The Decline in Journalistic Standards and Its Relevance to the Anonymised Posting of Comments

 An article I published on LinkedIn.

Once upon a time journalism was a respected profession, its job to relay the events of the day, investigate wrongdoing and holding the powerful to account.  Being a journalist offered an individual some measure of respect.  A journalist was a crusader for truth and, in some respect, justice and their words held a kind of gravitas that no one else could lay claim to.  The powerful were afraid of the journalist because their integrity meant that any negative press coverage would destroy them but they also held them in awe because any positive coverage could bring popularity.  It’s not to say that there wasn’t bias in the Press but it was kept to a minimum, coverage was weighted towards truth.

In the last few decades, however, truth and justice are low on the priorities of the Press.  Bias has become the norm and has slowly been replaced by ideological propaganda.  The powerful in politics have become so entwined with the press barons that it is the Press that seems to control government policy, not directly, however, subtly and insidiously.

In order to cover the Press influence over government, the public are fed a constant stream of non-stories and complete inanity in which non-entities are raised to the level of celebrities, devaluing both the profession of journalism and the meaning of what it is to be a celebrity.

Press coverage has been dumbed down to the level of early years reading books in the tabloids and so infused with ideology in the broadsheet-type of newspaper that it is little more than a brain-washing tool to convert those who haven’t already succumbed to the predominantly Right-wing political view espoused by the media and to reinforce those beliefs in those already of an authoritarian bent.  Unfortunately, what little there was of independent or Left-wing media has dissipated to the level of almost non-existence or slowly moved to the political Right.  Thank Heavens for the new breed of Left-wing online media to give people a counter-narrative to the one pushed by the print and television media.

Local media outlets were slightly less affected by the degeneration in journalistic standards.  Their output, although sometimes biased, contained much more news content than a national newspaper.  The content may not have been the kind of hard-hitting journalism that would set the world to rights or worry too many people in power but local journalists did serve at least one of the old pillars of quality journalism – the truth.

Local newspapers made heroes of local residents for minor accomplishments but didn’t try to make them into celebrities and, although they allow local politicians of the ruling political party and local MPs access to a platform to push their ideological agenda, what news was covered in their pages was fairly untainted by political bias.  The local politicians were still, although in diluted form, held to account for their decisions and local celebrities were considered human beings who were only made to justify bad behaviour.  Members of the public were off-limits unless they were the subject of a news story – criminal, victim or hero.

Sadly, it seems that even local media is succumbing to the decline in journalistic standards.  Members of the public who are simply commenting on news stories have become fair game.  You don’t have to be a criminal, victim or hero any more to be targeted by an unscrupulous journalist and their ethically-challenged editor.

The new age of journalism has brought about the rise of the Left-wing online press who employ professional journalists of the political Left with their inherent bias and the local online newspapers (or news blogs, depending on your chosen terminology) who rely on a small team of professional journalists of whatever political persuasion the publisher happens to favour and amateur journalists, those enthusiastic writers who never had a chance to become ‘proper’ journalists but have some talent and like to uphold standards in their work and those people who happen to be friends with the publisher who lack standards but get published anyway to fill space.

I have become a victim of one of these amateur journalists, a gentleman named Peter Perrin, an elderly person who happens to be friends with the owner, editor and publisher, a gentleman named Michael Casey, of one of these online newspapers, Your Thurrock.

Perrin decided to use my full real name in one of his columns back in January 2019.  It was in reference to what he referred to as a “war” between myself and some other commenters in the comments section of the various articles published.  It was not a conflict I started because it initially began after I defended people with addiction issues from some nasty comments by another commenter and I was attacked by the other person so I defended myself.  The attacks by the other person, who posts anonymously under a screen name, kept on coming so I had to defend myself each time.

And that’s where my complaint lies.  Perrin referred to every person involved in the so-called “war” but was unable to identify any of the others as they all used anonymous screen names whereas I use my preferred name, Valen, together with my real name as my screen identity thus I am called “Valen (Myles) Cook”.  Perrin used my full name including my full real name when he could have just referred to me as “Valen” or not even used any names at all and just referred to ‘the individuals involved’.

You might say that I brought this on myself for using my real name but, at the time Perrin referred to me by my full name, another of the referenced commenters had also included his real name as part of his screen identity.  Perrin didn’t refer to that person by their real name although he had access to it.  It was an act that can only be considered as a direct personal attack, an act of persecution on his behalf.

I demanded an apology that never came.  Perrin stated that he wasn’t a journalist and had done nothing wrong.  He is wrong on both accounts.  As soon as you have an article published, whether paid or not, you are a journalist.  A commenter on a news story or article is not a public figure, they post as a member of the public and therefore should be off-limits to attack as being no criminal, victim or hero in a newsworthy story.

I complained to Michael Casey.  He ignored my complaint to begin with then exacerbated the situation but stating that “Peter is a private citizen, not an employee”, which is incorrect.  He may not be paid but even volunteers are considered employees of the organisations they work for.  Casey also stated that “As fair as we are concerned this is a private matter between you and Peter”.  This is again incorrect.  Casey is a publisher of a publically accessible news website.  Perrin’s attack was published by Casey, who is also the owner and editor, on his publically accessible news website which makes him responsible for the resolution of the situation.  A private matter is something that happens in private, this was public and personal.

Casey having washed his hands of his responsibilities as editor, publisher and employer of Perrin left me with no alternative but to take the matter up with the press regulator IMPRESS.  I received an e-mail that gave me two routes to take to resolve the situation but, and this is where the matter comes back to the decline in journalistic standards, from what I could see, my situation falls through the massive hole in their Standards Code.

The clauses of the IMPRESS Standards Code seem not to apply in any form to a direct attack on a member of the public (who is not subject of a news story) by a journalist.  There is mention, under the heading of Public Interest, of a publisher needing to show that “They could not have achieved the same result using measures that are 
compliant with the Code” but only if there is a breach of the clauses of the Code.  The fact that Perrin could have achieved the same result without using my full name or that Casey, as editor, could have removed my full name before publication seems irrelevant.

Some might say that, if a journalist can attack a member of the general public who is not the subject of a news item and get away with it, the Standards Code they are held to is unfit for purpose.  The fact that Michael Casey has further victimised me by removing my account on his site so I can no longer post comments or defend myself from any attacks that I might be subject to from commenters, or his journalists, in the future shows how low journalistic standards have dropped from the heady days of yore when journalists were respected.

It saddens me, as an amateur journalist myself, to see the profession I saw as noble fall so far in its standards of ethics.  Over the years I have written for and edited club magazines and home-produced spare-time magazine projects as well as having written for Your Thurrock itself and, in everything I’ve done, I refused to lower myself to personal attacks on members of the public in my articles and columns.  I held a belief that journalism had to be better than what we are currently offered in the media, a journalist had to be nobler and stand for truth and for what’s right.

Most of my columns and articles are comment pieces and may deal with public figures in a harsh manner but I would never stoop so low as to attack a member of the public.  I used to fiercely debate with people on a level footing in the comments section of my articles, posting as just another member of the public, and that’s acceptable.  Using one’s privileged position as a journalist - paid or unpaid, professional or amateur – to attack a member of the public is just wrong – morally and ethically.

The problem with this apparent hole in the IMPRESS Standards Code means that people who wish to post comments on news websites, YouTube or any number of blog sites will be unwilling to do so using their real name because of the possibility of attack from the writer.

People spend a lot of time complaining about abuse they get from anonymous commenters but nothing is ever done about it.  Why should anyone do anything to prevent anonymous comments when it’s that anonymity that stops people from being held accountable for their comments, views and abuse? 

The people who don’t post abuse prefer the anonymity because they can be someone different online that may upset their friends and family if they found out (a closeted gay, for instance, waiting to gather up the confidence to tell their family and friends but using the anonymity the internet provides to explore their sexuality) so they don’t want change.  The people who do engage in online abuse prefer the anonymity because they won’t be held accountable for the abuse they hurl into cyberspace so they won’t push for change either.

The subject of internet anonymity is problematical but there are some websites that could enforce an anti-anonymity policy to prevent abuse amongst the commenters on their site rather than victimising those who willingly use their real name when posting comments.

A few months ago, I suggested to Michael Casey that he should ban people from posting comments under anonymous screen identities due to some of the offensive comments people were posting on Your Thurrock.  Nothing ever came of it yet he is willing to allow one of his columnists to victimise me for using my real name.  Michael Casey allows abuse between commenters, vile and uneducated views to be posted and expletives without comment, yet he deletes my account because I dare to stand up for myself in the face of a personal attack from one of his columnists and his lack of journalistic standards.

Journalism could be the noble profession that it used to be, holding the powerful to account, championing truth and justice and informing the public of the events of the day but not while the standards to which journalists are held are so lax and while there are people like Michael Casey and Peter Perrin who can’t even maintain the moral and ethical standards at levels that surpass the official Standards Code.

Please note: I am using the names of Michael Casey and Peter Perrin under the Public Interest rules as their lack of journalistic standards should be noted as a matter of public interest and there is no other way to achieve the same result without using their names.

Crime, Punishment and Austerity

During a debate on the article “Series of knifepoint robberies in Chafford Hundred” on Your Thurrock, some extremely dubious comments were made about the need for harsher sentences to deter criminals.  However, it has been proven in studies that the only real deterrence is the threat of being caught by the police.

Before I continue, I would like to present the debate cut-and-pasted from the comments section on the article’s page to give the proper context.  Please note: all quotes are reproduced exactly as they appear on the original page.

thurrocksgonedownhill – “We are all paying the price for weak namby pamby policies that don’t work. Lets bring back harsh penalties for these scum bags.”

littlebopeep – “Absolutely terrible. Discipline should start in the home. Sadly many children have none and are allowed to develope into hooligans.”

Valen (Myles) Cook – “Some people believe that harsh punishments deter criminals. There is plenty of evidence that they don’t. The only true deterrent is the threat of capture by the police which can’t happen under the Tories as they have cut police numbers leading to a criminal’s paradise. Of course, some people will ignore the evidence that is plentifully available if they can be bothered to look for it but there can’t be any people that stupid or lazy out there, can there?”

littlebopeep – “So what should the penalty be. A tap on the hand and don’t do it again? Sorry, cannot agree. Many of these children who have knives are well under age. Where are their families?”

thurrocksgonedownhill – “It would seem some on here would give them a new phone and trainers and tell them to play nicely… I guess that’s parasitic Labour voters for you.”

Valen (Myles) Cook – “littlebopeep – Well that’s a very stupid thing to say and not what I said. I didn’t say let violent criminals off. I merely stated that harsher punishments don’t deter criminals and there is evidence to that effect. What does deter criminals is the risk of capture so more police are necessary. The current sentences are sufficient if we had the police officers is sufficient number to increase the risk of capture. And I don’t know why you included stuff about children with knives in response to me when I didn’t include any reference to them in my comment. Perhaps you should try reading people’s comments properly before you reply.”

littlebopeep – “I suppose everyone is entitled to there opinion, but do feel that the threat of hanging might help.”

Valen (Myles) Cook – “littlebopeep – I’m sorry but I was not offering my opinion. I was presenting the result of many studies on the role of punishment on criminals. The result was that only the fear of getting caught provides sufficient deterrence because many criminals believe that they won’t get caught so won’t suffer any punishment. Get more police on the streets and you’ll see a reduction in crime. If a criminal doesn’t get caught having a sentence of hanging or whatever has absolutely no effect at all. Not only is what I said a fact, it’s a bleeding obvious fact.”

thurrocksgonedownhill – “Getting caught is really a deterrent…not. Going to prison is a badge of honour and all these studies are do gooder rubbish.

Here’s a fact- TBC & The Police spend tax payers money banning this so called E 17 gang from Grays, well that really scared them big time. Members of the gang were then seen in the town and even seen making video’s a week or so later and continue to be seen in the town.

“Maybe we should have another expensive study into the study that clearly didn’t tell them to play nicely.

“Blinkered Labour voters for you I guess.”

littlebopeep – “Sadly, common sense falls on deaf ears.”

thurrocksgonedownhill – “Littlebopeep your absolutely right, Sadly we live in a namby pamby society that rewards failure.

“People (in fact animals) who carry knifes and use them are taking another’s life and wrecking the lifes’ of the people left behind. Yet reading some of the comments on here from so called intelligent (sic) people you would be forgiven to believe that is ok.

“Hard line sentences is the only thing these feral no goods will understand.We don’t need parasitic imbeciles telling us all is fine…it’s Tory cuts to blame.”

[http://www.yourthurrock.com/2019/03/10/series-knifepoint-robberies-chafford-hundred/ (Accessed 12 March 2019)]

As you can see, a point I made was that harsh sentences aren’t a deterrent if the chances of being caught and punished are low.  At the current time, with the massive cuts to the policing budget which has seen a reduction of over 20,000 police officers on the streets of the UK and an increase of 14% in overall crime in just the last 12 months (gun crime up 20%, knife crime up 21%, robbery up 29%, vehicle theft up 18%, domestic burglary up 32%, and stalking crimes up 36%), the chances of being caught are low and getting lower all the time, especially as the number of police officers is at the lowest level since 1985.

So, is my point mere opinion on my part or does it have any intellectual weight behind it?  Well, as I have already stated, there are studies that have proven that, although harsh sentences have some deterrent effect, that effect is minimal compared to the chances of capture.  I wouldn’t ask you to take me purely at my word, that would not be right and proper, so I am going to back up my argument for more police on our streets being the only real effective deterrent by quoting some verifiable facts and expert opinion.

In Deterrence in the Twenty-First Century (2013), author Daniel S Nagin states that the main conclusions of his study are “First, there is little evidence that increases in the length of already long prison sentences yield general deterrent effects that are sufficiently large to justify their social and economic costs…Second, on the basis of the earlier noted Crime and justice review (Nagin, Cullen, and Jonson 2009), I have concluded that there is little evidence of a specific deterrent effect arising from the experience of imprisonment compared with the experience of noncustodial sanctions such as probation.  Instead, the evidence suggests that that reoffending is either unaffected or increased…Third, there is substantial evidence that increasing the visibility of the police by hiring more officers and allocating existing officers in ways that materially heighten the perceived risk of apprehension can deter crimes.  This evidence is consistent with the perceptual deterrence literature that surveys individuals on sanction risk perceptions and relates these perceptions to their actual or intended offending behaviour.  This literature finds that perceived certainty of punishment is associated with reduced self-reported or intended offending…Thus, I conclude, as have many prior reviews of deterrence research, that evidence in support of the deterrent effect of various measures of the certainty of punishment is far more convincing and consistent than for the severity of punishment.” [Crime and Justice Vol. 42, No. 1, Crime and Justice in America 1975–2025 (August 2013), pp. 199-263]

The National Institute of Justice website uses Mr Nagin’s work as the basis of its page called Five Things About Deterrence in which they translate some of the language into a more user-friendly type and boil down the entire article into five basic points.  The five points are: 1) “The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment.  Research shows clearly that the chance of being caught is a vastly more effective deterrent than even draconian punishment”, 2) “Sending an individual convicted of a crime to prison isn’t a very effective way to deter crime”, 3) “Police deter crime by increasing the perception that criminals will be caught and punished”, 4) “Increasing the severity of punishment does little to deter crime”, and 5) “There is no proof that the death penalty deters criminals”.  [https://nij.gov/five-things/pages/deterrence.aspx (Accessed 12 March 2019)]  The last point is rather moot as the UK doesn’t have a death penalty but does add something to our current discussion.

On the BBC Future website, the article The myth behind long prison sentences by Bryan Lufkin (posted 15 May 2018) states that: “Criminals seem to value the future less than non criminals, one study found, meaning that long sentences can seem “arbitrary”, and only work to deter up to a point. Education played a role too, with lesser educated criminals seemingly less put off by a harsher sentence.” [http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20180514-do-long-prison-sentences-deter-crime (Accessed 12 March 2019)]

In their article Sentence Severity and Crime: Accepting the Null Hypothesis, authors Anthony N Doob and Cheryl Marie Webster stated that “The literature on the effects of sentence severity on crime levels has been reviewed numerous times in the past twenty-five years.  Most reviews conclude that there is little or no consistent evidence that harsher sanctions reduce crime rates in Western populations.” [Crime and Justice Vol. 30 (2003), pp. 143-195]

A report from the National Research Council, The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences (2014), notes that “Evidence is limited on the crime prevention effects of most of the policies that contributed to the post-1973 increase in incarceration rates.  Nevertheless, the evidence base demonstrates that lengthy prison sentences are ineffective as a crime control measure. Specifically, the incremental deterrent effect of increases in lengthy prison sentences is modest at best.” [The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences (2014), pp. 155]  Please note:  You can pick up a free PDF copy of this report at https://www.nap.edu/catalog/18613/the-growth-of-incarceration-in-the-united-states-exploring-causes

So, given all the evidence to the contrary, what are we to do to reduce crime on our streets if harsher sentences aren’t going to do the job?

Well surely it’s obvious to even the most ignorant reader – we need to have a greater police presence to increase the chances of catching the criminals and punishing them.  However, how can we possibly increase police numbers without increasing the police budget?  We can’t.  The only way to increase police numbers and reduce crime is to stop cutting the police budget as the Tories have been doing for the best part of a decade and start to pump more money into the service.

Of course, this only addresses actually catching criminals and we are still left with the societal causes of crime beyond the basic greed inherent in human nature.  The same reasons that brought about the vote for Brexit are responsible for the increase in crime that a lack of police officers has caused – stagnant wages, lowering living standards, increasing poverty, a lack of funding for public services that has resulted in the shutting down of youth services which in turn has increased knife crime and gang culture.

The current age of austerity has exacerbated the already volatile tensions inherent in society at the lower end of the socio-economic ladder and the longer austerity goes on the more volatile things will become.  Austerity was always an ideological project by the Tories who were able to use the deficit and the global financial crash that started in the US to push through their ideological plans to strip the UK of its welfare system and National Health Service and reduce the State’s obligations to its citizens.  With orgasmic fervour the Tories have reduced spending in every department and created the powder keg that has seen such a large rise in the levels of crime across the board.  All of this they have done in the name of “reducing the deficit” (which was supposed to take five years and may now not be achieved in twenty) and paying off the UK debt, which is ironic as, despite austerity and the deaths and poverty it has caused, the debt has now risen to £2.1 trillion where it once sat at £979.8 billion as of May 2010.

The question to be asked is – if crime levels are increased by austerity (in the form of lower police numbers and volatile social conditions brought on by cuts to public services) and the national debt is actually rising, where has all that money that has been added to the national debt gone to?  Surely there’s enough money to increase police funding and funding to all the services that could alleviate the tensions in society and reduce crime?

It is generally accepted that you can’t cut a nation’s way out of a deficit/debt problem.  Austerity doesn’t work.  It is generally accepted that the only way out of a financial problem at the State level is to invest in infrastructure, in businesses, in education.  Anything else is folly, yet there seems to be no investment being made by the current government and yet they borrow more and more, cut more and more and the UK drowns under a tsunami of austerity-induced crime and national debt.  Who exactly is benefitting from austerity?  One thing’s for sure, it certainly isn’t the average person in the street and things will only get worse as the worst in human nature is revealed by the desperation felt outside the hallowed halls of Parliament.

Austerity is a political choice.  It will take an act of political will to reverse it.

We have a decision to make as a country – do we want to sink into a quagmire of crime and hatred fuelled by austerity or do we want to do better and become the better versions of ourselves that we could become if only we had the will to do so?

Update: since I wrote the above article the following statement was made by Institute for Fiscal Studies director Paul Johnson: “If the chancellor uses his headroom to find an extra £15bn for public services, he could say with more conviction that austerity is coming to an end.”

That one statement provides enough evidence that austerity could be ended.  The fact that it is not ending can therefore only be a political choice made by the Tories.

Mr Johnson also indicated that Brexit will negatively impact the economy meaning that the current volatile social situation exacerbated by austerity probably won’t get any better any time soon.  Mr Johnson stated: “There is a consensus that the economy would have been about 2 per cent bigger had the Brexit vote not occurred.”

He continued: “In those circumstances the deficit would have been smaller still and the fiscal room for manoeuvre greater. The end of austerity could already have been rather more decisively with us.”  [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/austerity-end-government-philip-hammond-ifs-report-a8822411.html (Accessed 14 March 2019)]

This provides more evidence placing the blame for the current economic situation solely in the hands of the Tories because it was the Tories, in trying to keep their own party from splitting along Euro-sceptic/pro-European lines, who brought about the EU Referendum that has split the UK along the only faultline that hadn’t already been cynically exploited to divide society.

Austerity and the damage it has caused was and always will be an act of political will by the Tories.  A choice that they could roll back on now they apparently have £15 billion extra to pump into public services but that they choose not to for their own ideological reasons.