September 2008 Archives

I'm shattered today.

This may be because this is my first day back from a two week holiday (I invoke bloggers' bragging rights for that mention, but I promise no tedious traveler's tales).

More likely an explanation for my red-eyed Monday yawning is that I stayed up last night watching a horror movie.

This was no average horror movie - there were no globulous monsters enveloping screaming fraternity girls, or a hairy Lon Chaney baring teeth resembling a miniature porcelain alps - the horror here was in the mind.

As I supped my warm cocoa and hid cringing behind my Transformers duvet (Optimus Prime on one side Megatron on the other - you decide) a nightmarish vision unfurled on the screen in front of me.

Okay, by now I know you're thinking I'm leading you down the garden path, cunningly attempting to make you believe I was watching a nasty slasher flick only to whip back the curtain (I don't know why there's a curtain in the garden, maybe the tulips are shy) to reveal a childish flick called something like "The Fluffy Bunny Wunnies Visit Cuddle Land", and thus hilarity ensues.

But no, the film in question, Shattered Glass, genuinely did cause me to break out in a cold sweat, if only because the very concept was such a horrific one for any journalist to witness.

The plot follows the true story of The New Republic reporter Stephen Glass, who between 1995-1998 repeatedly fabricated quotes, and in some case whole stories, until his lies were eventually unwound by a rival publication.

Now every journalist, no matter how good, knows the horrible stomach-turning feeling that you have when it turns out an important fact in a story is wrong.

Normally this will be due to an error beginning with one of your sources - there is always a certain amount of trust you have to place in people like councillors or the police, but even such lofty bodies will make the occassional boob.

However, in Glass's case the errors were entirely his own fabrication, so, unsettling as it felt to watch his stories unwind, I had little sympathy for the young chancer.

The real horror was in watching his editor realise the real magnitude of Glass's journalistic crimes.

Editors must place an incredible amount of trust in their reporters - if someone decides to sue a paper it is the editor who is directly in the firing line.

Much as certain facts such as road names or dates can often be checked independently, the accuracy of crucial points such as descriptions or quotes has to be trusted entirely to the reporter.

I should quickly point out this is not a problem here in Harrow (all our reporters have the ability to make their eyes swirl while they hypnotically hiss "Trussst in me"), but just watching a depiction of an editor coming to the realisation that he had a rogue reporter on his hands was enough to send shivers down my spine.

I have written on the subject of accuracy before, but I don't think I can emphasize enough the importance of it, and just plain fabricating stories in unforgivable in the world of reporting.

Admittedly there is a certain pressure to find the big scoops and the articles which will draw the public's attention, but making them up negates the whole idea of news and turns any newspaper into a potential work of fiction.

Readers must also form a bond of trust with journalists and a publication, and they have every right to believe that what they read is truthful, whatever their opinion on the matter.

Nothing is more damaging in any relationship than finding out you've been lied to by someone you have trusted and in the case of a paper and its readers this relationship can be near impossible to rebuild.

So there it is, an insight into the journalist's second-worst nightmare, falling just behind attempting to run through a swamp filled with caramel while being chased by a 50ft chief executive in a mini-skirt who is set on draining your blood to serve to shareholders at their annual meeting.

Lucky it's all just a dream eh?

Journalism is a lot more dangerous than people often imagine.

In the course of chasing a story it is fairly easy to get into a scrape, most often when you least expect it.

Only a few weeks into my career as a reporter I found myself rapidly attempting to talk my way out of a beating at the hands of an angry man who made guns for feature films. He was incensed that I should take an interest in a robbery which had happened at his warehouse, despite the fact the thieves had made off with a small arsenal of weapons.

But this was nothing compared to my last paper, the South London Press, where our crime reporter was threatened with an axe by the friends of a murdered teenager just for asking if they wanted to pay tribute.

The problem is, people want the news as it's happening, and the best way to bring that to our readers is either to talk directly to the people experiencing whatever is going on, or better still, have it happen to you.

A prime example of this is currently being displayed on our newsroom television (describing it with the word 'newsroom' always makes it sound far more dynamic than your common or garden television, though realistically if you've got a television in your garden it's probably pretty special. Or broken).

As I type a Sky News anchor is stood in a field in New Orleans attempting to be heard over the incoming hurricane and occasionally pointing at a puddle around the bottom of a telephone pole, with the purpose I can only assume of reminding us all that rain = puddles and big rain = big puddles, or flooding.

Now this news anchor looks like he's having no fun at all, with one hand desperately clasping onto his microphone and the other constantly readjusting his anorak hood in an attempt to keep a storm which is threatening to devastate a massive city from ruining his hair. But he must stick it out - not only is he reporting the news, but, more importantly, the news is happening to him.

As the storm thunders ever closer to the East American coast an interesting and bizarre competition is unveiling in front of the viewing public - namely who can stand out in it in front of a camera the longest.

Earlier today a female news anchor was talking about who was left in New Orleans after the mass evacuation and came out with the line: "The streets are empty apart from groups of militia and, er, journalists." As the last words came out her mouth you could see a brief flash of panic across her face as she realised just what they meant - the only people remaining are people who are trained to face death unquestioning and people such as herself who, when confronted by the grim reaper, would be likely to break a new land speed record (stopping only to ask the skeletal scyther to appear exclusively on her show next week).

But that is what the viewing public want, and if the BBC anchor is still stood up to his waist in corpse-ridden flood waters as alligators gnaw at his knees then why should Sky's correspondent be safely tucked up in a warm studio hiding from the excitement of the news? I'll tell you why - because we're not soldiers, nor are we modern-day King Canutes and in the end no story is worth dying for.

Much as it would entertain me to see certain on-the-scene reporters swept up in a Wizard of Oz-style hurricane I salute the first network to get out of town (as nearly all authorities and aid agencies have repeatedly advised), as that may well be the first example of intelligent and responsible reporting I have seen on television for a while.