NY Times Started nearly a half-century ago as a chronicle of 1960s
counterculture, Rolling Stone established its journalistic credibility
with provocative coverage of politics and current affairs.[...]
The magazine seemed to have struck again last month with a vivid account of a young woman who said she was gang-raped at a University of Virginia fraternity party, a story that helped drive the national debate over the problem of sexual assault on college campuses. [ Original Rolling Stone article with apology]
But
late last week Rolling Stone found itself facing a crisis that
threatened its reputation as a place for serious, significant
journalism. Faced with reporting in The Washington Post
that appeared to undermine crucial details of the accuser’s account,
and a rebuttal of some aspects from the fraternity, the magazine published a note
to readers on Friday saying that it had reservations about the article.
It also acknowledged that it had erred in relying solely on the word of
the accuser, named only as Jackie, and in agreeing not to try to
contact the men she accused.
“I
have serious questions about what happened, and I am at this point not
ready to say what happened that night,” the magazine’s managing editor,
Will Dana, said in an interview Friday. “There should never be a story
in Rolling Stone where I feel that way.” [...]
Rolling
Stone was harshly criticized by media critics for its journalistic
lapses, and by women’s groups who said it set back the cause of
encouraging sexual assault victims to come forward. [...]
The
accuser appeared to be distressed, perhaps as a result of her trauma,
according to a person familiar with the newsroom’s process, who spoke on
the condition of anonymity in order to describe sensitive events. She
had repeatedly asked Ms. Erdely that those she accused of raping her not
be contacted. When the magazine brought up the issue again later, she
threatened to withdraw from the story. [...]
The
magazine faces some potential legal liability, said Eugene Volokh, a
University of California, Los Angeles, law professor who also writes for
The Washington Post. “Based on the facts as I have read about them in
the media,” he said, “I would not have approved the publication of a
story that names a fraternity, when there hadn’t been a call to the
alleged rapists.” [...]
From the article: "Sabrina had talked to quite a few other women who had said, ‘If you talk to me, you can’t go talk to my attacker’ ” Mr. Dana said, and so it seemed like a reasonable request."
ReplyDeleteTo my mind, such demands should raise a red flag in the mind of any serious journalist. It makes me wonder whether anything they publish can be trusted. Clearly, their standards are flexible, to say the least.