Arthur Brisbane's "Standards That Everyone Can See": What About Censorship, Anti-Semitism and Journalistic Ethics at The New York Times?

Arthur Brisbane, the new Public Editor of The New York Times, has published an opinion piece entitled "Standards That Everyone Can See" (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/opinion/03pubed.html) in which he takes the position that The Times should make its rules of the road easy for readers to navigate:

"The Times has a good set of policies. It should double down on its commitment to high standards by organizing them into a reader-friendly format and then trust its audience — which is now a paying audience both online and in print — to readily access these important principles and rules."

But what good are policies that are not enforced?

I submitted an online comment to Mr. Brisbane's piece, and - wonders will never cease - it was posted (no. 38):

"The Times should make its rules of the road easy for readers to navigate"? My belief is that the "rules of the road" are understood by your readership; however, their interpretation and implementation by your newspaper leave much to be desired.

Examples:

1. Notwithstanding your newspaper's written declaration that "Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive," my online comments are regularly rejected by your so-called "moderators" when the said comments intelligently refute or are at odds, in a non-abusive manner, with the content of a given op-ed or editorial [see, most recently: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2011/03/roger-cohens-arabs-will-be-free.html].

2. Notwithstanding your newspaper's written declaration that "Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive," there have been many instances where vile anti-Semitic comments have been tolerated by your so-called "moderators" [see, for example: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2009/06/open-letter-no-2-to-clark-hoyt-public.html]. I brought this phenomenon to the attention of one of your senior editors, and after he investigated my allegations, many of these racist comments were retroactively deleted. However, soon thereafter, additional anti-Semitic comments were posted.

3. Notwithstanding your newspaper's written declaration that "Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive," there was an instance where your so-called "moderators" permitted a call for extreme physical violence against a high ranking former Republican government official. Only after I contacted one of your senior editors was this comment removed. [The comment, no. 8, posted by The New York Times in response to Maureen Dowd's April 29, 2009 op-ed, "Vice's Secret Vices", stated: "I think writing about Dick Cheney is at bottom passe Maureen. If you can't get the balls to put a material bullet between his eyes,,go away."]

4. In the not too distant past, I submitted to the prior Public Editor a complaint, inquiring whether a certain columnist had adhered to your newspaper's ethical guidelines, and I received the following response: "I am looking into this further, and doing some homework on the case right now. I also have Mr. Hoyt looking into it, and I will report our findings to you as soon as they are ready." Needless to say, I never heard back from the office of the Public Editor. [see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2009/06/was-roger-cohens-what-irans-jews-say-in_17.html]

In a nutshell, The New York Times has become highly politicized, and it is not your readership that needs to be reminded concerning the "rules of the road", which are no longer being enforced.

What good are internal policies and standards that are ignored by a news organization? My guess is that Mr. Brisbane has yet to discover to what depths The New York Times has descended.