Balkanalysis.com

Thank God for Jayson Blair- and Argo Riistan too!

Until recently, the Jayson Blair “scandal” seemed certain to be the most uplifting media event of the year. But who could have anticipated that this sublime manifestation of the “Disneyworld Principle” would be upstaged by the textual trickery of an unknown journalist from little Estonia?

It must have been especially hilarious for master of simulation Jean Baudrillard (if not for his lawyers) to learn that he had been interviewed by a conniving 21 year-old, it seems by telepathy. Eulogizing Argo Riistan as a “cut-and-paste conman,” Reuters spoke of the “…impressive list of published interviews,” allegedly conducted by the Estonian, which apparently included, “…writers Milan Kundera, Martin Amis, Alex Garland, Ian McEwan and Tom Stoppard, as well as star academics Jean Baudrillard and Richard Rorty, film director Milos Forman and others.”

Apparently, Riistan’s fatal Icarus moment came when he offered a Tallinn magazine an interview with George Soros. While dialogues with cultural figures had somehow seemed within the youngster’s reach, landing a chat with this king of capital somehow provoked more suspicion. The subsequent investigation revealed that the journalist had never contacted Soros in the first place. We can only marvel at what the financier and champion of an “open society” would have told us, had the simulation been allowed to unfold. We might just have enjoyed it.

The embarrassed editor of one duped Tallinn weekly issued a revealing apology: “…Tiina Kaalep said her paper had been ‘naпve’ and that, ‘the written word had been devalued’ by Riistan’s actions.”

Fascinating stuff! But was there ever any value to the written word to begin with? No, this- as well as all other “scandals” of “journalistic ethics”- have the tremendous social value of restoring public faith in the inherently good and moral mission of the media community. Not so much because the people believe in it anyway, but because they know they should believe in it, if in fact they are really the kind of people who can knowingly and unblinkingly participate in perpetuating the simulations upon which the globalized world depends.

Dangerously for them, some of my pious colleagues within the media also took solace from these scandals. Under scrutiny for feeding the massive Iraq deception, such scandals reassure them- by contrast- of their own inner sanctity. “Not us!” they cry in righteous indignation, certain that their own journalistic moral compass will steer them through these troubling times of deception and simulation.

Sadly, Jayson Blair has let us down. But could there have been any other way? After resigning from the New York Times on May 1st, and taking two top editors with him, Blair spent that month planning the strategy for his resurrected media future, and upcoming book (announced finally on September 10th, set to be released next spring). On June 6th, the media hungrily consumed the image and words of a man whose chief story was that he’d made no stories.

In fact, the only reason this “non-story” became so celebrated was in its application to ethics- since Americans think themselves so moral and righteous. It was therefore sadly predictable that Blair would seize on the traditional victimology strategy, adopting the weepy, penitent persona so beloved by American talk shows, therapists and Hollywood. Such stories offer endless opportunity for self-denigration and negative escapism, followed triumphantly by forgiveness, self-transformation and inner peace- typical American excess of reality. Seducing the cameras, Blair bemoaned his life and career as a “…complicated, human tragedy.” CNN incestuously lapped up the self-indulgence on the 6th of June:

“…It has to do with my own human demons, my own weaknesses and it ranges from, you know, my struggles with substance abuse to my own struggles with mental illness, to the fact that since I was in college or high school, I deferred my own desires and my own wants for … what others wanted and somehow, when you add race and when you add other elements to that, I lost my compass.”

Indeed! When a story in itself has absolutely no significance, the protagonist must seek to provide a rationale for it. Accolades on simulating not once but twice! We know it, we recognize it and we love it all the more for that. If the photogenic young journalist has really lost his compass, the American people will certainly help him find it. They will even gladly pay for the search. They are duty-bound, after all, and grateful for the invitation. Jayson Blair will be welcomed back into the fold not so much because his deed was terrible, or because his explanation may be true, but because there was no other explanation he could have given to restore value (read: material value) to his “devalued” words. In short, we are satisfied, and we approve; he has chosen reality. Recall Baudrillard’s lament:

“Say: I am real, this is real, the world is real, and nobody laughs. But say: this is a simulacrum, you are only a simulacrum, this war is a simulacrum and everybody bursts out laughing.”

Were Jayson Blair not to apologize but to openly exult in his mischief- for whatever reason- that would not be tolerated. Worse, were he to invoke philosophical principles questioning the reality of today’s media- that would be the worst crime, the unthinkable. And the people might not even laugh, or get the joke. After all, everyone already is already seriously indulging in the incestuous game of “objectivity”- and willfully so, wrote The Guardian’s Matthew Perry in January:

“…most Washington reports consist of stories emanating from inside the government: these may (rarely) be genuine leaks; they may come from officials anxious to brief against rival officials, but that too is rare in this disciplined and corporately-run administration. Most of these stories, which look like impressive scoops at first glimpse, actually come from officials using the press to perform on-message spin. Whatever the category, the papers lap this up, even when it is obvious nonsense, a practice that reached its apogee last year when palpably absurd plans for the invasion of Iraq emerged, allegedly from inside the Pentagon, on to the New York Times front page.”

However, the American media, always fastidious and self-assured, is the product not only of government interest but of enlightened journalistic graduate schools bent on objectivity, factuality, and murky notions of finding “the truth.” Off you go then, young writers! But first, are you armed? Or, are you honest enough to say how impossible it is to tell the truth?

We know that they’re not honest enough to say it- there is interest, after all, mostly financial but also personal, in claiming to perpetuate the illusion by defending and seeking the truth. Yet they are themselves its main assailants. After all, flagrant violations of the truth only serve to reinforce it. Crackdowns on media freedom
in totalitarian regimes, for example, remind us of how free and true Western media must be, somehow. It’s only us who endanger it by purporting to uphold it.

But more than that: are they honest enough to even think so negatively? One hopes so. Without detachment, without cynicism, without malevolence- we are left with the despairing thought that maybe they really do believe in the truth before seeking to defile it, that maybe things so human and as pathetic as Jayson Blair refers to (substance abuse, mental health problems, ambition) could really precipitate one’s participation in the magical world of simulation. Blair claimed that mental health and substance abuse problems led him down the snaking path to plagiarism. Can this testimony be trusted, or- as it would seem from his subsequent media appearances and upcoming book- is it just part of a greater, more masterful simulation?

We must hope. After all, how boring, how all-too-human the first motive would be! It would merely reinforce the belief in reality that allows the apology of a Jayson Blair to resonate with us so deeply that we practically ignore the frequent “apologies” of the US Army, when it incinerates Iraqi schoolchildren or Afghan wedding guests “by mistake.” After all, they were simply human, whereas Blair is not only that, but also a “complicated, human tragedy.”

Anyway, forget about Jayson Blair. He might not turn out to be very interesting, and (if he really believes his own stated rationale for his “unethical” actions), even monstrous. A lost soul crying in the wilderness. But the Estonian hasn’t apologized to us yet (or at least a potential apology has not reached us yet, which is the same difference), and seems perhaps more clever. In any case, we can use his non-story about not making stories to make a nice story about the ecological benefits of recycling. And this is an internet lesson, too.

What does it mean for a journalist to be a “cut-and-paste conman?” As a colleague recently told me, with the modest, composed dignity of someone on death row, “I am a content aggregator.” He could have said, “I am a farmer,” or “I shine shoes,” or something equally humble. We writers have no pride anymore, really. Why?

All journalists are aware of it: the internet’s marvelous propensity for recycling of content that enables us all to work. There is no use keeping up with the events, much less the information. It takes all of our energy just to grasp hold of the information we can find and try not to lose it, so we can repackage it and send it out again under a new name and hopefully make a living.

Indeed, who has time to think now? Even in Biblical times, there was already nothing new under the sun. Today, all that nothing has simply been condensed onto one place. The internet has thus made it so much easier to observe the proverb- while the truth-lovers never cease from trying to violate it.

So three cheers for Argo Riistan! We should praise all attempts to cut down on the clutter afflicting us today. Maybe all of our stories should be recycled from now on. After all, why should they be wasted, when they can so easily be reused? Recycling is good for the mental environment!

In the end, the fact that a Jayson Blair or an Argo Riistan could pull off their nefarious schemes for so long without being detected- this indicates that no one is really paying attention, anyway. The editors are asleep at the wheel, the readers, at their desks. Scandals of media fraud and plagiarism are only really of interest to the media, for its own self-replication and reproduction. We the people are prodded to make our indignant protest on cue, when our allotted moment for reaction comes. And that’s that. Everyone is happy with the story and their part in it.

Maybe plagiarism used to be the sincerest form of flattery. Now it is the sincerest apology to reality.

One could imagine a new periodical- “Plagiarism Today.” Would it be up-to-the-minute, or would it easily become outdated? And what would it contain? Would anyone take credit for its contents- or everyone? And what kind of strategies could we arm ourselves with from it?

Or perhaps this protection is not even necessary. After all, this is the age of asymmetric threats, dangerous forces cut loose from any central command or control. Who knows how many Blairs and Riistans are currently lurking right now in media offices around the world? And, could we become such perpetrators with force of will and a greedy, inquisitive computer mouse alone? Is it a vocation, an addiction, or simply a hobby for dabblers and would be terrorists of the written word?

Maybe, I will test it out, when I sit down to “provide content” one of these days. Start with cutting and pasting one paragraph. Then two. Then- a whole article. Then combine parts of two articles, or three.

But- of course- make it my own. Change a word here or there. Eliminate an offensive comma or semi-colon. Give some suicidal dangling preposition a hearty push into the abyss. Persuade two truncated sentences to come together as one. And then dissuade Microsoft’s grammar check from irrevocably damning that sentence as a “fragment.”

No, the morally shocked and easily outraged realize not how much work it takes today just to steal! It is an editing process, selective and methodical, as was performed by the Alexandrine scholars in the old days of the library. Say what you like, but it appears young Riistan was quite culturally aware. What imagination! And good taste! If the accusers only understood, they’d see that the time and effort spent certainly have a monetary value, at least according to Western capitalistic values.

Indeed, would I be denied an honest day’s pay for an honest day’s work? Would I have to be content with a spiritual reward only, while all around my brethren writers were being rewarded for their (conscious or unconscious) intellectual dishonesty? Could I at least seduce Borges into rising from the tomb?

We should forgive Mssrs. Blair and Riistan- especially if they know not what they’ve done. Whether they know it or not, they’re doing God’s work. Why not join them?

Entranced by the existential import of media simulation? Read Jean Baudrillard’s Simulacra and Simulation- and also his indispensable guide to the modern world, The Spirit of Terrorism