Media norms and practices (even from serious professionals seeking, in their own way, to achieve excellence) are clearly part of the reason ‘why’ Donald Trump occupies the White House. And, such norms are also clearly part of why it has been so hard to achieve paths to address (mitigation and adaptation) Global Warming over past decades and, now, the mounting urgency of the climate crisis. From both sides framing to accommodating angry voices (promoting falsehood and deception) to embracing controversy as a path for boosting reach (e.g, #clickbait), the February 24th Washington Post front page section provided horrific examples from page A1 “reporting” to page A17 opinion by the editorial page editor.
- On the OPED section, editorial page editor Fred Hiatt falsely makes an equivalency between Trump’s climate science denialism and Sen. Bernie Sanders’ advocacy of policies Hiatt disagrees with.
- In the ‘news’ section, reporters Desmond Butler and Juliet Eilperin promote a young German climate science denialist, being promoted by climate-science denial institutions, as ‘the anti-Greta”.
Upfront, both of these are textbook quality examples of how not to do journalism and it is stunning to have such horrific mediocrity — after so many years of clear discussions about the problems these exemplify — bookending the front page section of one of the most important newspapers in the world.
Very shortly, while neither merited publication, rather than ‘both sides’ equivalency, here is roughly an accurate framing (even if sadly staying with ‘both sides’):
- OPED on presidential candidates representing a stark choice
- Trump denies the science and pursues policies at odds with the science that are worsening the actual situation
- Sanders understands the science, promotes a policy agenda aligned with the science that would ameliorate the situation although those policies might be unrealistically aggressive and unachievable politically.
- Article on astroturf young German:
- Greta Thunberg’s core message: respect the science, listen to the scientists
- Naomi Siebt’s core message: dismiss the science, disrespect the scientists.
That is an honest summary of the situation rather than the false equivalency both sides that bookended The Washington Post‘s front section.
From the opinion pages
Fred Hiatt’s atrocious “Two ways to deny climate change” falsely #bothsides climate-science denialist Trump and perhaps unrealistically aggressive solutions promoter Senator Sanders as two sides of the same coin.
Hiatt opens
The survival of our planet as we know it is in danger.
We have at hand a bipartisan, rigorous plan to address that danger.
And now it is more than possible that we will end up with two presidential candidates who reject that plan in favor of two varieties of utter unseriousness.
I don’t know how to overstate how horrific this framing is and how reckless it is that this is the editorial page editor of The Washington Post speaking. (Though, considering the long history of Fred Hiatt coddling climate science denialism from his writers and embracing bothersiderism, sadly not necessarily surprising.) Hiatt’s framing was lazy, false, and certainly designed as clickbait.
Of course, the opening bothersiderism only starts the problems with Hiatt’s monstrously bad OPED. Honestly, one could write a monograph (or even several) making clear how wrong Hiatt is on many critical points. Several examples:
- The person Hiatt quotes here, to frame and back his point about Sanders, is Total‘s chairman Patrick Pouyanne. Seriously, even though I find Pouyanne interesting to listen to and far more reasonable than a coal executive (even as Pouyanne’s presentations and discussions are filled with a degree of truthiness re climate), the key person that Hiatt relies on for laying out a sensible climate path forward is a fossil fuel executive?
- Hiatt (The Washington Post editorial page) has had a literally decades-long blinders-like vision that a carbon price is all that matters and that (essentially) everything else is a sub-optimal or unnecessary tool to address climate. Such a rigid belief in the non-existent, outside #DismalEconomics theory, Homo Economicus, blinds Hiatt (and the Post editorial team) to the need for a broad set of policies including pricing but also things like Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS), paths to help innovations leap the innovators’ valley of death, standards, and otherwise.
All in all, from start to finish (Emily Atkin’s Heated line-by-line examination), a horrific opinion piece whose only redeeming value might be providing such a clear and multi-faceted example for journalism schools about what one shouldn’t do.
News ‘reporting’ amplifying climate science denial
On the front page, with the atrocious title (in the print edition) of “Against climate alarmism: The anti-Greta”, subscribers have an article that “Amplifies Climate Change Denialism From Noted Propaganda Factory“. This long (over half a published page) article gives attention to a science denialist being promoted by a science denial institution. The Post falsely describes her as a “climate skeptic” (distorting what skepticism is and lacking the courage to confront direct deceit from the opening words) and is a direct tool for the heartless Heartland Institute which has been a funded purveyor for dishonesty about science from denying smoking’s linkage to cancer to denying that the planetary system is warming (to, when forced to, then falling back to ‘but it isn’t human’ and then falling back to ‘but it is good for us’ — all in all, lying deceit after deceptive dishonesty).
Rather than rant further, I’ll rely on Karl Bode who captures it so accurately.
As he opened his article,
The Heartland Institute has spent decades peddling pseudoscience on behalf or major corporations. From helping big tobacco downplay smoking cancer risks to helping big telecom demolish popular consumer protections like net neutrality, Heartland can routinely be found peeing in the public discourse pool on behalf of its corporate donors.
This week, the organization received some help spreading climate change denialism from the Washington Post
To write that The Washington Post, as an institution, and that the authors should be ashamed of their active assistance in promoting climate science denialism is weak phrasing. Yes, within the article are even points that enable an honest framing. Eilperin highlighted an example on twitter
The 4Ds … yet The Post chose to give visibility and voice to that 4D effort. And, we know that people read headlines (tweets) far more than the first paragraph, and the first paragraph more than the last. We are, honestly, perhaps 1000 more reading the headline than who read through the whole article and assimilate it. As structured, deceit dominates and with a major front-page article, that dominating deceit is being promoted. This shouldn’t have occurred, highly experienced reporters like Juliet Eilperin certainly should (do …) know better.
A simple question?
What will it take for The Post (and, well, the broader journalism world) to demonstrate responsibility, on a consistent basis, and fall back to sloppy ‘reporting’ that promotes deceit and falsehoods?
NOTE: After this post’s publication, a group of scientists who had written an OPED supporting Sanders on climate that The Washington Post chose not to publish had it put online by Earther.
3 responses so far ↓
1 Richard Mercer // Feb 26, 2020 at 12:38 am
Disgusting
2 John Egan // Feb 29, 2020 at 10:22 pm
You do realize that the good ladies of the WCTU were also certain of their rightness and their righteousness.
Can you exlain why the Russian Orthodox Church emerged from the collapse of the USSR stronger than any church in Europe even though the Soviet government had spent 75 years trying to destroy it – sometimes brutally, sometimes only through marginalization?
If you can answer that question, perhaps you can understand why climate activism has produced so little and engendered such backlash.
3 A Siegel // Mar 5, 2020 at 1:15 pm
Your techniques are so “Cranky Uncle” in form, nature, and intent.