If you are like me and saw this story yesterday, you probably said, well heck I knew that, and moved on to more interesting reading.
However, reader Cathy sent me the newly unemployed editor’s letter to AG Sulzberger and I found it a very worthwhile read, so I’m posting a bit of it here with a link to the whole stinging rebuke, of not just the NYT, but of most of the legacy media today.
If you don’t know about the controversy here is a story by Howard Kurtz of Fox News today.
Message to you (and to me!), if they are calling you a “Nazi” and a “racist” wear the label with pride because it means you have gotten under their skin.
(with a little emphasis from me)
Dear AG,
It is with sadness that I write to tell you that I am resigning from The New York Times.
[….]
But the lessons that ought to have followed the election—lessons about the importance of understanding other Americans, the necessity of resisting tribalism, and the centrality of the free exchange of ideas to a democratic society—have not been learned. Instead, a new consensus has emerged in the press, but perhaps especially at this paper: that truth isn’t a process of collective discovery, but an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else.
Twitter is not on the masthead of The New York Times. But Twitter has become its ultimate editor. As the ethics and mores of that platform have become those of the paper, the paper itself has increasingly become a kind of performance space. Stories are chosen and told in a way to satisfy the narrowest of audiences, rather than to allow a curious public to read about the world and then draw their own conclusions. I was always taught that journalists were charged with writing the first rough draft of history. Now, history itself is one more ephemeral thing molded to fit the needs of a predetermined narrative.
[….]
My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist…
[….]
I do not understand how you have allowed this kind of behavior to go on inside your company in full view of the paper’s entire staff and the public. And I certainly can’t square how you and other Times leaders have stood by while simultaneously praising me in private for my courage. Showing up for work as a centrist at an American newspaper should not require bravery.
Part of me wishes I could say that my experience was unique. But the truth is that intellectual curiosity—let alone risk-taking—is now a liability at The Times. Why edit something challenging to our readers, or write something bold only to go through the numbing process of making it ideologically kosher, when we can assure ourselves of job security (and clicks) by publishing our 4000th op-ed arguing that Donald Trump is a unique danger to the country and the world? And so self-censorship has become the norm.
Keep reading, it gets even better.
The world has turned upside down with these crazy leftists. There is more sense in a Kindergarten classroom. I think they all should be ostracized & ignored by society as a whole. I am a real person that lives a real life working in a real neighborhood with real people. That would be as part of America’s Middle Class.
Excellent, well written and heart felt. She was more than courageous to show up for work there. She was Daniel in the Lions Den. Thanks for sharing the whole letter. Will anything change? hmmm
LOL her wake up is a little too little, a little too late. She very well may be going to prison at some point. She hired Ali Watkins based on classified material Ali got from James Wolfe, who was part of the group directly responsible for the attempted take down of Trump. Remember that? Yea. I do.
So I don’t care about her letter. If she “gets it” now, great. Somehow I doubt it though. She’s a hard left Democrat and has zero critical thinking skills.
https://youtu.be/T77uFdw9HJA
Who is Ali Watkins and James Wolfe? Please explain your comment. We don’t all know the details of your comment.
James Wolfe was an Aide to Mark Warner of the SSCI. Who was working directly with Oleg Derispaska and Christopher Steele on the Trump/Russian collusion story.
He was sleeping with Ali Watkins, a reporter for Buzzfeed. He texted her the 80-something pages of the classified Steele memo and she broke it as a news story. She also showed it to Ms. Weiss as a chip to get hired at the NYT.
They are all likely going to go down in this. Leaking classified information, basically selling it for a job, using it to sway an election – yea, not good people.
Thanks. I figured there had to be more to the story. Bari Weiss the victim? I figured ulterior motives.
I took the time to watch the video on your link. It is a shame that people like them control 90% of our media. They are welcome to their opinions but our American laws will probably be changed to mirror their McCarthyistic opinions. Their conversation was filled with leftist hate speech.