I'm wondering about the ethics ...

I'm wondering about the ethics of writing a blog.

Gordon Peterson of WUSA-TV tells the story about how writing has its risks. He described his first job application in the writing business. “In my long talk with the editor, he asked, "Why do you want to do this, kid?" "Because I want to show how decent the American people are," I said, "I want to show them both sides of the coin; I want to give the people a sense of the ultimate goodness of their community." He answered, "That’s all right, kid, but remember one thing: serenity’s not news."

Gregorian Rants, a year-old blog coming out of Carbondale, Illinois, has succumbed like so may in-your-face talk shows and attack blogs to the allure of rhetoric over substance, derision over analysis, and insult over discourse. This is a sad development for Carbondale - a university community that has a history of fairly civil political discourse supported by candidates for office that avoid dirty campaigns, and civic organizations such as the League of Women Voters that foster public debates rather than let ad hominem attacks rule the civic conversation. As much as I like citizen journalism that blogging supports, I disdain the decline of civil discourse that some bloggers encourage by their name calling and vitriol – often with the seeming purpose of recruiting voyeuristic readers with similar attack mentality. I’m certainly no journalist, but I know muckraking when I see it.

Recent posts of Gregorian Rants help substantiate the fact that “traditional journalists view citizen journalism with some skepticism, believing that only trained journalists can understand the exactitude and ethics involved in reporting news.”

You may be asking ‘Hey, what’s the problem? Who needs serenity? ’ Well, it all comes down to the blog's constant use of questionable logic, hyperbole, insults, innuendo and exaggeration that results in turning away his audience. For example, Peter arrogantly writes about Carbondale politics saying:

• The Greens (the political party) like being poor as church mice, it make them more righteous or something.


• The (mayoral candidate Sheila Simon) is a Senator's daughter after all, bigger and more expensive government is the family business.


• If Sheila had been mayor or if Maggie (a former councilwoman) had won the last election, the drug addicts would still be shooting up in the American Tap.

I surmise that Peter relies upon hyperbole for so many arguments because it is titillating to read… oooooh, ahhh...ahhh, snicker, snicker.
Integrity and accusing candidates of illegal or unethical acts.
The blog favors using a variety of attack mechanisms including the classic ‘straw man argument’. To use the technique, one first sets-up an easily refutable distortion of an opposing viewpoint or action, and then attacks distortion rather than the person. Here are two examples.

(The Distortion): Since Sheila isn't clearly calling for a pro-business city hall, I assume she doesn't want one.
(The Attack): At the end of his term, Brad is going to have the best business development record of any Carbondale mayor in my lifetime. Sheila is going to stink in comparison if she is elected.

(The Distortion) Sheila thinks that employers are going to get their employees to live in Carbondale? (The Attack): What a stupid idea.

He also just loves to complain about the very behavior he uses in his own blog:

I notice that in addition to the $50 shell game that the platform and campaign tactics are going to be based on accusing of illegal or unethical acts. This is a pretty standard political tactic when you have no accomplishments and your opponent does. You use attack, innuendo and deception to get ahead. If your primary campaign tactics are the standard Illinois rough house BS, does that give you the high ground on having integrity?
Another. (The Distortion): Guess it would be impossible for her to win on merit.(The Attack): Daddy's name and mud are her game.

So and So's economic development plan is really, really stupid.
When Peter isn’t using phrases like the above to insult the opponent of his favored candidate, he expounds on “least government” salvation for the masses and derides civil servants:

One of my frustrations with professors, state employees and other people in the public sector in Carbondale is you guys have been on the reservation too long. The USA is a incredibly efficient capitalist machine. Capitalism isn't perfect, but it is better then all of the options. So many people in Carbondale and Illinois don't honestly look at results of this huge government machine we have made (and their trailing costs). I guess, if you are part of the system it is hard to admit there is a system wide problem. More government isn't the answer, we have plenty already.

And from that philosophical wellspring comes the Peter’s musings about state and municipal code enforcement:

If Carbondale really needed another army of inspectors there would be warning signs, for example we might see lots of fires? Lawsuits from students who have fallen through their floors or the like? Does anyone see that?

As a matter of fact, most people have seen the warning signs and worked to create laws, organizations and programs to address the health and safety problems in the region. You can drive by the local fire station every day and see the fire call board increase in numbers nearly every day. City of Carbondale fire fighters respond to about 900 emergency calls a year. In the first 50 days of this year, they have been on at least 142 calls. In addition, the small volunteer Carbondale Township Fire Department goes on about 80 emergency calls a year, a quarter of which are structure fire calls.

In the end, Peter has become just another “Kool-Aid drinking” pundit. Such pundits are so committed to a political cause, candidate, or philosophy that they senselessly ignore facts in conflict with both their political viewpoint and their reader’s notion of entertainment. Being a pundit didn’t use to have this derogatory connotation. A pundit once meant being an expert or opinion-leader who analyzes events in their area of expertise. Peter has valuable expertise in running a software business, but not in government, university management, or downtown revitalization - all topics on which he covers with passion.

Until late I’ve been regularly reading all that Peter publishes. We even agree on quite a few things the blog covers, but I will probably stop reading his rants because doing so just makes me sad. I recently came across the Biology of Mind blog that triggered my decision and summarized my melancholy about Gregorian Rants:

The real shame, though, is that the kneejerk "everyone else is an idiot" tenor is poisoning the potential the Internet once had. People used to dream of a global village, where maybe we can work out our differences, where direct communication might make us realize that we have a lot in common after all, no matter where we live or what our beliefs.“… instead of finding common ground, we're finding new ways to spit on the other guy, to push them away. The Internet is making it easier to attack, not to embrace. Maybe as the Internet becomes as predominant as air, somebody will realize that online behavior isn't just an afterthought. Maybe, along with HTML and how to gauge a Web site's credibility, schools and colleges will one day realize that there's something else to teach about the Internet: Civility 101.”