This is a funny one. I had lots of calls for interviews around the globe after my trial ended.
One of these phone calls was Chris Arsenault. This was funny because the first thing I said - ARE YOU CALLING ME TO GIVE ME AN AWARD? You can read the biog. by clicking below -
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Blog
Anyway, he did a story and I must admit that I really agitated the guy for working for the Irvings! He took a lot of abuse from me during the interview.
I’m surprise the Irving printed his story. I might add that Chris knows personally that I took more than one picture because I met the guy outside Atlantica Conference and took his picture but sadly the Saint John Police Force deleted this nice souvenir. Too bad.....
Chris writes as I always said- These employees of the Irving media cannot write cortical stories of the Irvings because they would be fired on the spot and since the Irvings owns 95% of the newspapers in this province?
They would be fired on the spot!!!! Therefore forcing to the Province. Very sad indeed.
Here’s his story -
By Chris Arsenault
Acquitting an enemy of objectivity
The trial of blogger Charles LeBlanc should prompt journalistic self-examination.
It's not everyday that a 'scruffy' New Brunswicker on social assistance makes the New York Times. But Charles LeBlanc isn't exactly a regular guy, and with a host of benefactors and plenty of detractors, everyone seems to be paying attention to the man who calls himself the "grandfather of New Brunswick Bloggers."
Last week, LeBlanc won his day in court. Over the summer, he was arrested and charged with obstructing justice while covering a protest outside Atlantica, a conference of businesspeople and right wing economists, in Saint John.
The trial generated national and even international interest because it raised fundamental questions about media organization, namely: should bloggers have the same access and rights as mainstream journalists?
"LeBlanc was never advised by the police that he would be arrested if he did certain things. He was simply plying his trade, photographing the demonstration for inclusion in his blog when he was arrested," wrote Judge William McCarroll in his 20 page acquittal decision.
LeBlanc has ascended to international acclaim - or at least provincial notoriety - because he has followed one of the most basic and under-appreciated rules of political journalism.
The responsibility of the journalist is to "monitor the centres of power," according to the courageous Israeli reporter Amira Hass. While lacking a newspaper, a salary, a decent camera and sometimes even proper syntax, LeBlanc has fulfilled that basic journalistic duty with uncanny accuracy.
"This blogger (LeBlanc) can't be sued and he can't be bought," said activist Tim Smith.
Leblanc is anything but 'objective', the word typically associated with good journalism. But maybe that's not such a bad thing. "The only thing I ever saw that came close to objective journalism was a closed-circuit TV setup that watched shoplifters in the general store at Woody Creek, Colorado," wrote the late, great Dr. Hunter S. Thompson.
It is possible to be fair, giving equal voice to multiple sides of an issue, without standing in the glass house of objectivity. If objectivity is a false journalistic construct, it certainly doesn't mean it's OK to marginalize unconventional voices or lie. That's where we come to the Saint John Police Department and the courtroom antics of one Sgt. John Parks, the officer who arrested LeBlanc last summer.
According to CBC, "Parks testified that he arrested LeBlanc partly because he was "scruffy" looking and carrying an unprofessional-looking digital camera. Parks also testified that LeBlanc challenged police authority at the event, and resisted arrest."
Parks' testimony was contradicted by CBC video tape from the event, an objective source if ever there was one, which showed LeBlanc was not obstructing police and was simply shooting pictures with other journalists.
Thus Sgt. Parks obviously and willfully lied on the stand. LeBlanc has lodged a complaint.
"As far as Sgt. Parks goes, his testimony was totally the opposite of what happened," said LeBlanc. "Someone will have to be held responsible for this." Ironically, members of Saint John police admitted to frequently checking LeBlanc's blog in the days preceding the Atlantica protest.
Whatever one thinks of blogs as a mode of communication and bloggers as the new journalists, they are becoming increasingly popular in a media world dominated by a relatively small cabal of companies.
According to Enn Raudsepp, head of Concordia University's journalism program (in 2003) 84 per cent of Canadian media is owned by the five largest media companies, resulting in "increasingly homogeneous perspectives." CanWest Global, the largest Canadian media company, controls over 30 per cent of the Canadian media market, including 14 metropolitan daily newspapers and hundreds of community papers (these figures are based on 2003 numbers, and newspapers often change hands like baseball cards, so current ownership demographics could be slightly different). With the Irvings controlling every major paper in New Brunswick, including this one, average people are asking questions about corporate control.
"There is a prevailing feeling among some journalists in Atlantic Canada of self-censorship, that some are afraid to actually write what they think is right because they work in an environment where there's one dominant player," said Senator Jim Munson who helped write a 2006 report on Canadian media concentration for Senate Committee on Transportation and Communications.
Self-censorship clearly isn't a problem faced by bloggers like LeBlanc.
Maybe journalists themselves need take an objective look at the state of media in this province? It's high time we start holding our own centres of power to account.
Despite the lousy pay, Chris Arsenault doesn't mind working for the Irvings. Visit him at www.chrisarsenault.ca
5 comments:
He did a great job on reporting.
Good story with a great ending that is soo true!
Not THAT good. First off, the title is called "enemy of objectivity". That's hardly flattering as it just assumes you are a liar and that mainstream media is 'objective'.
Objectivity is a tricky word. Take for example your coverage of those with no residential tenants rights. You basically showed them and described their condition and experiences. You pointed out in the legislation where it omitted certain groups in the province.
That's all pretty objective. Its obviously harder to be objective when the news is about YOU. When you were arrested you described what happened to you and what you thought about. That is also pretty objective, in fact that is what we praise journalists for-the more info the better. You didn't try to get an interview with the police, but news reports often only present one spokesman, usually because the 'other side' doesn't want to talk.
Having an opinion doesn't have anything to do with objectivity, in fact its a central part of it. Irvings have a 'we say' section where they basically state their bias. THey are 'objective' but only about their views.
And much of the report was just taken from the CBC, meaning he wasn't even in the courtroom.
Well I'm very proud of Charles, I don't care what anyone else says. I too have said some nasty things on here in comments just like a lot of others.
I would like to say to Charles that I am very sorry for any nasty comments I have made in the past.
I read the article today in the Here Newspaper and I was blown away by it.
Charles, you are going to be a household name, I can see it coming, well you are now, in MY household,
But I'm talking internationally.
Next call-HOLLYWOOD !!
Good luck Charles, I hope you can find it in your little old heart to forgive me for comments I made in the past, I'm not looking for anything, just your friendship, and if you have benefectors, as the article states, more power to you !
God Bless.
in response to...
# posted by Anonymous : 3:34 PM
Nice try but what you wrote reads like blah blah blah. How do you know for sure what he was thinking when he chose to name his article "Acquitting an enemy of objectivity" ? He could have easily meant that he sees Charles as a kind of person who is quite capable of caring for other people...especially people he don't even know. I'm asking you, do you notice that quality about him ?
When that caring emotion takes place, a person can become SUBjective, because they care and want to do what they can to relieve the troubled person. They often push past these "boundaries" to try and help out, all because they care.
To prove my point further, he chose to open a blog and invite everyone in to say what they need to say, even (probably OBjective)
people like YOU. I would like an answer to my question please...do you notice that quality about him ?
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