Inkara1
Well-Known Member
Here's an e-mail the opinion editor at the on-campus newspaper sent to everyone on the listserv about it:
From: A Rodriguez
Date: Monday, May 12, 2003 2:28 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Heard about Jayson Blair yet?
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If you haven't, you should check it out (it was on the bottom of yesterday's front page of the bee).
I have always wondered how we at The Collegian could possibly be able to verify all the information we print. This shows that we need to trust each other for this to work, and when a phony like this sociopathically betrays that trust, man are we all hurt...
Especially those of us just coming onto the scene. The sad thing is that we are going to have to try to look good to the editors at our new jobs, but if we look too good then we look suspicious. Keep your notes and tapes!
People are also saying this guy was allowed to screw up this bad because he came out of a minority fellowship program (he's black) and the editors didn't want to lose him as a status symbol... I thought, oh I'll be damned if he's from chips quinn... but I checked and I don't think so.
But it has nothing to do with diversity goals in a newspaper. I think the Internet and all sorts of other technological breakthroughs are making it easier for a person to just lift things, here or there. There are many times when you can make a statement nobody would question or look into... Numbers that you don't want to double-check, and maybe if you just put any number, nobody will bother to add it all up...
Of course. any sane person realizes that thousands of people will see the story and someone is bound to report it. This guy seems to have made a habit out of lying-- nearly a career out of it-- and nothing was done about it, which is baffling.
If it shows us anything, it's that if you aren't doing the honest work a reporter should do, it doesn't matter who you are. Eventually you're going to get caught.
From: A Rodriguez
Date: Monday, May 12, 2003 2:28 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Heard about Jayson Blair yet?
---
If you haven't, you should check it out (it was on the bottom of yesterday's front page of the bee).
I have always wondered how we at The Collegian could possibly be able to verify all the information we print. This shows that we need to trust each other for this to work, and when a phony like this sociopathically betrays that trust, man are we all hurt...
Especially those of us just coming onto the scene. The sad thing is that we are going to have to try to look good to the editors at our new jobs, but if we look too good then we look suspicious. Keep your notes and tapes!
People are also saying this guy was allowed to screw up this bad because he came out of a minority fellowship program (he's black) and the editors didn't want to lose him as a status symbol... I thought, oh I'll be damned if he's from chips quinn... but I checked and I don't think so.
But it has nothing to do with diversity goals in a newspaper. I think the Internet and all sorts of other technological breakthroughs are making it easier for a person to just lift things, here or there. There are many times when you can make a statement nobody would question or look into... Numbers that you don't want to double-check, and maybe if you just put any number, nobody will bother to add it all up...
Of course. any sane person realizes that thousands of people will see the story and someone is bound to report it. This guy seems to have made a habit out of lying-- nearly a career out of it-- and nothing was done about it, which is baffling.
If it shows us anything, it's that if you aren't doing the honest work a reporter should do, it doesn't matter who you are. Eventually you're going to get caught.