The Times' Blair Affair Puts Diversity on Trial

[MORTARDUDE]

http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/...ts%2Dheadlines The Times' Blair Affair Puts Diversity on Trial



Clarence Page

Clarence Page is a syndicated Chicago Tribune columnist based in Chicago.

May 15, 2003


A lot of people are wondering whether the Jayson Blair affair, which has indelibly stained The New York Times' 152-year history, resulted from affirmative action run amok. Other people are certain of it.

Blair, 27, "committed frequent acts of journalistic fraud" while covering major news events for the Times in recent months, the newspaper reported last Sunday. These included fabricating comments, concocting scenes and plagiarizing material.

Worse, a Times investigation uncovered an unusually high rate of mistakes in earlier stories that resulted in a dramatic April 2002 e-mail from metropolitan editor Jonathan Landman: "We have to stop Jayson from writing for the Times. Right now." Yet, he was not stopped.

"Look at how long they (the Times' editors) were willing to knowingly tolerate this behavior in the name of 'diversity,'" right-wing motormouth Rush Limbaugh says on his Web site, "because they had condescendingly lower standards for minority reporters!" Did they? There appears to be just as much evidence that Blair was remarkably adept at working the ancient art of office politics. He appeared to be bright, personable and prolific, like many other promising reporters. The fact that he was black undoubtedly added to his appeal at the diversity-minded Times. But, it also appears to be one straw among many others that made this camel collapse.

Nevertheless, as one African-American reporter for the Times told me, "this guy (Blair) is going to become the poster child for those who look upon affirmative action as a lowering of standards." In the lengthy mea-culpa report in last Sunday's Times, Times editors say that diversity probably had little or nothing to do with the scandal. Still, the report notes that Blair initially was hired "in an internship program that was then being used in large part to help the paper diversify its newsroom."

Has the Times lowered standards to hire or retain minorities? The black Timesman with whom I talked said that he has not seen standards at the Gray Lady lowered to help minorities, but "sometimes I have seen standards lowered to help members of the Old Boy Network." The Times is hardly unique in that regard. Blair, a charmer by most accounts, was quite practiced at office politics by which workers of all colors and cultures have benefited.

Ironically, affirmative action in its mildest forms has brought about reforms like anti-nepotism rules and other changes that have leveled the playing field for many workers, including some white males, who previously were excluded from the inside track by their lack of important social connections.

Bad reporters are like bad cops. Our profession tries to weed them out, but they sometimes slip through. It can happen for many reasons. On the same day that the Times published its own Blair-watch project last Sunday, CBS's "60 Minutes" featured Stephen Glass, who was fired from The New Republic for fabricating all or parts of 27 stories. He's embarking on a new career as a novelist. At least now, everyone says, he can properly label his work fiction.

There are other high-profile cases of journalistic infractions too numerous for me to detail here. Suffice it to say that diversity practices did not emerge as an issue in most of them because, quite simply, the perpetrators were white.

And minority recruitment at the Times mostly has been a success over the past three decades, as it has been in most other major media.

But, in yet another irony, it is in the nature of news to focus on the bad news. In this case, it is one reporter who lied, not the many others who didn't.

And, since diversity management practices call on bosses to take race into account, it's only fair that the Times and everyone else take it into account as a possible reason for the Jayson Blair affair.

The reputation of American media has been damaged by a bad apple at its premier newspaper and by his bosses' failure to snag him. It is important that we in the media and in other industries and professions learn from mistakes like this one. It is important that the Times dig a little deeper and tell us, if race is not the reason for the Blair snafu, what is?