February 3, 2004

Hutton Report

The Guardian has a wonderful editorial on British Journalism and the BBC in particular and its reaction to the Hutton report. bq. The threat to the media is real. It comes from within Prejudice, petulance and cynicism have fueled the reaction to Hutton bq. Having read the Hutton report and most of what has been written about it, I have reached the following, strictly non-judicial, conclusions: first, that the episode illuminates a wider crisis in British journalism than the turmoil at the BBC; second, that too many journalists are in denial about this wider crisis; third, that journalists need to be at the forefront of trying to rectify it; and, fourth, that this will almost certainly not happen. bq. The reporting of Lord Hutton's conclusions and of the reactions to them has been meticulous. The same cannot be said of large tracts of the commentary and editorializing - nor of much of the equally kneejerk newspaper correspondence. Much of this comment has been sullied by scorn, prejudice and petulance. The more you read it, the more you get the sense that the modern journalist is prone to behaving like a child throwing its rattle out of the pram because it has not got what it wanted. Read the whole thing - the author (Martin Kettle) skewers everyone with precision... Posted by DaveH at February 3, 2004 10:38 AM