Heather Brooke is wrong on anonymous sources
Heather Brooke, the journalist and freedom of information campaigner, spoke on Charlie Brooker’s Newswipe last night, about journalists using anonymous sources for information.
She bemoaned the faceless sources and made this sweeping statement:
There’s only really one reason to remain anonymous and that is to avoid accountability for what they say. If they were confident about what they were saying then they would put their name behind it, end of story.
Well…that may be true for some people. But what about those who are trying to protect their jobs? Margaret Haywood was a nurse who went undercover for Panorama and exposed the neglect of elderly patients in a Sussex hospital. She wasn’t anonymous and put her name to the exposé – and was subsequently being struck off the nursing register. If whistleblowers aren’t anonymous they put their jobs, and very possibly their safety, at risk. It has nothing to do with accountability.
I’m sure there are some cases where the anonymous source is trying to manipulate the journalist. Brooke says:
Because they know that their name isn’t going to be linked with that statement, sometimes there’s a temptation to bend the truth, to misrepresent the truth and sometimes to outright lie…What they are providing is information control, not information sharing.
To an extent, Brooke’s right. Some of these sources will try to trick the journalist, but this is where it’s important that a journo uses his/her instinct. Do they trust the source? Does the story sound likely? Have they challenged the source to prove or justify what they’re saying?
The last thing a journalist wants to do is burn their source, particularly if it’s a good one. So why not protect them from a backlash? We can’t trust on-the-record statements from officials to offer the truth, so we rely on off-the-record briefings from our sources to get underneath the bullshit.
Only using sources willing to go on-the-record would mean a lot of information would never make it into the public domain. It’d be like cutting a life-line. It’s already hard enough to get past the public face of those in power, without then closing a useful way through.
It’s down to the journalist’s competence and ethics on scrutinising the source’s reliability, and whether to use the gathered info in a report. Only using named sources is not the answer to the problem.
Trying my hand at a bit of subbing…
I’m reading Essential English by Harold Evans (buy it, it’s amazing) and I thought I’d test myself.
I spotted a story in the Lincolnshire Echo that I think needs tweaking. Read the original here. I’ll paste sections from the article and then write what I think needs changing.
The Horse and Groom pub in Carholme Road has “to let” signs posted outside it along with notes warning customers the site is temporarily closed for business.
We can strip away “posted”, and do the signs really “warn” customers that the pub is closed? Warnings are, generally speaking, for dangerous or difficult situations. Unless you have to be warned not to walk into closed doors, you’re going to be “told”. So, it should read “telling customers”. Moreover, “the site is temporarily closed for business” can be streamlined as “it’s closed down”.
Little is known about the closure of a pub motorists stare at every day while waiting at the Carholme Road traffic lights.
Do we need this sentence? It doesn’t add anything to the story.
It had once been the city’s main gay bar until it was turned into a live music venue when it changed hands in 2007.
This can be shortened to “It was the city’s main gay bar until it became a live music venue in 2007.” Twenty-four words cropped to sixteen.
Now its closure has shone a light once again on the perilous state of small pubs in the city.
Yuk. This is just bad poetry. The phrase “shone a light once again” is horrible. “Highlights” is much better, as it’s one word and it’s the present tense. Also, “perilous state” – not a great term to use. Perhaps “The closure highlights the difficulties for the city’s small pubs” is better. It’s concise and doesn’t lose any of the original sentence’s meaning.
One landlord told the Echo he needed to make £250 a day to break even.
“Needs” not “needed”. Keep it active, not passive.
The Horse and Groom could well be open for business again soon if it is let out.
As the Horse and Groom has already been named earlier in the article, do we need this repetition? Just refer to it as “pub”. Besides, this sentence states the bleedin’ obvious. You might as well add “but it may remain closed if nobody wants it”. Oh wait…
But for the time-being, the kitchen is closed and a sign has gone up stating “pub business to let”.
So, in two sentences, 37 words have told me nothing that I don’t already know. All of it can go. It could be replaced with a fact about the national closure rates of small pubs in the UK, to add value for the reader.
Well, that’s it. Have I been too much of a pedant? Or not enough? Or am I totally wrong and the original is fine?
Islam4UK – put up or ban?
Sunny Hundal of Liberal Conspiracy lays out his case for banning Islam4UK, arguing that the group has incited hatred and promoted and incited terrorism. Read his post here. He makes some interesting, and fair, points. However, the one thing he doesn’t address is the counter-productivity of banning them.
Surely you’ll just drive them underground? They’ll still have the same sentiments, harbour the same beliefs, get media attention – they just won’t be an ‘official’ organisation anymore. It’ll become harder to track their activities if you sweep them under the carpet.
Keep them out in the open where we can see them.
