't do that. How do you explain that?
Comment by Dan Casey — November 3, 2009 @ 12:12 pm
Didn't the FBI hire that guy from Catch Me If You Can to work on banking fraud?
I don't find this remarkable. If nothing else, he's an object lesson for the students. I doubt it's going to be a "Plariarism, a Handy How-to" discussion. More like.."I fought the law and the law won"
Comment by Kristen — November 3, 2009 @ 12:22 pm
"I fought the law and the law won" and then I turned that into a career move. Mayhap that is the "lesson" and the title of the seminar should have been "examples of the lack of ethics and why that is a problem".
Comment by Sandi Saunders — November 3, 2009 @ 12:44 pm
Dan,
It isn't a matter of "comments". It is a matter of "which facts to use".
My comments where I am obviously editorializing should be regarded in that light. But a fact related, is a different story. I mean, you have pointed this out this election. Deeds was trailing by 18 or 4 (within the error margin of the poll) so which poll you cite depends on the one that supports whatever is in your story.
Similarly, you can ignore the scientists who claim global warming doesn't exist if your view is that it does.
Or you can ignore that evolution as a process is inconsistent with the 2nd law of thermodynamics:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_law_of_thermodynamics
if you believe in evolution. Note: the second law of thermodynamics dictates that all closed systems in the universe will, if left to their own devices, tend to disorder. So therefore, "scientists" who propose evolution as a "fact" and also subscribe to the above law of thermodynamics are at odds with themselves. But, you can choose to relate the one "fact" while leaving out the other.
FWIW, you can discount anything I have to say, factual or not, and I am not going to have my feelings hurt.
Bob
Comment by Bob H — November 3, 2009 @ 1:15 pm
Companies everywhere hire the very people who were once out to fraud them. If you are a repentant bank robber, the first one who wants to give you a job is the very bank you robbed. The same holds true for computer hackers, house burglars, and horse theives... to name a few.
Who better to teach them how not to be taken advantage of, than the ones who have the skills to take advantage?
Comment by Lynda K — November 4, 2009 @ 7:12 pm
Boh H
Please get your science information from anywhere other than Answers in Genesis (or whichever second rate religious apologetics blog you learned about the second Law of Thermodynamics from). Please, it is embarassing that you think it reasonable to get actual science from an ID-iot website.
To specify: your comment on the Second Law of Thermodynamics and The Theory of Evolution.
"you can ignore that evolution as a process is inconsistent with the 2nd law of thermodynamics"
Yet when you go on to say the "second law of thermodynamics dictates that all closed systems in the universe will, if left to their own devices, tend to disorder."
So, it seems that your extremely limited exposure to science failed to include the FACT that the earth is not a closed system, since it receives energy from the sun (outside the earth).
Thus the Second Law of Thermodynamics does not apply to things which occur on the earth. Thus the Second Law of Thermodynamics does not, in any way impinge upon the fact of evolution.
Btw, every creationist and ID supporter who has brought this up has had these facts pointed out to them for at least 5 years. Whatever site or book or pamphlet you got your information from really did you a disservice and made you look like a complete fool. Read a book.
So, your post is completely wrong. Not even based upon what you thought you had read. Buy a actual book about science that was not endorsed by the Discovery Institute if you want to learn actual facts written by actual scientists.
Comment by VVarlock — November 7, 2009 @ 8:50 pm
Bob H
Btw - did you even bother to read the wiki link you posted or did you just assume we wouldn't either?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_law_of_thermodynamics
To quote from the link you included.
From the section of that link labeled "Applications to living systems"
"it is incorrect to apply the closed-system expression of the second law of thermodynamics to any one sub-system connected by mass-energy flows to another ("open system")."
"This is very different, however, from the claim made by many creationists that evolution violates the second law of thermodynamics. "
"the process of natural selection responsible for such local increase in order may be mathematically derived from the expression of the second law equation for non-equilibrium connected open systems,[17] arguably making the Theory of Evolution itself an expression of the Second Law."
"Furthermore, the second law is only true of closed systems. It is easy to decrease entropy, with an energy source. For example, a refrigerator separates warm and cold air, but only when it is plugged in. Since all biology requires an external energy source, there's nothing unusual (thermodynamically) with it growing more complex with time."
Not only did your AiG equivalent craptastic fount of lies and misinformation fail you, so did your attempt to pass off a wiki link which clearly and perfectly contradicts the point you were trying to make.
Nicely done.
Comment by VVarlock — November 7, 2009 @ 8:59 pm