Celebrating Post-Modernism in Journalism and the Media
The date was September 15, 2004. Trends take years to manifest, but often there is a watershed event at which one can say a tipping point has been reached. Such was the case when the New York Times ran the headline:
THE 2004 CAMPAIGN: NATIONAL GUARD; Memos on Bush Are Fake But Accurate, Typist Says
"Fake but Accurate" has become, even when the words differ slightly, a common refrain in post-modern journalism. It is a statement that the narrative matters more than facts, and that the truth or falsity of a narrative would no longer be judged solely on facts and logic.
I have zero opinion about the quality or quantity of President Bush's military service, but the memos in question were unquestionably fake. They used printing technology that did not exist at the time. They exactly mirrored Microsoft Word's default settings for font and margin. The person who supposedly typed the memos said she never did so, and no one could provide any plausible chain of possession for how the documents reached CBS. So fake. But CBS and many outlets stuck with the story in the face of all these facts because the narrative was one they so desperately wanted to be true, and fit so well their pre-existing opinions of Bush. Dan Rather and Mary Mapes have apparently never admitted they were fakes.
Recently, Robert Redford has reinforced this event as a seminal turning point in journalism by making a movie called, of all things, "Truth", which essentially still sticks to the story the memos weren't faked. He couldn't be more clearly making the point that in post-modern media, "truth" is the narrative, not the facts.
By the way, I find this every day in the climate world, where I hear "fake but accurate" all the time in defense of the narrative of apocalyptic man-made climate change. I can't tell you how many times that, having demolished some analysis as flawed (e.g. Michael Mann's hockey stick), I am told that, "well, that study may be wrong but it's still accurate."
