Apologies to anyone who heard promos and expected to hear me on Open Source on WBUR 90.9 FM today. I did something Ive only done once in my life before, years ago: walked off the set. The reason was that after a detailed preliminary discussion on topics and possible guests, the lineup had nothing in common with what was discussed and included a woman who was identified as a Russian-American journalist. Neither the host nor the producers seemed to know anything about her - except that until earlier this yea she had worked for the Kremlin propaganda holding Russia Today and now is flogging a book supposedly critical of Putin. I have not read the book, but I do know that people who work for Russia Today are not journalists. I said I wasnt sure I was comfortable with this woman. At this point Christopher Lydon put on his headphones and started taping the intro to the show. I signaled time out to the sound booth. They shouted back: Put your headphones on! I said I was not ready to start taping (taping! the show was not going to be live). No reaction. I got up and tried to open the studio door - a producer actually held it shut. When I made it clear Id shout into the microphone if they didnt stop, I was let out of the studio. The sound engineer shouted at me: We dont have time for this crap! Fine, I said, Ill save you time and leave. Now Lydon finally stopped taping and came out of the studio. I googled the woman and immediately found she also worked for the English-language Voice of Russia, another state-owned propaganda outlet. Two years ago, when Nadya Tolokonnikova and Masha Alekhina were being shipped off to prison colonies where they would face slave-labor conditions, torture, and violence, this woman hosted a Voice of Russia show in which she talked about their publicity stunt, their potential shelf life, and said theyd provoked the government into punishing them. I said I wouldnt do the show with this woman. Lydon seemed genuinely puzzled: he had seen me speaking publicly the day before, comfortably talking with people whose opinions are clearly very different from mine. I tried to explain to him that my problem is not with a difference of opinion - its with the misrepresentation inherent in calling state propaganda agents journalists. But I used to work for The New York Times, said Lydon, meaning apparently that he used to be a slave to corporate journalism before going over to the brave new world of NPR. I again tried to explain that my issue is not with the womans position, if she has one at all, but with her employer - the state - and her profession, which pretends to be the same as mine but isnt. Agreeing to talk to her as though we were colleagues would legitimize that lie. Thats so Soviet, said Lydon. I left.
Posted on: Fri, 14 Nov 2014 01:44:26 +0000
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