Nelson’s Corner | April 2024

As I begin my tenure in the Corner, I offer a few thoughts on the craft we practice in these pages.

Journalism is a threatened species. The primacy of social media marginalizes and handicaps real journalists as objective reporting offers little seduction in a world where Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram are considered reliable sources. Even the most — allegedly — reliable arbiters of complex matters are inclined to sell their wares with a dash of sensation or dollop of “give them what they want.” It is not hard to find a writer’s or editor’s implicit bias in a supposedly “objective” news story, even in the venerable The New York Times. In this corner, there will be no implicit bias. The bias will be quite explicit, as befits opinion writing.

One aspect of the surrender to commercial pressure is bending over backward to appear “objective,” thereby aiding and abetting a culture of false equivalence. The most absurd recent stumble was the 5-day reign of Ronna (Romney) McDaniel as a contributor to NBC News. This opportunistic Republican operative was so deep in Trump’s pocket that I’m surprised the NBC execs found her at all. You may wonder, “What were they thinking?” The answer is: “They weren’t.” The New York Times, Washington Post, MSNBC, and other purported “liberal” outlets hire conservative opinion writers to appear balanced. In rare cases, the efforts are useful but more often are contrived. As Stephen Colbert quipped at the 2006 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, “Reality has a well-known liberal bias.”

Despite reality’s liberal bias, I recognize the dangers of claiming the exclusive “truth.” In many complex matters, a variety of thoughtful perspectives can be illuminating. Good citizenship is cultivated through honest debate. But when you spend too much time bending over backward, falls like the McDaniel debacle are inevitable. Professor Walter Kotschnig offered cautionary advice in 1940 when he urged Mount Holyoke College students to keep their minds open — “but not so open that your brains fall out.”

The most rankling iterations of progressive surrender are found in the sad capitulation to the culture war barrages from the right flank. Take this paragraph from a recent New York Times op-ed by columnist Pamela Paul about Threads, the Meta version of Twitter/X:

“If progressives and liberals were provoked by Trumpers and Breitbart types on Twitter, on Threads they have the opportunity to be wounded by their own kind.

Threads’ algorithm seems precision-tweaked to confront the user with posts devoted to whichever progressive position is slightly lefter-than-thou. It knows, for example, exactly where — on the left, bien sûr — you stand with regard to the Middle East, gender ideology, D.E.I., body positivity, neurodivergence, Covid …”

The Middle East “standing” she apparently references is that of objections to the indiscriminate slaughter and starvation of Palestinians in Gaza. At least in that matter, the historic plight of Jews and the inhumanity of Hamas offer a plausible realm for discussion. But “gender ideology”? What precisely is that? Do she and others believe that gender identity is just a political gimmick on the left — a belief that should be balanced by good old heteronormative religious hokum? Or the nearly universal disdain for D.E.I, as though the acronym itself presents a clear danger to civilization? Or, heaven forbid, that women, in particular, should refrain from positive regard toward their own natural shape? Or “neurodivergence,” which, perhaps to Ms. Paul, is better expressed by “weird” or “disabled”? And what on earth is an oppressively progressive view on COVID-19?

The right wing and its morality goon squad have successfully marginalized or reversed much of the hard-won social progress of my lifetime. They have Stone-Aged women’s rights, outlawed anti-racism and the teaching of real history, burned books that exude a whiff of gayness, scrapped affirmative action, replaced bibliographies with Bibles, and demonized the most vulnerable in society. Protesting venomous speakers is recast as “cancel culture.” Sensitivity to the vulnerability of Black and other college students in the minority is ridiculed as “snowflake safe spaces.”

It is exceedingly disappointing to find that so many so-called liberals jump right on that apologetic bandwagon, often postulating that progressive “overreach” will cost elections. The best defense is a good offense. Liberals, Democrats, and Progressives (aka sane and humane people) should fight like hell for women, racial equity, the protection of the most vulnerable, and the need for social, judicial, and legislative efforts to those ends.

I expect to continue fighting like hell. I hope you’re in my corner.

Always happy to hear from you: [email protected].