Comments on: Busting Mr. Daisey

By: btomdarga

btomdarga — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 22:48:24 +0000

“He is an actor -writer calling attention to our supporting abusive working conditions”

And he just set that caused back.

By: btomdarga

btomdarga — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 22:46:11 +0000

“Its not Mike Daisy’s job to be honest, its his job to tell the truth as he sees it.” – dramadefender

“It is not the responsibility of the playwright to be factually accurate.” – SethDuerr

Being Honest damn well IS the job of anyone who wants to be believed and taken seriously by the people he is trying to motivate/educate.

Daisey’s lies will only make the work of those trying to educate the public about REAL abuses of workers that much harder. All of your rationalizations will not change that.

dramadefender,

“The truth as I know it” might be based on untruths that I think are true, but by definition it cannot be based on untruths that I KNOW are untrue. If you are saying something that you know to be untrue, then you are NOT telling the “truth as you know it”.

Please explain how someone can tell the truth without being honest?

By: dramadefender

dramadefender — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 17:15:25 +0000

Daisy is not, and never has been, a journalist. Ira Glass artfully constructed a show around Daisy’s theater piece and assumed that the artist was telling the truth because the artist said he was. Daisy’s work tells the truth via the illumination and interpretation of contemporary society. To constantly confound his criticism with its overt bias with the nonobjective standards of journalism is pushing forward blatant mistruths about the very nature of art. It is an attack on art itself. Its not Mike Daisy’s job to be honest, its his job to tell the truth as he sees it. Ira Glass is the only one in this conversation who was a journalist. And he made a poor choice. If you ask me, his follow up, using all of the immense skills he has as a creative radio genius, was pure character assassination.

First he constructed a show around Daisy’s monologue. This wasn’t a presentation of Daisy’s work in its totality. It was 15 minutes of a 48 minute show. And it wasn’t fact checked. Google exists. That show was TAL’s most popular not because of Daisy, but because of the narrative storytelling of Glass. And he didn’t check his facts. When he got caught, not Daisy, when he got caught, he then used his skills as a radio host to construct an audio record that allowed him to confess and place blame at the same time. And you fell for it.

Once again, Mike Daisy doesn’t have to tell truth. He has to tell a story. That is what he does. Up next, Arthur Miller’s The Crucible: What really happened?

By: SethDuerr

SethDuerr — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 04:23:48 +0000

To “ChKen”:

Yes, they were part his play, either essential truth of storytelling within the theater or publicity for that story outside. Mr. Daisey is not qualified to report facts as a journalist and it is solely the fault of Mr. Glass and his producers if they have an issue with their own failure to adequately confirm the facts.

By: SethDuerr

SethDuerr — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 04:22:05 +0000

To “The Dollar Game”:

I don’t care what Mr. Daisey did or did not say or what parts of it were factually accurate or not. If journalists want to legitimately practice their profession it is incumbent on them to perform proper fact-checking. Taking a playwright’s word on any factual statements as opposed to just the essence of his story is ludicrous. Glass admits that he and his program failed to fact-check. That’s the end of it. Mr. Daisey was on the program to publicize his essential story, not report facts as a journalist.

By: CapitalismSays

CapitalismSays — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 21:19:58 +0000

When are people going to learn? Everything you read has a spin put on it, intentionally or not. No one is so removed from the world that they can be truly independent every time. Welcome to human nature 101. Get your news from multiple sources and multiple view points and draw your own conclusions.

And to whoever mentioned Michael Moore getting it right…I’m really having a hard time with that one. Given the amount of spin he puts on everything he does, I’m surprised he can walk straight. He may use facts, but that doesn’t count for much when you portray them in whatever way furthers your own views…even if those views are right. Numbers don’t lie, but you can make them say whatever you want.

By: jamois

jamois — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 19:48:39 +0000

Hey, Jack – The “one-man theatrical performance” you suggest in your last paragraph has already been done. By Mike Daisey. It was called “Truth (the heart is a million little pieces above all things)”. In it, Daisey took on the fabulist James Frey and fictional author J.T. LeRoy. Irony much?

I assume you’re looking for someone else to create your “one-man theatrical performance.”

By: Ex-journalist

Ex-journalist — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 19:10:06 +0000

A major problem with This American Life (TAL) is that it pretends to be a news and information program, but in fact, is entertainment. This is not the first time TAL has been caught using fabricated material. Jack Shafer wrote about a piece by Malcolm Gladwell in 2008 that TAL swallowed whole and broadcast without apology or correction — even though much of it was “bunk,” as Shafer detailed. A piece put together by TAL shortly after the Penn State scandal last fall pretended to be journalism, but actually was extremely shoddy reporting. Many contributors to TAL are stand-up comics, not journalists. The program should either raise its standards and do some real reporting, or clearly label material as pure story telling that is not necessarily true or verifiable.

By: truthynesslover

truthynesslover — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 18:14:21 +0000

So now Upton Sinclair is a liar?
Charles Dickens?

He isnt a journalist or a reporter.He is an actor -writer calling attention to our supporting abusive working conditions.What he does is “not journalism,” he is not a reporter so why all the fuss?
It wasnt meant to be a news report.

Was “The Jungle”…a lie?…Grapes of Wrath?

And it is a factual memoir.Most of it can be backed by the fact that workers are mistreated and are poisoned.

All of the abuses did happen.Did he take dramatic license?Yes he did after all he is an ACTOR and WRITER.

By: ChKen

ChKen — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 02:13:46 +0000

@Mr. Duerr, you wrote, “It is not the responsibility of the playwright to be factually accurate. ”

That would be the case if Mr. Daisey hadn’t gone all over the networks giving interviews. Are you saying all his comments in answering questions for journalists were just part of his play?