Senator Andrew Bartlett
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
 
Me Being Stupid
One piece of advice I have regularly received from a wide variety of people across the entire political spectrum over many years is that as general rule it is really dumb for people in politics to attack journalists. This is based on the simple fact that the media are in an infinitely stronger position to attack back in a manner and time of their choosing, coupled with the perception that politicians are one of the few groups who are held in lower esteem by the public than journalists and therefore you are unlikely to gain much sympathy if the media decide to hoe into you.

I saw an article written by a journalist which makes some comments on journalism. It is by a former editor of The Age, Les Carlyon, and is entitled The write stuff. His view is that "the main troubles with journalism are sloppy writing and sloppy editing, advocacy masquerading as reporting, gossip masquerading as reporting, stories that abound in loose ends and clichés, stories that are half-right, stories that insult the reader's intelligence."

In keeping with advice, I make no comment. After all, Les Carlyon is a journalist, so what would he know about journalism?

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Tuesday, March 22, 2005 Permalink
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