Lies, Retractions and This American Life

Mike Daisey

In January I heard an episode of This American Life called “Mr Daisey and the Apple Factory”. Mike Daisey – a theatre monologist, writer and self-confessed Apple devotee – narrated the details of a trip that he made to China. He toured factories making Apple products, primarily those owned by Foxconn. He said that he spoke to numerous workers and heard first hand accounts of terrible working conditions.

It was a captivating and compelling piece of radio. It personalised of the ordeals suffered by Chinese factory workers that are often only given a passing level of consideration in the news – highlighting our connection to their lives by focusing on a brand that we all know.
                       

However, a journalist based in China thought that several aspects of the narrative sounded odd, such as Daisey’s claim that he saw factory guards with guns (in China only the military and the police can carry firearms). He tracked down Daisey’s Chinese interpreter, who disputed several aspects of Daisey’s account.

As a result This American Life pulled the show from their website and issued a statement:

“I have difficult news. We've learned that Mike Daisey's story about Apple in China - which we broadcast in January - contained significant fabrications. We're retracting the story because we can’t vouch for its truth.”
“The China correspondent for the public radio show Marketplace tracked down the interpreter that Daisey hired when he visited Shenzhen China. The interpreter disputed much of what Daisey has been saying on stage and on our show.”
“Daisey lied to me and to This American Life producer Brian Reed during the fact checking we did on the story, before it was broadcast. That doesn't excuse the fact that we never should've put this on the air. In the end, this was our mistake.”


The full statement can be read here: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/blog/2012/03/retracting-mr-daisey-and-the-apple-factory

In addition to this statement This American Life made a one hour long ‘Retraction’ episode, which is even more interesting than the original show. It’s well worth hearing in full (even if you haven’t heard the original piece), but I suggest that you at least listen to the first four minutes, where Ira Glass issues an apology:

Ira Glass

It was a fascinating episode, since they interviewed Mike Daisey himself, putting to him that he lied to them. Ira Glass proved himself to be a formidable interviewer, pinning Daisey down with the facts, exposing the fabrications and conveying that he was really pissed off without losing his temper.

There are lots of awkward silences, which really hold the audience on edge and make Daisey look the fool. Daisey’s defence…. he didn’t give an account that was up to journalistic standards of truth, but what he does is theatre not journalism. Daisey reiterated his “it’s theatre, so it doesn't have to be true” defence in this 3 minute prologue to his subsequent shows.

https://sites.google.com/site/mp3hostshauntey/mike-daisey-this-american-life/prologue.mp3?attredirects=0&d=1

What was interesting about this retraction was the way Ira Glass expressed that public radio had a strong reputation for accurate journalism. There are strong parallels with the values of the BBC in the belief that non-commercial radio must hold itself to a higher standard. Ira Glass appeared to be concerned for the reputation of American public radio as a whole and not just his show.

Something which is important to consider is that the journalistic integrity of the original episode held up. The This American Life team cross checked the allegations against Apple and laid out the evidence during a 20 minute segment of the original show, which scrutinised Daisey’s account. They found objective evidence that verified the allegations that Daisey made against Apple, mostly using Apple’s own internal audits. There are numerous other accounts of terrible working conditions and suppression of trade unions in China. Journalistically This American Life already had their backs covered. This retraction proved the show to have an extra commitment to integrity. Furthermore, its exploration of the conflict between journalism and art made great radio.

You can hear a full stream and read more about the controversy at: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/460/retraction

The Artist

On the weekend I finally got around to seeing The Artist. My opinion.... I thought it was good, very good in fact... and certainly interesting.

I think what makes it interesting is that comes across as an artefact from another age, which allows us to break with the typical expectations that we have from a modern film. The film has a light hearted playful campiness, that marks it out in our cynical age (the Descendents it is most certainly not). 

I think it is the nostalgic tropes that allows us to suspend our eye rolling cynicism and run away with this beautiful piece of escapism. If the film was a full colour all speaking period piece on the era of the silent cinema, it would come across as over the top and unbelievable.

However, being a film that genuinely looked and felt like something from the past, it allowed the audience to make exceptions to the realism that we have come to expect from films. Once we were in this vintage mindset we could simply relish the exaggerated wide-eyed expressions and fantastical plot.

I wonder if this film could spark a revival in silent cinema. I for one would love to see some more silent films, since I loved the level of concentration I gave to the screen and the added emotional intensity the absence of dialogue gave to the musical score.

Well, enough of my views. Let's hear from Alex, Thoughtfully Tooting's resident film critic (sort of). Oh and the quality of the recording is pretty dreadful, lots of very noisy wind! Lesson: never record an interview next to a bridge! Seriously, what was I thinking. I guess I always have to learn the hard way.

Ray Man Music and the Yangqin

The day after the Podcaster Masterclass I did another class at the Roundhouse called an “Intro to Speech Radio”.

After discussing a few audio clips that were played to us, we were handed some Olympus dictaphones set an exercise to tell a story through sounds found in the area.

So strolling around Chalk Farm road, I thought I’d go into this interesting instrument shop called Ray Man. It appeared to be a shop run by several generations of a Chinese family. Here’s the piece I recorded:

This is a picture of the instrument, the Yang Qin (which I misheard as a Jiang Qin… whoops).

I asked the guy who played for me a few questions about the instrument for my own record:

I had to do a bit of negotiating with the woman who appeared to be running the shop since they have a store policy that prohibits the recording of musical instruments. She let me record once I got headed letter from the Roundhouse stating that I was on a course. She was quite interested in the dictaphone that I was using (the Olympus LS-11 Linear PCM Recorder – which I personally think is fantastic), so I did I quick interview with her so that she could hear the quality of the recordings it made.

 

So another great class at the Roundhouse. Listening to it again I probably should have tried to make it shorter and reduced the volume of the voiceover, but like the Podcast Masterclass, there was a real joy in creating something against the clock in a rush. Hopefully I will do more of these short pieces on local shops in the future.