The downward spiral of Paxman
Got back from work tonight just in time to catch most of Jeremy Paxman's half hour interview with Charles Kennedy - one in a sequence of interviews with the main party leaders. Paxman probably feels this is a great coup for cutting edge political media. Or maybe he just got ordered to do it the way he got ordered to do the weather on Newsnight. Either way, it was dire. The trademark Paxman sneer and complete disregard for anything the interviewee says were in full effect. The BBC loves this style as it's 'hard on the politicians', 'doesn't let them off the hook', 'no kid gloves' etc. But I defy anyone to watch this kind of 'interview' and come out any the wiser about any of the political issues involved in the election, let alone what the politician being interviewed thinks on any particular topic.
It genuinely worries me that the king of TV interviewing in this country is a boorish misanthrope who built a career out of casually insulting people. But would I rather a 'soft soap' interviewing style which lets the politicians say what they like? Well, yes, actually. Give politicians enough rope and they will hang themselves. A skilled interviewer will often be able to ask probing and difficult questions without being aggressive - and when they aren't answered he/she can point it out. (In fact a strap line could appear at the bottom of the screen saying, 'interviewee has not answered question', 'statement is false', etc. - even if this were not possible in real time, the interview could be stored for replay on the web or digital TV.)
Yesterday's Observer featured an article on just this topic, reporting that Channel 4 News's Jon snow had 'called of an end to cynical interviews after criticism that sneering presenters are undermining public debate.' Snow's argument is that 'lack of deference' has gone too far, but 'deference' is the wrong word to use. Actually it's what Hunter S Thompson called the 'downward spiral of dumbness'. Broadcasters assume that politicians are lying (admittedly often true), and so refuse to acknowledge or take at face value any sort of answer to a question. Meanwhile, politicians have no incentive to answer the questions the broadcasters pose, and no incentive not to lie - what could they possibly gain from telling the truth? they will be pilloried whatever they say. And we wonder why no-one can be bothered to vote for this journalistic chainsaw massacre.
It genuinely worries me that the king of TV interviewing in this country is a boorish misanthrope who built a career out of casually insulting people. But would I rather a 'soft soap' interviewing style which lets the politicians say what they like? Well, yes, actually. Give politicians enough rope and they will hang themselves. A skilled interviewer will often be able to ask probing and difficult questions without being aggressive - and when they aren't answered he/she can point it out. (In fact a strap line could appear at the bottom of the screen saying, 'interviewee has not answered question', 'statement is false', etc. - even if this were not possible in real time, the interview could be stored for replay on the web or digital TV.)
Yesterday's Observer featured an article on just this topic, reporting that Channel 4 News's Jon snow had 'called of an end to cynical interviews after criticism that sneering presenters are undermining public debate.' Snow's argument is that 'lack of deference' has gone too far, but 'deference' is the wrong word to use. Actually it's what Hunter S Thompson called the 'downward spiral of dumbness'. Broadcasters assume that politicians are lying (admittedly often true), and so refuse to acknowledge or take at face value any sort of answer to a question. Meanwhile, politicians have no incentive to answer the questions the broadcasters pose, and no incentive not to lie - what could they possibly gain from telling the truth? they will be pilloried whatever they say. And we wonder why no-one can be bothered to vote for this journalistic chainsaw massacre.
4 Comments:
I agree that interviewers have mistaken a harsh or bullying approach for an incisive one. It's also a question of what the broadcaster is aiming to get out of the interview. I want to pursue the second of these.
Although (for example) the Today programme typically only allocates a few minutes per interview, the interviewers still aim for a broad discussion when the pursuit of a single point might be far more instructive. Through this approach, interviewers puts themselves in a difficult position. They are thus pressed to get through a lot in a limited time. The interviewee knows this, and so only needs to repel an attack for a few seconds before the interviewer feels compelled to move on. This is where the "hard on the politicians" argument falls down for me: the interview simply can't get any depth.
I'm not sure that the bluster is all that really differentiates the likes of Paxman and Humphrys from the rest, but it is distracting, and may even take the pressure off the interviewee. Too much of the "soft soap" can be bad too, though. I saw Wolf Blitzer interview George Bush for the 2000 US election. Bush declined to answer a question on abortion. Blizter pressed; Bush declined again. Blizter moved on to the next question...
I agree completely that the 'soft soap' style is disastrous if it results in a failure to ask intelligent questions, or to press for the answer to a question. Out-front bias is even worse; many of the "journalists" on Fox News crucify anyone on the Left, and it's the Right that gets the soft soap.
Again there is much here that is good - the 'soft soap' approach may have the impact of disarming people and leaving them free to dig themselves into a very large hole. I dislike the Paxman approach intensely unless directed against the hard left (Respect coalition, Labour left -wingers, Pro-Saddamites, etc)- The Kennedy interview was a fiasco.
A quick point to be made in response to the jibe at Fox News is that on the BBC(For which every household in the UK is obliged to pay - unlike Fox News), the 'soft soap' approach is almost never adopted with right-wing personalities, and it is people like arch-stalinists Mandelson and Brown who are treated in hagiographic fashion.
Van Patten - give me ONE specific example of where the BBC have given Brown or Mandelson an easy ride. And as for not having to pay for Fox News - I don't have to pay for CO2 in the atmosphere either but that doesn't mean it isn't very dangerous.
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