Singapore Ink got first dibs on the news from ChannelNewsLater on A*Star’s press conference. After reading their post, I clicked on the link to ChannelNewsLater’s piece, and what do you know. Something smelly this way comes.
Extract from Singapore Ink’s post:
At a news conference on Friday, A*Star said it wanted Chen to retract the statements which it claimed were made on his blog.
A*Star said the post-graduate student made serious accusations that hit at the core of the organisation?s integrity, such as bribery, misuse of money and misbehaviour.
The former scholar had since April 26 taken the blog off-line and published an apology.
But A*Star said it wanted the student to apologise unreservedly, retract what he had previously said in his blogs and promise not to do it again.
It said it had given Chen till May 8 to respond and that it had no desire to go to the courts over the issue.
At a news conference on Friday, A*Star said it wanted Chen to retract the statements which it claimed were made on his blog.
A*Star said the post-graduate student made serious accusations that hit at the core of the organisation’s integrity.
But it could not comment on what exactly was defamatory due to legal constraints.
The former scholar had since April 26 taken the blog off-line and published an apology.
But A*Star said it wanted the student to apologise unreservedly, retract what he had previously said in his blogs and promise not to do it again.
It said it had given Chen till May 8 to respond and that it had no desire to go to the courts over the issue.
Ok, something stinks here, and it stinks real bad. Given the inconsistency between Singapore Ink’s reporting, and ChannelNewsLater, what is going on?
At this point in time, I am definitely inclined to trust the words of Singapore Ink as opposed to ChannelNewsLater. Unless ChannelNewsLater explains why the change in the writing, they will have on record that they’re doing something weaselly and stinky.
ChannelNewsLater, what is going on?
Singapore Ink. ? Accusations and counter-accusations
Channelnewsasia.com - A*Star seeks unreserved apology from blogger
18 Comments
It is definitely a subtle but drastic difference.
Well spotted.
What are they up to ? Don’t they know their every movement is being watched? I wonder how they feel now..
Even better than that–because many of us are out of the country, bloggers are actually watching their every move from different timezones! It’s like the British Empire, of which it was said that the sun never sets…
lol, where the sun never sets! That a good one.
Has anyone thought that even if the amendment and original are read in tendem it still makes sense?
ie.
my sentiments precisely Ivan. I guess this is one of the perils of the Internet: information only goes to those who actively search for it, those who do search for it have a point to prove. Han my darling, don’t be so harsh on CNA : )
The more ancient manuscript A reportedly says “x”, though we only know of it through quotation in other texts. The received manuscript B says “y”; while at least one late Medieval copy has “x and y”. There is a good chance that the late copy actually might have it right–for example, because both A and B are derived from an even more ancient Ur-text that has “x and y” but became the reduced forms because of scribal errors, whether through miscopying or doctrinal influences. Though it is also possible that the Medieval scribes–being loath to discard readings from any ancient manuscript, took the easy way out by simply combining the two readings, seeing that it would make sense. A nice little puzzle for the textual critic. As you can see, I am becoming delirious.
lol… huichieh u crack me up… hmm.. need to start reading ancient books on philosophy, or is it books on ancient philosophy
So the point being you never know unless you know of the source…?
pea:
well glad that someone thinks the same way as i do… however huichieh’s comment makes me rethink my position… hmmm… or at least makes me think why the change in words.
Heehee. From New Testament textual criticism actually. But many of the same principles apply to textual criticism in other areas (ancient Greek/Roman/Chinese texts, etc…).
By the way, something like the “x and y” reading appeared in the ST version of the story. Posted some comments on that issue. Nutshell, I’m beginning to think that perhaps, just perhaps, something like the combined reading appeared in the press conference itself. But I can’t be sure.
Here’s a real example: 1 John 1:4. Some ancient manuscripts have “…so that our joy may be complete”, others, “…so that your joy may be complete”, and one early translation (the Syriac or Armenian or something) has “…so that our joy and yours may be complete”. The difference is exactly only one letter: a upsilon or a eta, which, by the way, look like inverted versions of each other (u vs. n). In this case, it’s pretty obvious that the third “combined” reading is the attempt of some scribe, when translating from two manuscripts that show the two readings, took the safe way out rather than stand the chance of being someone accusing him of tempering with God’s word (poor scribes…). The big NT scholars today go with the first reading (our), but the reasoning is complicated. Not that it even makes a real doctrinal difference for 1 John as a whole.
Sorry Han for the offtopic, but things are so serious nowadays.
wah very cheem examples..but i still think that while there it is subtle the implications are drastic and that this points towards the change being very intentional (how do u change things ‘accidentally’?) indeed (not that its right or wrong to change, it just is).
One is so generalised and the other is specific. Naturally, when combined together, they will make sense, exactly because the specific sentence simply qualifies the former sentence’s general nature!
Eg: She has an unhealthy diet AND
She eats fatty steaks, greasy fries and a pint of coke every meal.
can simply be combined: She has an unhealthy diet, she eats fatty steaks, greasy fries and a pint of coke every meal.
If only the first sentence is constructed, readers will only form a generalised impression of her ‘unhealthy’ diet, whereas if the latter sentence is used, readers will have specific knowledge of what her diet consists of.
So for whatever reasons, CNA thought it wisest to remain deliberately vague..
Good observations Redrown. Let’s lay all the know facts on the table:
CNA#1: “A*Star said the post-graduate student made serious accusations that hit at the core of the organisation?s integrity, such as bribery, misuse of money and misbehaviour.” (as captured by Ink)
CNA#2: “A*Star said the post-graduate student made serious accusations that hit at the core of the organisation?s integrity. But it could not comment on what exactly was defamatory due to legal constraints.”
ST: “A*Star declined to reveal the exact nature of the statement on its lawyers’ advice, as this would amount to repeating the libel. Such remarks could include direct accusations of bribery and misuse of public money, for example.”
(Notice that in ST, the second sentence is non-committal as to whether it is a comment by A*Star, or an explanation provided by the journalist)
* * * * *
Ok, now about those ancient manuscripts of the bible. The situation is this:
- Manuscript A originally has “God said ‘x’”, crossed out, and replaced with “God said ‘y’”.
- Manuscript B says “God said ‘y’, and that may be like ‘x’”
The textual critic conjectures:
1. Both A and B are derivative of an earlier Manuscript C that probably says something like “God said ‘x and y’”.
2. The scribe who gave us the final form of A had access to C, but somehow felt that having God say ‘x’ or ‘x and y’ is doctrinally incorrect; so he stuck to “God said ‘y’”.
3. The scribe who gave us B also had access to C. Furthermore, he seems to consider himself smarter. On the one hand, he wants to preserve both ‘x’ and ‘y’, but understanding the doctrinal controversies surrounding the former, wrote in an additional qualifier.
Heh thanks for ‘cheem’ifying my layman examples. I am not so well versed with academia of such and I shall stick to simple examples:)
I wish to further add that such careful use of language, while seemingly innocuous, can be cunningly deceptive as well.
Think of a scenario where a girl is forbidden from clubbing by her mum and one day she wants to go clubbing, but she does not want to lie.
Mum: Where are you going?
Girl: I am going out with some friends
Mum: Ok, have fun, don’t come home too late.
Rather than
Mum: Where are you going?
Girl: I am going out clubbing with some friends.
Mum: You are forbidden from clubbing. You cannot go.
(Remember she does NOT want to lie, in the 1st instance, she is technically not telling a lie, yet she gets to get her cake and eat it)
As we can see, the Girl cannot said to be Lying per se, but the impression of her intentions given to her mum in the 1st and 2nd example are very different
Of course, in CNA’s situation it is not about lying or deception or whatever, it is about not wanting to publish false or inaccurate facts.
CNA#1: “bribery, misuse of money and misbehaviour” - stated as fact. If found to be falsetious or inaccurate, may be liable to lawsuits. Also, may be used against them if in future, ’suddenly’ other accusations ‘pop’ into the equation.
CNA#2: “legal constraints” - wide scope, generalised. If this was ‘really’ the reasons which PY has given to them before, it ensures they do not hinder PY who are certainly researching and looking for additional substantive grounds on their allegations, which would elsewise may be delimited by CNA’s threefold grounds.If its not, well, then they are reporting facts wrongly. Both ways, generalisation seems a better option.
ST#1: Indeed non committal, perhaps trying to cover up the kinks in CNA that were spotted by eagle eyed bloggers by adopting a similar strategy of Ivan’s (ie fusing both statements together to show that it can form one coherent whole, but they went one step further by ensuring it was phrased in a non commital way;)
Did I also mention maintaining an atmosphere of uncertainty is a great strategy? That the worst enemy is one that you are not sure about? AcidFlask has repeatedly said he has not been told exactly what was defamatory. Using this uncertainty and fear of litigation, would a lesser mortal not submit ? If AcidFlask was told in no uncertain terms what PY construed as defamatory and why, would AcidFlask not be able to read his own alleged defamatory words himself and decide for certain if what he wrote was really defamatory?
With the boon of certainty, would AcidFlask then be able to adopt a certain strategy as well?
One scenario is whereby he does realise his words are indeed libel and post a conclusive apology.
The alternative is whereby he feels that his words are not defamatory, and take a confident stand against PY. Right now, he is in limbo, which is exactly what PY wants, because most people in such a situation would ‘err to the side of caution’ and make an unreserved apology’.
We often forget that newspaper editors are not dumb, and neither are journalists. And we do forget news selection is governed by newsworthiness, news values and - as much as you choose to remain skeptical about - ethics. The very fact that we have to take govtal press releases as the official word is due to the unwillingness of Singaporeans to speak up, and because they simply have to produce a daily read in 10 hours everyday and the only people willing to fill in news holes are govtal sources.
On an almost totally unrelated note, I personally know journalists on the ground for CNA and really, journalism is not just a job, it’s a passion (and i know this perfectly well. i’m a media student yet no way am i going into journ cos it’s very tough :P). Those in this line know what they want and do abide by their journalistic ethics (if they want to lie, be a PR Officer lah!). In fact, I’ve been told they most of them are anti-government.
For AcidFlask’s case, I don’t think CNA meant to conceal anything. Seriously. Blog posts have no word limits whatsoever but news articles observe several layers of editing and stringent lengths. Further the audience they reach is vastly different: CNA reaches the masses while bloggers reach people who specifically source for information on their websites.
Both sources of information take into account different considerations while editing their content: being bloggers we understand our point of view but shouldn’t we take a step further to understand the newsroom?
Bottomline: we are now exposed to alternative sources of information so why don’t we just make full use of it, instead of complain about the inadequacies of the paper when we know it’s bounded by more restrictions than the Internet database?
I can go on about the workings of the media tied in with the government affected by public opinion, (see Walter Lippmann’a agenda-setting model of any of you are interested) having studied about these issues for the past 2 years of my life. But being the intelligent bloggers you guys are, I’m sure I don’t have to go into that right?
: D
I think folks are aware that news reports are done by real people behind a computer. It’s just in this particular instance, there are just quite a few things that could have been done right by an intern, at first glance.
The first thing I did after I read the first ‘funny’ CNA report was to google for other works by the same writer. They are really not bad. So why is this particular CNA report ‘weird’? What’s the real story behind this? Maybe that’s what the other bloggers are trying to discern. And then comes later reports, which I agree with you doesn’t really mean they are trying to ‘conceal anything’, and naturally people’s sensitivities are heightened to hidden meanings between the lines and so on haha
And so, the thrust of our inquiries is not just about CNA per se, but like you say, the people who give them the stories! (But of course, I personally am very interested to know what goes on in newsrooms too!)
I think Lippmann’s model can be quite neutral, maybe just to raise ratings, still not so bad. But sometimes governments can take advantage of this to their benefit, like, of course, manufacturing consent to war. (Bush’s brilliant use of CNN syndrome). But like you say, it’s just the way it is…
i don’t personally know the law on defamation in singapore, but i daresay i’m relatively well-versed on it’s british equivalent on which it’s presumably based. wouldn’t any responsible press agency be able to raise both the defences of fair comment (since the public clearly has an interest and it may not be an assertion of fact) and qualified privilege (based on the principle of repricocity to the public), which would make their reporting a tad more open? as in (Reynolds v. Times Newspapers).
and more fundamentally, isn’t it a basic rule of defamation that any material which is TRUE may not be defamatory?
you might want to re-clarify that stand. As with all laws and rules, there are exceptions to exceptions, or legal circumvention/creativity.
well in english law as long as a statement made is ’substantially true’, it may not be defamatory, even in dubious circumstances, raising the defence of justification. see grobbelar v. news group newspapers and the Defamation Act s5.
of course the burden of proof is on the defendant on a balance of probabilities. if the statement is in fact substantially true is, however, a matter ultimately for the jury (defamation is the only civil action remaining that requires the use of a jury, although the Court of Appeal and House of Lords may overturn a ‘perverse’ decision). in this case it seems to me that there is sufficient unequivocal evidence to raise such a defence.
the only time it may not be used is if the defence of innocent defamation has already been raised, but i don’t think that even comes close to applying here.
i’ll keep it short as sweet.
justification deals with the defamatory meaning, not statement.
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