90. Nobody is getting away with making up shit

Fools and fuckwits who bang on about fake news in the mainstream news media always seem to conveniently overlook the fact that all the big news media companies have to be accountable for what they say, and can be legally forced to correct or retract anything they get wrong. Making up shit just isn't worth it. At all.

While the President of the United States can spend all day telling lies that can be easily refuted by actual facts, news organisations that cover his bullshit have to make sure they have everything right before they ever get near publication or broadcast (and then get endless crap from that orange shithead in the White House about it anyway).

There have been many, many think-pieces in the past decade about the failing power of big news media and how new news sources like social media have disemboweled the old beasts, but if there is one thing the old guard have going for them, it's that they have exact standards to meet and can face severe punishments if they fail to do so.

Meanwhile, social media is full of unverified bullshit - something isn't true just because it's been endlessly shared - and when something is shown to be complete bullshit, there are rarely any more repercussions than a shrug from the audience, who goes on to click on the next piece of dishonest trash.

All news organisations with a staff of more than two people have to be bloody sure they get things right - for example, if anybody is going to try and name and shame the actress who bit Beyonce, they're going to be 120 percent sure they're naming the right fucking person. It's not just the threat of legal action if they get in wrong, it's a irreplaceable loss of credibility.

And this is just one small part of the accountability umbrella the whole business is covered by - there are plenty of things that are not acceptable in this industry and can lead to instant dismissal, such as plagiarism or making up stories, (although these things are actually fairly rare, because most people are smart enough to know its wrong, and others who might be tempted are still bright enough to know you can't get away with that shit).

There are, of course, some exceptions - column writers get to spout endless bullshit while hiding behind their keyboards, but that's not really news anyway; while some organisations let their staff get away with some amazingly awful shit - Fox News won't fire its odious news show presenters who think it's fine to attack teenagers who are sick of their schools getting shot up, even when those presenters go way over the fucking line. 

But in general, there are so many checks and balances in place at newspapers, TV networks and radio stations, the errors are in the minimum. It is a major reason why all the columnists worried about Stuff's #metoonz need to check themselves before they wreck themselves, because there is no way the country's biggest news group is going to let fly with accusations without stacking them up.

It is arguable that journalists are more accountable and liable to pay the price for something that the powerful people they often interact with, and for a strong example of that, you only need to see the fall-out from the Hirschfeld/Curran breakfast meeting

After a long career as a distinguished journo, Hirschfeld had to resign from Radio NZ the other week over the meeting, while Curran remains in her job as both broadcasting minister and minister for open government, despite another mark in her long record of political incompetence and stupidity.

To be clear, it wasn't the meeting itself that led directly to Hirschfeld's resignation, that was a fuck-up that could be forgiven, but lying to your bosses about it and forcing them to lie to a select committee about it was unforgivable, and Carol had to go after that.

But it is another example of journos - especially those involved with public broadcasting in any way - paying the price for something they did, and paying it in the most public way possible. To hold onto its credibility, any news organisation is going to be extremely upfront and transparent about the measures it takes to set the record straight, because if it doesn't have that kind of credibility, it doesn't have anything.

There are still always going to be mistakes, and malicious errors, but when the whole industry can be tarnished by it, somebody is always going to be held accountable. It's just the way it works.

- Katherine Grant

89: Detachment is everything when you're reporting on yourself

It wasn't much of a surprise to see Carol Hirschfeld's resignation from RNZ get so much attention in New Zealand's media – she was a high-profile media figure who had been caught lying to her bosses about a meeting with the minister holding the public broadcasting purse-strings, (for reasons that remain unclear), forcing those bosses to unknowingly tell falsehoods to a parliamentary select committee. What news organisation wouldn't do a story on that?

It was equally unsurprising that RNZ also carried the story, even though it was about strife in its on ranks, and even though there was nothing on rnz.co.nz about the initial news of the fated meeting between Hirschfeld and Clare Curran. They covered it – and actually broke the news about it - because it was a bloody good story and covering bloody good stories is what journalists do.

In fact, it was essential that RNZ covered it like it was any other news story, because it would just make things more awkward – and raise serious questions about the RNZ newsrooms' journalistic impartiality – if they did try to ignore it. It probably also helped that the organisation had the obvious scoop, since all the drama was playing out within the public broadcaster.

There were, of course, some people at RNZ who could have nothing to do with the story because they were directly involved in the case, because that would further taint that impartial image, but there were also plenty of journos there who had stayed at arms length, and could report on the situation with getting personally involved. (After all, by most accounts, the news of Hirschfeld's resignation caught 95 percent of the RNZ workforce by complete surprise.)

It can be fucking weird, writing and broadcasting stories about your own organisation, but any real journo will be able to foster a sense of detachment. There should always be some distance between the subject of a story and the people telling it, even if they share the same elevator in the morning.

It might be weird talking about RNZ in the third person when you're actually working there in the newsroom, but it can also be surprisingly easy. When it runs stories about the situation, reporters can even find it darkly amusing to say the chief executive or chairperson refused to comment, when you see them wandering around the office every day.

Plus, of course, if they're not going to talk to their own journos, those reporters can rest easy that they're almost certainly not going to gt scooped by another organisation. If Paul Thompson won't return Jane Patterson's phone calls, he's not about to turn around and give Barry Soper or Tracy Watkins the full story. Indeed, one of the few interviews he has given in the past week was for the Mediawatch programme on RNZ.

It can seem a little silly, and even have the faint hint of hypocrisy, when a newsroom covers shenanigans in its own office, but it's also absolutely vital that the reporters are free to cover these things, with no interference from the executive branch.

Otherwise, you end up with cases like Newsweek in the US, which recently fired several reporters who had the temerity to investigate the dodgy goings-on within its organisation. Now you can't trust anything coming out of that newsroom, because it's shown that the corporate sword is stronger than the editorial word.

This attitude among journos – of reporting on something within their own organisation without fear or favour - can drive media company executives with no real experience in an actual newsroom fucking crazy, because why the hell would you do something that could damage your own company. But journos understand they have to expose this shit in their own house if it comes out, otherwise all claims of credibility go right out the fucking window.

Fortunately, that's not a problem at RNZ, where everybody right up to the CEO has an editorial background, and is well aware of these issues. Hirschfeld's resignation – which was unavoidable after her lie went into the public record – was a big fucking story, and it was only right and proper that it was covered as if it was happening to anybody else.

The organisation has lost a strong, experienced and capable figure in its leadership team, and Hirschfeld's resignation puts a spanner in the works of the greater RNZ+ plan the new government is so keen on. But she had to go, and the reporters who once answered to her still have to have that detachment to investigate it all, or nobody will ever trust anything they ever say again.

- Margaret Tempest

88. No, Minister

Former health minister Jonathan Coleman put a proper full stop on his political career last week when he hung up on an interview with Radio NZ's Susie Ferguson, going out in the same way he had always operated as minister - obstructive, uninformative and just plain pissy.

Even in a National government that always viewed the media as the enemy, Coleman was notorious among New Zealand's news journalists for his unwillingness to talk about some huge issues facing the health sector. He would only talk to reporters if they caught him in the hallways of Parliament, would never agree to a decent one-on-one interview with anybody, and outright ignored some pretty fucking important questions from journos like Kirsty Johnston for a goddamn decade.

As a lame duck minister who is only filling in time until he can fill his pockets in the private sector, Coleman obviously thought they would take it a bit easier now that he was no longer in power and agreed to talk to RNZ, but seemed genuinely shocked to be asked some hard questions about the state of some health department buildings, which were found to contain some dangerous mould.

Coleman was so surprised that somebody might confront him about the issue of this black mould in buildings that were under his charge that he did the obvious thing, and attacked the people asking him the question, saying they had ambushed him without warning.

It sounded lame, but it worked with the usual idiots, who bombarded RNZ with messages telling them that Susie was shrill and mean and rude to the poor politician and they were never going to listen to the station again, because being less informed about news and current affairs was definitely going to help their arguments. (The language of these complaints were, of course, riddled with the kind of sexist, misogynistic bullshit that Guyon never seems to get.)

But the idea that Coleman was blindsided by the questioning was a load of crap, and the delightful Ms Ferguson confirmed this with a tweet, which contained the message to Doc Coleman's people from the day before the interview, making it quite clear what they were interested in talking about.

Of course RNZ were going to go hard on the mould thing - four big Middlemore Hospital buildings were full of rot and dangerous mould that could make staff and patients sick. It was a news story they had broken and was a long-term issue that his ministry was responsible for. That's always going to be the angle of any interview, not 'my top five haircuts during my time in government'.

Frankly, Coleman was fucking dreaming if he thought he wouldn't have to answer for failures on his watch. The health portfolio is massively important, and the National government's determined bid to run it like a business has been a bloody catastrophe. We're literally talking about matters of life and death here, and anybody at the head of all that needs to acknowledge that they have fucked up, or we're never going to get anywhere.

Coleman can piss off to work for a private health company now, leaving behind a system full of aging equipment, underpaid & overworked staff and buildings that can make sick people even sicker. But he can not walk away from this legacy, and no journalist is ever going to let him get off that easy.

People in position of power have to be held accountable and that accountability doesn't just melt away when you slink out of office. The current government is a bit more willing to talk to news people about the issues they're facing and while that isn't going to last forever, no journalist is ever going to try and stop asking the questions that need to be asked. No matter how rude they sound.

-  Katherine Grant

87. The only journalist at the barbecue

Journalists are like everybody else in modern society - when they're not at work they like to unwind and relax with friends and family. They like to go to barbecues and dinner parties and Friday night drinks, just like you do.

And they can be decent company, because part of their job requires them to be great at small talk and feeling empathy for other people, so they're terrific listeners and have interesting stories about dealing with the great and powerful, and have all sorts of gossip from behind the headlines.

But after a week at work, a lot of them just want to crash out on the couch and binge-watch some Netflix instead of going out and socialising, because being the only journo at a barbecue can be a massive pain in the arse.

Everybody has their opinions about the state of the modern news media and most of it is fairly uninformed and dull, (and yeah, some of us have enough opinions to start a blog about it, so we're fully aware of the hypocrisy involved here). And if you're the member of this vast and sprawling industry at a social gathering, you're almost guaranteed to hear those opinions. At length.

If you're surrounded by non-journos, you'll be lucky if you get away with some light interrogation about the 'real' story behind something, and at worst, you might be held up as an example of everything that is wrong with the world. In between mouthfuls of sausage and bread, somebody will mention something about the bloody media and how they all distort and deceive.

In particularly awful cases, you'll have to sit there and listen to a full conspiracy theory from cousin Phil or Mary's partner Sean, who are happily and obliviously undermining everything you do every day. It's doubtful that they even know they're insulting you, they're just declaring that you're a liar and a cheat and a fraud, that's all. 

Most of the time, it will be casual insults, and they will not even realise they're doing it. Friends and family will talk about the media in such broad terms they might not even think they're talking about you, but it's hard not to take it personally when people who have never set foot in a newsroom start pontificating about how all journos suck. Do you need another drink?

And then it turns out they're talking about a completely different radio station/newspaper/TV network/website to the one you work at, but that doesn't matter, because you're all the bloody same. Everybody knows that. You're all responsible for everything everybody else does, even if they're hated competitors.

Nobody would get very far if they started declaring that all office managers or account executives or mechanics were charlatans, based on their own limited and anecdotal experiences, but it doesn't matter if you work at RNZ or the Women's Weekly, all journalists are the same.

There are some commonalities between us - every journo at every company never fully turns off, they've always got an ear out for a story - but the media industry is fucking huge, even after years of deconstruction, and any generalisations are pointless, because we've all got different motivations and goals and methods

Journos do like to get out of the house and have a beer or three, and often do it with colleagues who work in the same field. This is partly because they all do shitty shift work, but also because it's easier to relax, because you don't have that weird spotlight. You're all in the same game. There is still plenty of moaning, but at least we have a vague idea of what the hell we're talking about.

- Ron Troupe

86: It's a dickhead hunt

If you were only judging the vibe of the NZ news media scene by the content of its columnists, you could be forgiven for thinking the launch of Stuff's #metoonz campaign has created a deep schism in the industry, between those who are rushing to judgement and those who have deep concerns about the entire idea.

But there isn't, not really. Most journalists, especially those down on the newsroom floor every day, are happy to see people like Alison Mau and Paula Penfold really get stuck into it. Even though a lot of us still blame Stuff for pushing NZ's news towards trashy, worthless content, we can also applaud their efforts when they really take a stand, or do something really innovative.

And it probably helps that the news media scene has a long history of sexual harassment, which can be objectively seen in the higher ranks of the industry. You can bet your arse there are going to be a few Stuff reporters with some harrowing first-person stories to tell, and their colleagues at every other rival news organisation want to see their own industry held to the same account as everyone else.

Still, that hasn't stop a lot of chin-stroking opinion pieces to appear in recent weeks, which spend a great amount of space looking at the new campaign, wondering what it's all about.

Hosking, of course, got in there early, but he's been joined by Al Nisbet's deeply dumb witch hunt cartoon for the Press; a mind-numbing observation from Davd Cohen in the NBR that even though there are men are scumbags in all other cultures and nations, that doesn't mean there are scumbags here too; a Deborah Hill Cone column in the NZ Herald yesterday, telling harassment victims that they should probably keep quiet for their own good, while implying that the journos involved would throw a hissy-fit if a story fell over; and a piece from John Drinnan where he was very, very John Drinnan.

Leaving aside the fact that these efforts reek of having something to hide, it's baffling that many of these takes come from people who have worked in big newsrooms, and know how much things like this get legally approved. Nobody is going to publish anything until they're really, really sure they've got the proper story, because it would be media suicide to do otherwise.

Everything they receive is going to be collated and cross-referenced and stacked up. They're not going to do a five-part series on something they heard whispered at a Christmas party, they're going to get their facts straight. They're explicitly targeting the richest and most powerful people in the country, people who probably have something nasty to hide, and if they make one wrong step, they're going to be litigated and shamed into oblivion.

It's not going to be easy and nobody is doing it just for the exposure or web page clicks. They're doing it because it's the right thing to do.

Despite the fear-mongering, #metoonz is not a witch hunt, because it's not powerful men destroying poor women for fun and profit. Instead, it's a dickhead hunt - and these campaigns are designed to expose the behaviour of those dickheads and to try to prevent it happening again in the future.

One of the great goals of journalism is to find, name and shame the biggest dickheads in our society, to get some justice for their innocent victims, and to show the world that this kind of shit is not acceptable anymore, and will not be tolerated in any way. This is how we grow as a civilisation, and as individual people, by not being dickheads. It's the only way we're ever going to move forward.

If there is a schism in the industry, it's between the dickheads and the non-dickheads. And trust us, mate - the dickheads are losing. You can tell by how much they're whining about it.

- Margaret Tempest

Editors' note: Media Scrum would like to apologise for doing two posts in a row on the reaction to the #metoonz campaign, but it just really, really fucked us off. So, yeah, we would like to apologise, but we're not actually going to. Next time we'll talk about barbecues or some shit.

85. Fuck off, Mike

Media Scrum usually likes to ignore the lunatic ravings of Mr Mike Hosking, and it's pretty easy to do. He might consider himself an essential provocateur and a speaker of plain truths and common sense, but his writing is turgid, his conclusions are trite and his opinion is dull as fuck. Who really needs more of that shit in their life?

Still, every now and then, our low opinion of Mr Hosking manages to sink even further and his Friday column for the NZ Herald website really did manage to plummet to new depths, and can not be so easily ignored.

In the column - and you'll have to look it up if you want to read it, because there is no fucking way we're linking to it here - he launched a vicious attack on Stuff's latest #metoo efforts, which is encouraging people who have been sexually assaulted and abused to get some justice. It should be noted that this isn't really anything new - every major news media organisation in the country has done many stories on horrific abuse in homes, workplaces and general society and have all been open to telling the stories of victims who are brave enough to come forward. The new campaign is riding a new zeitgeist of justifiable outrage, but is part of some long-term efforts.

But to Mike and his mates, this is a step too far and he spewed his vile opinion on the matter all across the homepage of the once-great NZ Herald. Not surprisingly, Mr Hosking is quite concerned by all these matters coming to light, and in a column full of the usual half-truths and scare-mongering, he kept wondering why we can't just move on with things, and forget the past.

Mr Hosking has made his position on the matter clear in the past, but this new column was another cavalcade of the usual bullshit and was particularly distasteful. Even for him.

It's not just his usual hypocrisy, because you'd expect that from him now, and when he starts randomly attacking journos for getting basic facts wrong, it's inevitable that he's going to fuck up with a couple of his own facts - such as a) they're not called Fairfax anymore and b) yes, actually, pinching somebody's arse IS a fucking crime.

And it's not just the snide dig at Stuff and insistence that his company, which is publishing his idiotic ramblings, would never do a thing like that, which is pure horseshit - the Herald has proudly named and shamed those guilty of sexual misconduct, and has happily crowed about the page hits these things produce on its website.

And it's not just the idea that journalists should never investigate everything, because they can't be trusted. Leaving aside the fact that Stuff's #metoo campaign has some extremely solid, experienced and professional journos involved, and also has a lot of experts and lawyers backing it, it appears that Mr Hosking thinks reporters should be transcribers of notable events, and shouldn't go digging into things, especially into the affairs of people with a bit of power. Mr Hosking frequently asserts that he is not a journalist, but that doesn't that ignorance stop him from telling journos how to (wrongly) do their jobs. 

It's not even the blithe, arrogant assertion as fact that Hosking wasn't alone in his uneasiness, that there was widespread derision and a large consensus that this was all a witch hunt by a bunch of stroppy feminists, when even the most casual reading of the reaction showed wide support for the project from everybody who wasn't an old straight white dude. Or a Christchurch cartoonist.

No, above all, it's that nobody fucking needed another example of 'there's nothing to see here' mentality, which has allowed the shitheads responsible for so much misery and harm to get away with it for so long. It's the casual misogyny of it all, and the seeding of distrust of any potential victims who may have the guts to come forward. That's what really stings - the lack of concern for people who have been fucked over and the idea that everyone would be happier if they just kept their traps shut.

The Herald still produces a fucking heap of great stories, and has a lot of great journos working for it, but they're all tainted when this sort of trash is published. Hosking's complaining reeks of the fear of somebody who has something to hide, and is so at odds with everything great journalism stands for that it has no place sitting alongside legitimate reporting.

It's easy for most of us to ignore most of what Mike Hosking says most of the time, but we're not getting anywhere until places like the Herald start ignoring him too.

- Steve Lombard

84. Only a community can save a community

When Stuff said last week it was shutting down or selling off a large number of small and localised publications, the news was depressingly predictable - the media company has made no secret of the fact that such moves were on the cards, especially with the NZME merger looking less and less likely.

It only strengthens the view here at Media Scrum that this is the year when the shit hits the fan, and this really is shit. It's shit for the journalists involved, for the regions and towns that are now facing zero local media coverage, and for the people who actually like to know what the hell is going on in their area.

Stuff has promised that nobody is really missing out on local news, because it has things like the Neighbourly social media platform, which is completely fucking useless for finding out how things went down at the local council meeting, and slightly useful for things like finding a local babysitter (provided you can find the relevant information in an ocean of spam).

Shutting down a small paper in an area that doesn't have any radio or TV reporters will inevitably lead to a complete lack of any kind of decent and relevant local news. In an era of information overload, entire communities are facing a news void.

But there is also some hope that this could help spark a revitalisation of truly local news in this country, with plenty of lessons to be learned from the past, and a few that are being taught right now.

One thing that media companies are now learning is that the business model of multi-media conglomerates, comprised of a huge number of titles and mastheads and other assets, doesn't really work out well for anybody. The small fish don't make much of an impact on the big companies and are eventually seen as nothing but a drain on the bottom line, while those in the regions found that promises of back-office savings and shared content saw them labelled with the same debt as the big boys, while their pages were soon filled with the blandest of shared stories.

So the only surprise generated by Stuff's latest move came from arseholes who expressed shock that these small towns even still had a paper, because everybody they know gets their news on their phone and who reads print anymore, anyway? (Answer: Quite a lot of people still prefer their news in paper form, instead of endless goddamn scrolling.)

If you only listened to all the talk of falling revenues and the problems of getting money out of digital operations, it would be easy to assume that local news is on the fast-track to oblivion, with nothing to replace them.

But human beings are strange creatures, and actually like to know what is going on in their immediate vicinity. They like the national and international stuff too, and they also love the trivial and silly stories, but people do actually want to know what there local authorities are up to, what local crime is happening, and when local events are being held.

Some of the success stories in local news in recent years have certainly found this out for themselves, and there are examples all over the place, of newspapers that have been bought by staff or locals, or of community trusts being set up to get the news flow going. Here in NZ, the Wairarapa Times-Age was taken back into local hands in 2016, and is chugging along nicely.

The future of local news means a rejection of the big company ethos that has infected the media industry for the past few decades, and a return to the kind of news and reporting that local communities managed to sustain for a long, long time, even with a far smaller population. The explosion in the number of newspapers in New Zealand's earliest days filled a vital gap that no social media platform can match, even if there weren't as many aspirational images of cats.

But to find out what is really going on in your community might actually require a bit of effort from that community, rather than an apathetic 'what can ya do' shrug. Whether that's something private individuals want to get involved in, or maybe even local authorities, the community needs to step up and demand local news for local people.

The news isn't dead yet. The news never dies, and sometimes it just means there are different ways to get that news to the people who need it. But for mass coverage in a particular area, you still can't beat the newspaper sitting in every mailbox.

- Ron Troupe