The complainant, Diane Bederman, objected to a report by Derek Stoffel who was at a protest in Ramallah on the one-hundredth anniversary of the Balfour Declaration. She thought that by reporting the Palestinian position, he was implying Israel did not have a right to exist. He attributed the statement to the views of the Palestinians.…
The complainant, Anthony Nolan, wrote to say that a report on an anti-white supremacy rally at Queen’s Park distorted the crowd size, and deliberately so, in his view. I agreed that reporting how many people expressed interest in coming, rather than the number of attendees, lacked clarity. COMPLAINT You took issue with a report about…
The complainant, Jyothi Jayaraman, was one of 9 who objected to the explanation of the process of medically-assisted death. In the course of taking questions live on Facebook, the interviewee gave wrong information. CBC admitted fault and despite best efforts, came up against the limitations of making corrections on a platform they don’t control. It’s…
The complainant, April Fahr, is the Director of Education and Advocacy for the HugABull Advocacy & Rescue Society. She was concerned that a Fifth Estate episode on whether pit bulls should be banned was biased and cherry-picked data and information. The documentary featured the highly polarized views of both the dog and the evidence about…
A reader in London, Ont., wrote to me to say there really shouldn’t be corrections – because all information should be checked before publication. “Doesn’t anybody proofread stories any more before a paper is printed? … To misspell a person’s name (Smyth instead of Smith, or other examples) I can see, BUT to use the…
As the Star reported this week, the Toronto District School Board says it never discussed the implications of allowing an 11-year-old girl to speak to a barrage of reporters after she had made false allegations that her hijab had been cut. It was “not part of the conversation,” TDSB spokesperson Ryan Bird told the Star…
History’s habit of repeating itself has once again hamstrung Canadian antitrust law when it comes to preventing media monopolies. This time, however, the Supreme Court of Canada has left the door wide open to further increases in our already world-leading level of media ownership concentration. The court’s decision three years ago to allow Tervita Corp., an environmental waste…
The complainant, Jenni Byrne of Bayfield Strategy, Inc., wrote on behalf of her client, Fortress Developments. She stated that one of the reporters involved in ongoing coverage of Fortress was biased and sensationalistic in her reporting. She complained that there was no follow-up on a story regarding class-action suits against Fortress. The complaint against the…
With a significant portion of the audience arriving at news sites via social media and search, the imminent death of the homepage is a common refrain. One senior digital manager told me he was expecting the “death of the homepage revolution” to hit his market at some point, but it hadn’t yet. He might be…
A foundation for resiliency needs to be built up before journalists are in the field. Continue Reading Why trauma and mental health must be discussed in journalism schools