Thursday, April 03, 2008
“self-awareness should surely be a help..”
In the Irish News last week, Jim Gibney took the party line on who’s to blame for anti-social behaviour and criminality in west Belfast. Since then, and with particular reference to the Squinter episode, Tom Kelly has had his say, “Freedom of speech would be a good starting point, including the right to critique the record of the local MP”, and Susan McKay was pointed in her column, “Talk about sackcloth and ashes.” But perhaps the most effective criticism comes from Fionnula O’Connor in the Irish Times today [subs req],
Sinn Féin in Stormont has failed to shine and Martin McGuinness powersharing with Ian Paisley has its drawbacks, not least relegation for Adams. It is a long time since he last looked presidential, and now he has lost face at home. In its own defence, “the West” long ago became self-aggrandising. It is struggling to adjust to the most predictable of outcomes - that an end to war would not deliver prosperity and crime-free streets, no more than in Harriet Harman’s Peckham or Ahern’s Dublin.
Fionnula O’Connor goes on to say
Signing up to support civil policing produced no miracles beyond the spectacle of senior officers sitting down in public meetings with local people. Not at all surprisingly, the PSNI has not defeated “the hoods” any more than IRA beatings, shootings, exiling and the occasional “execution” did.
Some locals always jibbed at Sinn Féin dominance, though not necessarily because they loathed the IRA. It was the new establishment many disliked: agencies fronted by Adams’s supporters, cheerleaders at cultural events not exactly rattling jewellery in the best seats but setting a communal tone, with a backbeat of IRA enforcement.
Most acknowledged the uplift for a formerly downtrodden community, but resented the imposition nonetheless.
The violent deaths of two local men who apparently confronted young hoodlums have pointed up painful reality - perhaps most for ageing republicans aware of their own mortality.
Without the IRA at their backs, some have arrived on the doorsteps of “problem families” to be told where to go, or, worse, asked who they think they are.
It may be that leadership status has to be won afresh in west Belfast. Ranting against inadequate policing lets off steam, but is a diversion, like attacking critics - as Adams may have found out already. “Do nothing of any knee-jerk,” he once idiosyncratically appealed to republicans, at a tense moment for negotiations. But knee-jerk he did when lambasted a fortnight ago by the Squinter column in the Andersonstown News. Squinter is editor Robin Livingstone: the Andytown News has been Pravda to the Sinn Féin Kremlin. Blaming Adams - because he has been an MP for 20 years - for shirking responsibility for local ills might have been a mite skewed, but Squinter the rebel was a revelation.
The rebellion was brief. The next edition carried a stiff Adams objection on the front page and a slavish apology. Squinter’s defiance and the raft of substantially supportive responses - one comparing Sinn Féin unfavourably with Ian Paisley jnr’s lobbying at St Andrews for his “own people” - were wiped from the paper’s website.
Obviously nobody dared tell the Dear Leader what a comedown this was from windy talk about democracy and equality.
He may grudge the limelight to Deputy First Minister Martin. But if you want to stay number one in a collective leadership, self-awareness should surely be a help.
Pete Baker @ 08:16 AM
Adequate for whom? You referenced another thread without proffering any evidence for your statement.
Have I slipped into Pig Spainish again? I referenced an another thread as an example of how you can say nothing untrue, “offer evidence” and still be pushing a line.
The idea that Pete is some sort of paragon of objectivity is a straw man ken. You don’t need to buy into the idea that some work is more rigorous than others.
No it’s not a straw man, else we end up with “He’s very rigorous at pushing a line.”. Rigor says little about actual comment or bias, which I believe was at issue - via Pete Baker’s frenzied blogging of late, into unionist op ed
But you are pushing “rigour”. Who is working a straw man here, Mick?
<i>Absolutely. But you raised expectations yourself when you said, “if we look at your posts on the topic, and we can do it serially if you like”.
..........tumbleweed “
Pete created a thread on Fionnula O’Connor’s article. He then creates a separate thread on the controversy which is titled with a quote from that that article, and subsequently serves to colour the rest of the discussion. You cannot title your thread “Ranting against inadequate policing lets off steam, but is a diversion, like attacking critics..” and simultaneously pretend you are not going to influence opinion with it. I can guarantee the next thread on the topic by Pete will contain references to both, and push the same line.
If you want examples for other topics Mick then I suggest you start reading your own site.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 01:38 PMMaybe it’s me, but you are not making any sense here ken. Are you complaining about this thread because it is derivative of an earlier one? If so, why?
I admit that I do care about rigour in a way that I just don’t about bias. You clearly see it the other way round. Rigour is no guarantee of ‘truth’, but I am inclined to give it more attention than an apparently content-less rebuttal.
You promised ‘information’ that you since appear to have resiled from producing. I don’t need to see that information. But I would like to know what your essential objection to Pete’s work is.
“...you cannot title your thread ‘Ranting against inadequate policing lets off steam, but is a diversion, like attacking critics..’ and simultaneously pretend you are not going to influence opinion with it.”
As I look up, I see we are drifting effortlessly from the point in this thread, to the allleged motivation of the writer (thereby creating a strictly ad homenim argument). I picked Gilligan as an illustrative example above of a journalist whose work I don’t like, but who I am forced to admit has brought created a public value, because on some level he has stuck rigorously to his journalistic last.
By elevating bias over rigour, you are amongst other things creating a (self-serving?) elision between power politics and the media. That is a dangerous route to go if you value in the least the principle of a free media (mainstream or otherwise).
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 02:13 PMMaybe it’s me, but you are not making any sense here ken. Are you complaining about this thread because it is derivative of an earlier one? If so, why?
Well, I could level that accusation at any number of his threads because it’s irritating when he does it within three posts of the first one, but no, that wasn’t the point.
But the discussion was about bias. Pete claims he has none and offers no opinions, save where they are rigorous backed with evidence. I don’t mind bias, I browse some of the Unionist blogs (or occasionally worse, Tory ones) for example, I just don’t like this claim when it’s obviously false.
I admit that I do care about rigour in a way that I just don’t about bias. You clearly see it the other way round. Rigour is no guarantee of ‘truth’, but I am inclined to give it more attention than an apparently content-less rebuttal.
I have a degree in a mathematical discipline: rigor is vital, Mick. It’s important, I’m glad someone is doing it but it isn’t the be all and end all. I’m generally more enthused at interesting ideas at a higher conceptual level than chasing down every comma.
Something that offers intellectual challenge or an interesting point rather than rigorous analysis is not more or less worthy. They simply perform different functions.
You promised ‘information’ that you since appear to have resiled from producing. I don’t need to see that information. But I would like to know what your essential objection to Pete’s work is.
I didn’t promise any more information than I gave. If you want further examples of the same line towed in the recent articles on criticism of the PSNI, go back and read through the Taser ones, or the last time SF met the Policing Boards and one of the Unionist members made a comment about not attacking the police. the line and Pete’s opinions are the same and easily read between the lines. Read his constant use of “supernaturalists” in science or religious posts. Then come back and claim no bias or opinion.
I dislike Pete’s style immensely but I believe that is already well documented. I also dislike his attitude when he graciously decides to enlighten the plebs. But also well documented.
As I look up, I see we are drifting effortlessly from the point in this thread, to the allleged motivation of the writer (thereby creating a strictly ad homenim argument).
The accusation was of bias or otherwise. Again, what you initial took issue with was via Pete Baker’s frenzied blogging of late, into unionist op ed, and subsequently Pete claimed he didn’t offer opinions. Pete’s posts are therefore are the ball, unless you want me to somehow make my point about framing argument and implicit opinion without making reference to them. What I think about Pete is neither here nor there in this regard.
By elevating bias over rigour, you are amongst other things creating a (self-serving?) elision between power politics and the media. That is a dangerous route to go if you value in the least the principle of a free media (mainstream or otherwise).
I don’t elevate bias over anything. If Pete’s posts were not rigorous I could criticise him for that, independently of anything else. If he is claiming no bias and that he’s not offering any opinion while quite clearly doing so, I am free to challenge him on that, independently of anything else. This is a huge straw man, Mick.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 02:58 PMOkay. In the interests of said rigour, let’s look at this alleged claim to objectivity on Pete’s part:
“I tend not to do ‘op ed’, Northsider - check the archive by all means. And, if I do offer an opinion, I have always attempted to back that opinion up with some evidence.”
This is where your mathematical attention to detail seems to have failed you. You’ve factored a very specific statement that he generally doesn’t do op-ed, up into a claim (by Pete) to objectivity and freedom from bias. I see no evidence that he has ever made such a claim.
I don’t, and I am sure Pete doesn’t, resent the fact you don’t like the way he does things. If you make effective interventions in a public space, you should not expect everyone to love you or your work. Personally, I don’t see him as a spikey misanthrope, although others may demur.
Yet it is the very utility of Baker’s approach is what you seem to object to: i.e. that he visits and re-visits the same material each time there is a new piece of evidence in the same story. In this scenario, a story is never truly yesterday’s chip paper.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 03:18 PMThis is where your mathematical attention to detail seems to have failed you. You’ve factored a very specific statement that he generally doesn’t do op-ed, up into a claim (by Pete) to objectivity and freedom from bias. I see no evidence that he has ever made such a claim.
I am almost 100% certain Pete has protested innocence against bias in the past, and this follows a theme. And no, I’m not about to go through his 2000+ (and others) threads to find an example which the only reason I’m not stating it as bald fact.
I’d say if you were using this thread only as evidence that would certainly lack any type of rigor, Mick.
Yet it is the very utility of Baker’s approach is what you seem to object to: i.e. that he visits and re-visits the same material each time there is a new piece of evidence in the same story. In this scenario, a story is never truly yesterday’s chip paper.
I’m not sure an Op-Ed piece in a newspaper necessarily counts as “evidence” especially when it’s repeating a point already heard, Pete does not blog everything on a topic otherwise he would just be Newshound, the overlinking is terrible for the reader and the problem with incremental approaches is that of marginal utility, which I often feel Pete doesn’t get right.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 03:32 PMYour claims centre (in the first place) on what was said on this thread, where it took little effort to get it right. Yet you seem to have gotten it wrong. You surely don’t expect the rest of us to rattle through his 2,000 plus posts to uphold a claim on your behalf?
Overlinking? Too much information? That, if you don’t mind me being so blunt, is utter rubbish.
For me, the utility of systematic hyper-linking is far from marginal. For the reader is that they have access to the same primary and secondary resources as the writer. This both increases the writer’s accountability to the readership and the capacity of other writers to re-purpose it to their own means and ends.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 03:46 PMMick
Your claims centre (in the first place) on what was said on this thread, where it took little effort to get it right.
As informed by my previous experience on the site. I don’t live in a bubble.
Yet you seem to have gotten it wrong.
No, I don’t think I did and I think Pete’s implication is clear regardless.
You surely don’t expect the rest of us to rattle through his 2,000 plus posts to uphold a claim on your behalf?
Well, there’s always a chance of a bit of crowd sourcing but I’m just giving a health warning.
Overlinking? Too much information? That, if you don’t mind me being so blunt, is utter rubbish.
Done this one before Mick. Style and presentation matter as much as content. If you present a perfectly good argument in a fashion that discourages people from reading it, or obfuscates the main point, then you have failed in one of your central duties.
Over information? See Twain’s quote about making letters shorter, or the existence of the term “information overload”.
So, no, to be equally blunt, you’re flat wrong.
For me, the utility of systematic hyper-linking is far from marginal. For the reader is that they have access to the same primary and secondary resources as the writer. This both increases the writer’s accountability to the readership and the capacity of other writers to re-purpose it to their own means and ends.
The utility of one link may not be marginal, but the 50th may well be - that’d be why it’s marginal utility. And that is particularly true when it doesn’t actually relate directly to the post but is instead included in an knowing aside, often of no indication where the hell it’s going, to make tangential points or appear clever.
It is also entirely possible to obfuscate the main point by burying it in a huge number of sources that are very difficult to unravel. Especially true on the web. Too much of a good thing is bad.
Again, done this one before Mick.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 03:59 PMYeah, but no, but…
Night, my work here is done….
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 04:03 PM“It is also entirely possible to obfuscate the main point by burying it in a huge number of sources that are very difficult to unravel. Especially true on the web. Too much of a good thing is bad.”
Buried as to be indiscernible by the conscious mind? Otherwise it isn’t that subliminal, one highlights points,
one stresses them, sa in, hello here is my point, unless of course I’ve missed your point, in which case you may have a point.
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 06:05 PMIt is hard to believe that an apology was issued at all but then again when i think about it perhaps i am too naive in these matters.A full hand, indeed a Royal flush has been dealt to those in the Journalistic Community[in the main the print media]who have spent years degrading this and many other working class communities in the north it was not just nationalists Communities.Every attempt to write a comment re this Apology has been censored and rejected by the ATN ...a shameful day in free speech by a shameful paper which in my view should re assess its position….. to think they were once admired in this community.In a cruel irony Talkback read out a statement from Gerry Adams to day saying the apology was too much while Paul maskey vainly tried to defend the whole debacle
Posted by on Apr 04, 2008 @ 08:29 PMNo harn to the lot of you - it is time to stop believing you are so important and go out there into the real world and get a job.
Posted by on Apr 07, 2008 @ 11:00 AM
