It's been a hectic week, otherwise I would have responded sooner to ABC News' suspension of Brian Ross for four weeks without pay, after he erroneously reported that Michael Flynn had been directed by candidate Donald Trump to make contact with the Russians.
The report was erroneous - not sufficiently investigated or vetted by Ross - but his suspension is an even worse affront to professional, truthful journalism.
As I point out and detail in Fake News in Real Context, reporters and news media have always made errors - unsurprising, given that reporters are human. That's why there has long been an "errata" note at the bottom of many front pages of The New York Times. What make fake news fake is not that it is in error, but that is deliberately designed to be that way - intended to deceive.
Trump and his minions, who first became purveyors of fake news in the 2016 election - and fake news itself has always been with us, see the "Blood Libel" in medieval Europe - cleverly sought to turn this charge on its head and smear truthful, honest reporting as fake news. In Trump-speak, fake news is any report that Trump finds unwelcome.
Understandably, legitimate media are especially sensitive to the need for their reporting to be truthful. But suspending an excellent reporter for making an error is playing right into Trump's hands, by removing from the field, for whatever the period of time, an honest warrior in the fight for truth, which is in turn a fight for democracy.
To ABC News and all news media: Admit your errors, sure. By all means apologize for them. The same for your reporters. But don't hold human beings, including journalists, to impossible standards of perfection. You don't need to prove to Trump that you're not fake news. Everyone (including him) know that you're real. We need human journalists, not angels (who are not readily available), to counter Trump's assault on reason.
The report was erroneous - not sufficiently investigated or vetted by Ross - but his suspension is an even worse affront to professional, truthful journalism.
As I point out and detail in Fake News in Real Context, reporters and news media have always made errors - unsurprising, given that reporters are human. That's why there has long been an "errata" note at the bottom of many front pages of The New York Times. What make fake news fake is not that it is in error, but that is deliberately designed to be that way - intended to deceive.
Trump and his minions, who first became purveyors of fake news in the 2016 election - and fake news itself has always been with us, see the "Blood Libel" in medieval Europe - cleverly sought to turn this charge on its head and smear truthful, honest reporting as fake news. In Trump-speak, fake news is any report that Trump finds unwelcome.
Understandably, legitimate media are especially sensitive to the need for their reporting to be truthful. But suspending an excellent reporter for making an error is playing right into Trump's hands, by removing from the field, for whatever the period of time, an honest warrior in the fight for truth, which is in turn a fight for democracy.
To ABC News and all news media: Admit your errors, sure. By all means apologize for them. The same for your reporters. But don't hold human beings, including journalists, to impossible standards of perfection. You don't need to prove to Trump that you're not fake news. Everyone (including him) know that you're real. We need human journalists, not angels (who are not readily available), to counter Trump's assault on reason.
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