Tag: Topic

Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel?


Media Law Journal, Poneke (first, second, third), Public Address: Hard News, OnPoint, Kiwiblog (first, second), No Right Turn, Deltoid (first, second, third), Audent (first, second), Southern Dave, Barista, Tim Jones, from the morgue, Website.net.nz, Scoop.

[Update: Media7 coverage here, plus a somewhat confused David Cohen in the NBR]

[Update 2: International Journal of Inactivism, Mediawatch (27/4, Radio New Zealand).]

If you come across any more, stick ’em in the comments, and I’ll promote them to the post.

[Wikipedia, butterfliesandwheels.com]

The law won (again)

Correction and apology to The Listener and its editor Pamela Stirling

On 16 April 2008 we published on this site an article written by Gareth Renowden entitled “Climate cranks claim a scalp”. That article suggested that Dave Hansford had been sacked by The Listener as a result of views that he expressed on climate change, and that The Listener had caved in to pressure from the NZ Climate Science Coalition, or had sacked him because his views did nor coincide with those of The Listener‘s editor, Pamela Stirling. The article also questioned The Listener‘s commitment to environmental issues and its editorial integrity and independence, and was critical of its conduct with respect to Mr Hansford. In fact Mr Hansford was not sacked by The Listener, and nor did The Listener seek to censor or suppress Mr Hansford’s views. Hot Topic and AUT Media Ltd accept that The Listener and its editor have a strong commitment to environmental issues, and that there was no basis for any of the criticisms expressed on this site of either The Listener or its editor, or of the editorial integrity and independence of The Listener. Hot Topic and AUT Media Ltd unreservedly withdraw those statements an apologise to The Listener and to Pamela Stirling for the distress caused by our publication.

More on The Listener

Listener.jpg The Listener’s unfortunately timed decision to drop Dave Hansford as its Ecologic columnist is certainly making waves around the blogs, and is now being taken up by the general media. John Drinnan covers the story in the Herald today, and the issue has been commented on at Hard News, No Right Turn, Poneke, and (for balance, of course 😉 ) at Kiwiblog. Meanwhile Hansford has been interviewed for next week’s Media7 programme, and the issue is expected to be covered by Mediawatch on RadioNZ National this weekend. The comments here have been lively too – look for posts by some of the key players – including sceptics.

I’ll bring you more on this story as it develops. In the meantime, I offer you this article from the BBC, which discusses how a responsible media organisation should approach the question of balance in climate coverage. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to determine how the Listener performs in that context.

I’ll drown in my own tears

homer.jpg But tears of laughter or tears of frustration? I honestly don’t know whether to laugh or cry (but I’ve certainly got the blues) about a “Viewpoints” feature in this week’s Listener – here’s the intro that runs above two single page articles:

The latest UN climate change conference canvassed many opinions. The Listener asked people from opposite sides of the debate to share their views.

On the crank side we have Bryan Leyland and Chris de Freitas. The “balancing” view comes from Professor Dave Kelly, an ecologist from the University of Canterbury (previews only – full text available after April 19). As I’ve said before, framing the discussion about climate change as a “debate” and with only two sides (it’s real/it isn’t) is highly misleading because it misrepresents the balance of evidence – and I’ll be returning to that in more depth in a future post. But what really brought tears to my eyes were the outright lies from the cranks. CdF repeats some of the untruths in his last outing in the Herald, and BL adds a few more of his own. Here we go again…

Continue reading “I’ll drown in my own tears”