Redesigning Honesty

Brian Williams' transgression against the trust placed in him is not only indefensible, it is a clear example of the state of modern journalism stripped of the fog created by personal preference. 

Williams' claims, which throw into sharp focus the difficulty in crafting a comprehensive Stolen Valor Act while not infringing on speech, should be enough to make any thinking person strongly disgusted. But the purpose of our conversation is not to debate the truth or, as is actually the case, utter falsehood of Williams' lie. It is to look at the bizarre and, sadly, unsurprising response from those on the left who should really know better. The habit these people entertain of elevating liberal public figures to give themselves the feeling of being politically savvy and on the right side of the argument never fails to disappoint them. And when, inevitably, these figureheads prove to be just as fallible and unlikeable as the rest of the swine, you will find three basic arguments being resuscitated and marched about the square.

RIGHT! CAN'T THINK OF ANYTHING BETTER TO DO?

It begins with the minimization and redecoration of the offense through soft and non-descriptive language. Instead of calling Williams a liar, which is the correct accusation, his fellow journalists describe his statements as “misremembered,” “exaggerations,” or “embellishments,” when a child of six could see that's not so. The flowery and stunningly non-evocative language used by our bastions of journalism are a well-worn technique to prevent the communication of clear ideas by selecting words that mean next-to-nothing. As one of our greatest thinkers pointed out, “shell shock” is a two-syllable phrase that forcibly punches the meaning and idea into your ear. It almost sounds like the weaponry that caused the condition, and if you've ever seen the effects I doubt any other term would seem quite appropriate. It is a terrifying state, very difficult to treat medically, and is a terribly unsettling thing for the afflicted and those around them. To make it less so, the condition began to be described in soft, multisyllabic phrases that intentionally distanced the ugliness and the reality of the idea from you. Using phrases like “combat stress reaction,” “postconcussional syndrome,” or “post-traumatic stress disorder” make a cushion of comfort between what the thing is and how we think of it. This kind of language is fear-based, used because it's very easy and comforting for us to pretend wanting a thing makes it so.

This, for example, is my passport photo.

Following the misguided effort to take the sharp edges off the lie comes a wholesale attempt to divert focus. Undoubtably you've heard “Fox News is full of liars, no one there ever tells the truth, etc.” offered as a defense untold times by now. While that may be an accurate statement, and while I may personally agree with it whole-heartedly, it is nevertheless a childish and feeble-minded argument by any measure. When a child is caught stealing, we do not excuse their behavior if they can mention someone else who is also a thief. “America kept slaves” has not been a successful way to defend either Soviet Russia or the Islamic State. Likewise, defending the lies of a newsreader you prefer by bringing up the dishonesty of newsreaders you don't prefer is a tu quoque fallacy ab initio, itself a derivative of defending yourself through personal attack. It is an embarrassment to offer that kind of argument, though a cheap, easy, and effective one.

Broadly, this rare occurrence of a newsreader being publicly exposed as a liar gives me a chance to reiterate that the problem is not any one person or network. We still imagine that journalism – in the large, morning paper/evening news variety – is in any kind of solid or trustworthy shape. The rally of people to one network or another, be it commie or fascist, allows the perception to develop that they are somehow on your side. O'Reilly/Maddow may be a bloated windbag that you wouldn't piss on to extinguish, one goes around thinking, but Kelley/Olbermann is as unbiased as they come and only wants to inform me. This is obviously poor thinking, as no outlet has a monopoly on either information or obfuscation, and the intensely personal connection people develop with these figureheads is an emotionally overwrought delusion of grandeur.