From top: Irish Times article on Sinn Féin’s ‘opposition’ to new housing; Anthony Sheridan
On June 25 last the Irish Times published an article under the headline:’Sinn Féin has opposed building of 6,000 homes across Dublin, says Fine Gael report’.
There was strong reaction to the piece on social media with many feeling it was little more than a propaganda piece for Fine Gael, facilitated by the Irish Times and designed to damage Sinn Féin in the run-up to the by-election in Dublin Bay South.
Whatever the truth or otherwise of this claim, the journalist Jennifer Bray’s response to the online criticism tells us absolutely nothing about Sinn Féin.
It does, however, tell us a great deal about Irish journalism. Here’s her tweet:
Another day on Twitter. Called a despicable propagandist amongst many other slurs. Many by faceless trolls. It is most often on foot of articles about Sinn Féin. I mute and block & am totally grand but it would be nice to see SF TDs who are tagged in this stuff call it out.
— Jennifer Bray (@Jennifer_Bray) June 25, 2021
In these 53 words Ms. Bray seemingly abandons journalistic integrity and descends to the undergrowth where the trolls live and operate.
A deconstruction of her tweet reveals the truth of this conclusion.
”Called a despicable propagandist”
This opinion may be harsh but it is legitimate. It is not unknown for establishment media to publish reports from favoured sources and pass them off as genuine articles particularly in the run up to elections.
“among many other slurs“
Irrelevant – no facts provided.
“Many faceless trolls“
Anonymous trolls are a fact of life on social media and should be ignored or reported if possible.
“It is most often on foot of articles about Sinn Fein“
This is where Ms. Bray’s journalistic integrity takes flight. She is clearly implying, without evidence, that Sinn Féin is guilty of attacking her on social media. Many will not see the words ‘it is most often’. They will focus on the words ‘Sinn Fein’ and think – oh it’s that nasty Sinn Féin party attacking people again.
As a journalist it is likely Ms. Bray is aware of this. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that her offensive suggestion appeared designed to damage Sinn Féin. If that is the case then she is guilty of the same loathsome social media behaviour she so stridently condemns in others.
“I mute and block and am totally grand“
This is a victim plea designed to attract sympathy. Portraying oneself as a victim struggling against adversity strengthens an accusation particularly an accusation without evidence.
“But it would be nice to see SF TDs who are tagged in this stuff call it out“
Ms. Bray will be aware that it is impossible for Sinn Féin or any other group to control what other people publish on social media. She will also be aware that it is easy for anybody to create an anonymous account with the aim of smearing those they wish to damage. The recent Eoghan Harris scandal is a particularly nasty example of this strategy.
It is therefore reasonable to conclude that this final comment is an attempt to associate individual Sinn Féin TDs with abusive social media trolls.
Ms. Bray has a responsibility above that of ordinary users on social media platforms. She writes for a newspaper that enjoys a great deal of trust and respect among the population. As an opinion maker she wields a great deal of influence on how people form their opinions.
When she writes from the troll undergrowth she damages her own reputation and betrays the trust of her readers.
Anthony Sheridan is a freelance journalist and blogs at Public Enquiry.
…the best and the brightest,she sounds absolutely insufferable and unsuited to her job,this is just fabulist fiction…..
NO ABUSE PLEASE-its a student rag that no one,no one cares about , your just not that important.
… I did write for one issue for the Observer, I switched over to the far superior (no abuse, please) College Tribune and ended up editing that. While there I managed to get a few stories into the Sunday Tribune and I basically pestered the editors until they gave me an internship while I was in college. I seem to remember telling them when my internship ended that I would be back the following Tuesday regardless, and would chain myself to the desk if they tried to make me leave. I got a few odd looks but it worked in the end.
https://www.eolasmagazine.ie/meet-the-media-14/
‘She writes for a newspaper that enjoys a great deal of trust and respect among the population’
That’s debatable
Well said Anthony. Far too much of this goes on uncontested.
So many people screeching and bellowing about bizarre anti-vax conspiracies, creating noise, and playing into the hands of FF/FG leeches as they parcel up the country and mortgage it off for future generations to pay.
‘but it is legitimate.’
If only you took the time to SHOW that it’s legitimate instead of generalising that under certain circumstances it MIGHT be legitimate. Anyone would think she was writing an article and you were restricted to tweet-size wordcounts, not the other way round.
‘No facts provided.’
I think you mean ‘no examples provided.’ Unless you’re calling her a liar, she has presented a fact – namely that other slurs are directed at her. If you’re going to deconstruct a tweet in order to undemine someone’s journalistic integrity, some precision would seem to be called for, or you’re just indulging in hatchetry.
‘Anonymous trolls are a fact of life’
When you’re trying to deconstruct a tweet but there’s a line you can’t deconstruct but you want to make it seem as if the tweeter is doing something wrong, frame your stating of the obvious and your banal unsolicited advice in a way that implies a moral failing on the part of the tweeter.
‘She is clearly implying’
You have to work hard at this one, since it’s a pretty bare statement of her own experience. Nowhere does she imply Sinn Fein the party is behind the attacks – the only thing she’s implying is that the SF Party is ignoring the attacks – and you have to attribute some pretty masterful powers of suggestion on her part to make it work, then build to the crescendo of calling her loathesome just for talking about being harassed online. When you’ve twisted yourself into the positon that harassing someone online and talking publicly about that harassment are equally loathesome, you may have disqualified yourself from the job of assessing other people’s integrity.
‘This is a victim plea designed to attract sympathy.’
No it’s not. if you’re going to treat every aspect of her tweet as entirely self-serving and cynical, it’s a show of srength designed to elicit admiration for courage and hardiness. But most normal people would treat it as a straightforward disclaimer that she deals with these things routinely and moves on.
‘It is therefore reasonable to conclude that this final comment is an attempt to associate individual Sinn Féin TDs with abusive social media trolls.’
Seems more like she’s actually offering SF TDs an opportunity to dissociate themselves from abusive people who claim to be SF supporters. I’d say the trolls who attack her for criticising SF are the ones actually associating themselves with SF, if we’re being accurate about it. Whether they are real or fake works out more or less the same for SF TDs in terms of responses. They can ignore it, they can attack the victim, as you have done here, they can acknowledge it and criticise it and call for supporters to dial it back a bit, or deneounce them as fake. Even if the real or fake accounts ignore this latter action, SF TDs will at least have made their position clear.
So you took a fairly bog-standard I’m-being-harassed tweet and subjected it to a spectacularly bad-faith reading in order to attack the person being harassed for daring to point out that writing articles about SF seems to attract a lot of harassment, and you have the cheek to claim you have discredited her journalistic integrity in the process? Ths is weak, nasty stuff and I don’t know if it’s supposed to pass for analysis or opinion or what, but it’s the dregs of journalism and bad writing. The Irish Times may be in serious decline, but the quality of its critics is way ahead of it on the downward slope.
I wouldn’t consider being called a ‘despicable propagandist’ to be harassment.
Do you think it’s okay to say someone deserves hatred and contempt?
…i’m not judgy but in the link above,she is complaining about her writing,she writes for the Irish Times,i dont know why she is fishing for compliments like this,but some would consider that a bit you know much for a writer at the IT,just saying…
…. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy a glass or two of red wine and a block of cheese. I have always wanted to write a book but I never get around to it because I’m convinced the ideas are awful and my friends might disown me…
‘Whatever the truth or otherwise of this claim,’
One last thing – if I were actually out to challenge someone’s journalistic integrity, this right here, the truth or otherwise of the claim, would seem like the actual place to start, not a tweet about being harassed online. The reality of the online harassment has absolutely nothing to do with the truth or otherwise of the claim, it’s also not journalism, it’s just a tweet, but you chose to focus on the thing that isn’t journalism instead of the journalism. Everything about this article stinks.
Has Mr. Sheridan struck a nerve Nigel?
Yes, Giggidy, the really atrocious argument nerve.
Sheridan’s summation has basically been proven when you look at the tweet and the comments after it. It was a tweet to attract anti SF comment. It half succeeded, but some of the replies called her out, and she didn’t answer.
The date of the tweet, and (if you scroll down) the connection between her and Geoghegan says a lot about the timing and intention.
In the meantime, why don’t people just grow up and ditch twitter?
If Sheridan’s summation has been proved by things Sheridan didn’t bother to include in his article, that just underlines how atrocious Sherdian’s article is. I’m also not sure why someone who spends most of their time here making anti-political party comments would be especially bothered by the existence of other anti-political party comments on a different platform or treat it as proof of anything in particular, (other than personal immaturity, I suppose? )
Not bothered at all. I’m pointing out things that you, ahem, failed to research or account for in your own diatribe.
You spend quite a lot of your time ‘here’ too Nigel. Well, isn’t that odd? Sauce for the goose
If you want to go down the immaturity road, have a look over your contributions over the past while.
I think you mean things that Sheridan failed to research. They’re not in the article.
He can’t be holding your hand now can he?. Do some work yourself to understand why he’s written the article.
The proof of the pudding is the replies to the tweet.
I don’t think including the things in the article that prove the pudding you are trying to make in the article is excessive handholding, it’s generally regarded as basic good writing.
She will follow the party line of the IT and heap abuse on SF.
“It is most often on foot of articles about Sinn Fein“
This is where Ms. Bray’s journalistic integrity takes flight. She is clearly implying, without evidence, that Sinn Féin is guilty of attacking her on social media. Many will not see the words ‘it is most often’. They will focus on the words ‘Sinn Fein’ and think – oh it’s that nasty Sinn Féin party attacking people again.
Eh… Nope. I didn’t, and I don’t believe anyone would conclude that the “party” are the ones’ doing the trolling.
Again, nope. Silly comment, in fairness.
‘most often’
Can we look forward now to a similar tweet about ‘almost most often’ replies to her tweets. ?
This was a terrible piece Anthony… just woeful.
Shameful stuff…poor form from Broadsheet.
Being in Australia, I see similar tweets by Aussie journalists – Leigh Sales being the prime example. I can summarise Leigh’s responses to criticism on Twitter as “I don’t like being criticised on Twitter, so I will refer to these valid criticisms of my biased work as the work of anonymous trolls. Don’t they realise I am a self-important journalist”.
I love being able to provide feedback directly to journalists.
There is a general received deficiency in the major media of this state. I would love to know how much of the times/rte, the journal, newstalk etc advertising revenue came from the government. All those one-page covid ads , et cetera most have cost a pretty penny.
It could be argued that this relationship makes in major media outlets less likely to bite the hand that feeds them , and indeed publish articles that benefit them.
I am also not a fan of how journalists, commentators are allowed to blindly dismiss legitimate concerns by labelling them as Sinn Fein propaganda et cetera.
Spot on in your analysis Mr Sheridan.
The lack of integrity for what passes as Irish journalism is laughable
For too long the “Irish” Times along with the D.O’B owned media has been a mouthpiece for FFG and whichever one is in with them out of the lick spittle parties of labour and the Greenwashers
https://twitter.com/AranFitzpatrick/status/1414622818608766977
Varadkars asteroid hasn’t hit has it? Big headline 4-5 years ago in the Irish Times about how the NCH would be built by 2020 – unless we were hit by an asteroid. Now, there’s a little update that the IT could be pursuing – and Covid isn’t to blame either. No? Advertising lolly too important?