Thanks for the further update and for trying to seek answers to some of the questions posed here. The silence speaks volumes, and I imagine that email address is going to get rather busy…

James

Thanks for the updates and the clarification. This is now a very interesting blog entry and gives a small incite to how Jeni is being advised and the “if we ignore it, it will go away” attitude her “team” seem to be taking.

I think many of comments, received on this piece, stem from the strap line you have given the article, as most feel that the debate has been conducted in a very reasonable and factually based manner.

Finally, an apology for the harshness of my second comment and questioning your professionalism, you have more than proved your worth with such comprehensive updates.

Regards

JohnED

That really is an excellent and revealing post!

Thank you Judith for following this one so closely- I find it amazing that Common’s (and hence Jenni Barnett’s) position has been exposed by something so simple as a handful of questions thrown together from comments on his own press-release!

Excellent stuff- I really do hope this takes off! It really does deserve to into the mainstream primetime news!

All the best-
Oli

From a Journalism.co.uk perspective: we get sent press releases (about media and journalism although completely irrelevant ones too) every day from either external PR companies on behalf of their clients, or companies and organisations (or individuals!) directly. Our policy here is to always reference a quote to a press release ‘……[insert quote] he said, in a release’ for example, and link to it directly (where possible). It’s not as easy as saying using press releases = bad journalism because sometimes they include important or interesting announcements. We also have a system of putting releases straight to our blog in a category ‘media releases’ e.g in this manner: http://blogs.journalism.co.uk/editors/2009/02/11/media-release-dow-jones-grants-515000-in-newspaper-fund/

That allows us to publish announcements quickly without spending too much time repeating what will probably be covered elsewhere on other news sites. Readers can then read the press releases themselves and make their own judgements on them and what is (or isn’t being said). If there are important points to be pulled out or investigated we would do that.

You ask if there’s a repository. Well, funnily enough we host one here, separate to the part of the site which reports on media and journalism – a press release service called PressGo: http://www.journalism.co.uk/66/ Companies can register to have their press releases uploaded and they are circulated to journalists via a newsletter and a Twitter account http://twitter.com/pressreleases (chris@journalism.co.uk for more details). I think there are other similar services but I don’t have experience of them personally.

But PR-journalism relationship is perhaps an issue to expand on in another blog post…

@James: Point taken – I could have been clearer in labelling it as a claim by Common and I hope the updates now clarify this was the case. I maintain that it’s not my position to judge whether there were or were not offensive comments made; I have absolutely no way of knowing that. I would stress that Common said his remark refers to unpublished comments and emails -a statement I have no way of further researching as we cannot verfify the nature or volume of these (so cannot be compared in volume to the inoffensive comments that were posted).

One more update coming now – see post.

I wonder if anyone has started research into whether peoples’ epidermal layers are shrinking in recent years. It seems the slightest comment about anyone’s opinion, religion or anything else is suddenly offensive and such speech must therefore be banned immediately. It’s a bit depressing really.

I think Common has a rock solid case there “You can’t see them but, my god, there’s hundreds of nasty comments.” To make an analogy – I have a bridge, you can’t see it but I’ll sell it to you anyway.

I suggest that Common familarise himself with the horror stories of random online cranks (“an hero” being the terrible archetype) before he suggests that it must have been something that Ben Goldacre has control over. People can be very nasty without an NHS doctor leading them.

Thank you for the response and the update, but I have to take issue with one aspect of what you say. You claim that you have indeed researched what has been happening around this story, and posted links in this article. True enough, but if you had followed those links yourself you would already have known that the vast majority of comments posted on and now deleted from Jeni’s blog were, contrary to her agent’s claims, polite, well-written and to the point. Had you already known this, perhaps it would have made you think again about reproducing Commons’ statement without any qualification. You say that your readers are able to judge Commons’ ‘spin’ for themselves – they’d be better equipped to do so if you’d pointed out from the start that what he said was far from the whole truth.

That said, thank you for continuing to cover this story and for updating it as developments take place.

Yours,

James

Well here is my comment – no personal attack, just focused on the issue. As were the vast majority of (now deleted) comment:

43. At February 7, 2009 12:30 PM neoconnell wrote:

Critical thinking is a big challenge for everyone. At the heart of this matter are these simple facts:

Some children who receive the MMR vaccine have autism.

Some children who do not receive the MMR vaccine have autism.

Having the MMR vaccine bears no relationship with which child has autism and does not increase the chances of autism. It is a classic example of a false association.

In the current climate where people seem inherently suspicious of pharmaceuticals it seems plausible that MMR might be bad – it’s a gut feeling for those who immerse themselves in the modern media with a level of trust for its authority.

Gut feelings are unfortunately often wrong even when they feel really really right.

As a great scientist once said when asked what his gut feeling was on an issue:

“I try not to think with my gut”. (comment ends)

When faced with being outrageously wrong and irresponsible it is much easier to pretend that you are being victimised than to show some humility. So much for debate.

re the quotes from Ben Goldacre- fair enough.
You were right and I can see where you are coming from. Now his site is back up I can see I stand corrected- the quotes were not out of context in their isolation.

On a slightly different point on journalism in general, I do find it interesting that I always get the impression that the person quoted actually spoke to the journalist… I suppose it details my ignorance of what actually happens in journalism.

I would be interested if others get that impression too, or if I’m alone in my ignorance.

Can anyone tell me how do these press-releases work? Are they simply put up in a forum run by the agent, or sent to news agencies individually? Or is there some central repository for these things- like my imaginary pressreleases.org.uk, and the journalists simply subscribe to specific sources and wade through the rest?

All the best
Oli

Judith, thanks for responding to comments and for the updates. An example to others.

I suspect that the real problem is that a lot of opinionated columnists are having trouble coming to terms with the “democractisation” (for want of a better word) of journalism. This means that criticism and opinion is no longer a one way street. Those who are making ill-researched or unfounded statements are now much more open to criticism from the well informed (and not so well informed) who have not previously had access to such outlets. Previously such responses would have primarily been from a small club privileged journalists. Now we have experts with access to powerful distribution channels.

So, Jeni Barnett, and others who specialise in personalised diatribes on important public matters, be prepared for more of your utterances to be held up for public examination. The days when much of populist journalism provided for power without responsibility are long gone. Do your research, be a bit more open minded and stop thinking a personally held opinion is correct by divine right (are you also listening Melanie Phillips?). There are people more qualified on any subject – listen to them and be at least a little humble. Personal annecdotes do not constitute a truth.