There is an interesting story coming out of CBS this week where the network has refused to air advertisements for Truth by Sony Pictures Classics. The problem is that the film starring Cate Blanchett and Robert Redford places CBS in a negative light in exploring the network controversy over airing the 2004 news story on former President George W. Bush’s military service record. The story was discredited and CBS fired producer Mary Mapes. Anchor Dan Rather later retired from CBS. [For full disclosure, I worked for CBS as an on-air analyst with Rather and thought very highly of him in our work on the Bush v. Gore coverage].
The movie has received high critical acclaim. Redford plays Dan Rather in Truth and Blanchett plays Mapes in recounting the investigation into Bush’s Vietnam War-era commitment to service in the Texas Air National Guard. The film tells the story from the perspective of Mapes and Rather. Rather left in 2006 and later unsuccessfully sued the network.
CBS views the movie as inaccurate and denounced it as a disservice to the public and journalists. However, that does not answer the question of a media company barring advertisements based on the content of a film. It seems to me rather hypocritical for an organization dedicated to free speech. Sony is advertising on ABC, NBC, Fox and several cable networks, but not CBS.
CBS has an obvious conflict of interest in dealing with the film, which is precisely why I would have argued for neutrality in allowing the advertisements to air. There is no bar on CBS reporting on the film and challenging the accuracy. However, the blackout on advertising leaves the appearance that CBS wants to quash access or knowledge of a film that is inherently critical of CBS leadership in stomping on Mapes and Rather. CBS could well be right about the story and their work. However, that is a matter for public judgment and CBS should not be in a position of censoring advertisements when it does not like the content of a work.
When journalists are seen as censoring information because they disagree with a point of view, the result is an erosion of credibility and integrity of the field as a whole. Media has long subscribed to the view that the solution to bad speech is more speech. Here CBS is seeking to actively shield the public from knowledge of a film that is critical of its management. That is a far worst message than anything that the film make represent or misrepresent.
What do you think?
Source: CBS
I don’t blame CBS here. There’s nothing about free speech that says someone must facilitate speech that she finds offensive or wrong or even just embarrassing.
From the linked NYT review:
Just as there are conspiracy theorists who will never be satisfied with the Warren Commission report on the Kennedy assassination, there are some who passionately believe that Mr. Rather and his producer Mary Mapes (Cate Blanchett) conspired to tarnish George W. Bush’s reputation.
There are conspiracy nuts all around this story but the NYT can’t tell who they are (apparently they’re movie critics). To be clear the quote is the reviewer describing the country’s environment for purpose of understanding the film, not describing the film itself.
“Truth” doesn’t try to resolve mysteries that may never be solved or to drum up paranoia for the sake of extra heartbeats.
Pathetic water carrying here: there is no mystery.
On the matter of “Censorship” CBS doesn’t want to be associated with journalistic fraud. That’s quite a contrast from the NYT so I think the logical conclusion is that CBS learned a lesson – for now and on this subject at least.
Censorship can only occur when the censor has the power to deprive even one person of certain information, even an opinion. When CBS makes a business decision to refuse to advertise something that is critical of it, the organization looks cowardly and hypocritical. But it’s open for everyone to see. TRUTH may or may not be a good film, but CBS didn’t lie about why it won’t show the ads for it. It’s about self-interest, period. But news organizations routinely do something far worse. When CBS, or any news organization, deliberately omits a relevant part of a story, or distorts it, for ideological reasons, this harms the public more than any publicized rejection of an ad that people can see somewhere else. When a news organization distorts the news, it is exploiting the trust the public has in its integrity. It will often escape notice, and its harm will continue. But plain censorship may be less harmful because the secret gets out, usually, and the censor is disgraced. Nothing is gained from it. Censorship and distortion of the news are both bad, but the fiction that the news media presents us with an unbiased and fair reporting of the news is more harmful because the public believes it or, worse, thinks it can’t do anything about it.
I believe CBS, or any media outlet, has a right to refuse advertising if they are willing to forego the ad revenue. It is a business matter and not a matter of free speech. I haven’t seen the movie, but from the interviews, etc. I have seen about the movie, it appears to be a whitewash of an attempt by Rather and Mapes to smear Bush with a false story and a bashing of CBS for not “standing by their journalist and producer” once it became obvious that the story was false.
This is not the first time CBS and/or Rather have gotten in trouble for false reporting. Anyone remember the Ford truck episodes? How about Vietnam?
CBS still does news? Who knew!?
http://www.cpb.org/aboutpb/faq/cpbpbsnpr.html
CPB
Private corporation created by the federal government.
Does not produce or distribute programs.
Funded by the federal government.
Learn more about CPB
PBS
Private, non-profit media enterprise owned and operated by member stations.
Distributes programming to 348 public television stations across the country.
Funded by CPB and member stations.
http://www.pbs.org
NPR
Private, non-profit media enterprise.
Produces and distributes programs.
Funded by member stations.
I’m trying to find the document again that states that NPR is also funded by CPB.. More later. SO MUCH FOR PUBLIC. WAKE UP PEOPLE.
“Unless the journalists at CBS have responsibilities far beyond researching and presenting the news…”
Yet somehow they were unable to detect faked military correspondence that was uncovered within a few hours of the initial broadcast.
The majority of “journalists” are just Democrat operatives with a byline. Their only reponsibility is to shape the news to make other Democrats look good.
“CBS has an obvious conflict of interest in dealing with the film, which is precisely why I would have argued for neutrality in allowing the advertisements to air. … When journalists are seen as censoring information because they disagree with a point of view, the result is an erosion of credibility and integrity of the field as a whole.”
This view does not seem to distinguish CBS corporation from CBS news department.
The news department might have some responsibility and the potential for conflict of interest. But I am not so sure the corporation has any responsibility to sell advertising to any and all points of view.
Unless the journalists at CBS have responsibilities far beyond researching and presenting the news, it was not the journalists who censored the advertising. I don’t see that journalist did anything in this incident to erode credibility of themselves or the field as a whole.
I think this really raises the issue of what responsibility for-profit owners of news organizations have to the public. Right now, legally, they seem to have very few responsibilities.
To me this makes CBS look very bad
The Science Geek
http://www.thesciencegeek.org
This is a fight of commercial speech vs. commercial speech.
I am far more worried about:
+ the quality of CBS’ news division
+ what PBS & NPR censor on a daily basis
+ if NPR & PBS were to censor news about a film critical of NPR & PBS
Than about CBS, a privately owned network, not a news organization, denying the accuracy of a movie critical of them and telling the distributors of the movie to find another place to advertise.
The producers will still easily be able to spend their entire advertising budget on the best sites to advertise.
The rest of us should be so lucky.
Since “Truth” is in fact a massive lie, who cares? The actual truth and the movie lie each make CBS look bad, but this movie exculpates Rather and Mapes, where they should also be blamed for the fiasco of being caught pushing false evidence.
You can’t advertise cigarettes or alcohol in many venues anymore, because they are bad for you. Global warming believers want to punish dissenters. A Florida fire chief was recently fired for writing a book on religion that denounced homosexuality. College campuses disallow all sorts of speech.
There is no free speech in this country, not anymore. Once leftism took over, it followed Stalinists in moving to control speech. The Internet is next.
Why could CBS be any different?
Wasn’t this the false but true thing?
It reminds me of The Smothers Brothers being censored, but on a different level. It’s all about profit, not principle.
I stopped watching 60 Minutes after I learned how they manipulated the interviews in Westmoreland vs. 60 Minutes.
CBS and Sixty Minutes were pretty good programs until the day they lost Dan Rather. I have only watched 60 Minutes sporadically since then as the journalistic quality became unbearable. The recent unprofessional obnoxious incompetent interviews with Presidents and Obama were an unprecedented embarrassment to all media professionals.
CBS news is full of people with their head in the sand as is NBC and all the other “major” news outlets. Since they report the news, and since they must pick and choose which stories are worthy of being aired, over time they have become much too arrogant. In their zeal to get George Jr, they let the basic facts of the case escape them. George Sr, did what he could to keep George Jr out of Vietnam, as most fathers with considerable influence did. Some kids went anyway, the vast majority took their deferments to escape service.
“When journalists are seen as censoring information because they disagree with a point of view, the result is an erosion of credibility and integrity of the field as a whole.”
First of all, the field has no credibility or integrity to be eroded, so the point is moot. That being said, if one publication is discredited, that should in no way reflect on other publications. It is true that our media are discrediting themselves on a wholesale basis, but that is because they are acting alike, not because one bad actor is discrediting an entire industry.
Jonathan,
You might want to read “Into the Buzzsaw”:
https://books.google.com/books?id=MZeMQZRjlpsC&pg=PA35&lpg=PA35&dq=into+the+buzzsaw+dan+rather&source=bl&ots=Hg7uzh1lpR&sig=WwJrSlW_ts_QtART4MSXP15CQ7s&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDUQ6AEwA2oVChMIsa2jzNTOyAIVDMljCh0fegOW#v=onepage&q=into%20the%20buzzsaw%20dan%20rather&f=false
http://www.c-span.org/video/?185666-1/book-discussion-buzzsaw-information-war
CBS is some former news agency which still gets a column of stories on Google News each day. But few watch “news” on CBS– they watch sitcoms and shows from NYC with audiences clapping hands. People who watch “news” are tuned into Fox, CNN, PBS and ESPN. Few if any watch the old fashioned networks. Oh, some of you have fond memories. I do not think it was appropriate for Ed Murrow or Walter Cronkite to smoke cigarettes on air, to air advertisements themselves for cigarettes while doing the news. Millions thought it ok to smoke. Hundreds of thousands have died.
CBS stands for Can’t Be Stupider.
I think Mapes is a lying SOS. I think Redford is trying to rewrite history to save the legacy of a discredited Dan Rather. Finally, I think CBS is hypocritical on the free speech issue. This cluster coitus perfectly exemplifies the moral depravity of the MSM.