The complainant, Richard Reeleder, objected to an interview with an opponent of the herbicide Glyphosate. He thought he was presented as a scientific expert when he was not, and that his comments went unchallenged. He thought it was alarmist and unbalanced. This was one interview in ongoing coverage, but it raised the important question about…
Corrections are complex business these days when news organizations deliver information via print, on web and mobile apps, social media, video, newsletters, push notifications and voice personal assistants Continue Reading Toronto Star Public Editor: Timeless principles guide corrections in digital era
In the midst of the #MeToo reckoning, let’s consider the role of journalism. Of course, the foundation of the movement is the brave women who have been abused and who have stood tall willing to reveal the most intimate details, willing to stand the questioning and trolling to tell their truth. Without them, there would…
The complainant, Mike Fegelman, the Executive Director of HonestReporting Canada, made two requests for reviews. One concerned a headline dealing with the sentencing of an Israeli soldier and the other questioned the use of an old photograph for a news report. He was concerned that the story behind the photo made it inappropriate, and he…
CBC Ottawa ran a story about a programme to match homeless people to rental housing. It documented a case where it went wrong, leaving the landlord with a trashed apartment. The story showed the damage, but focused on the gap between the promises and the delivery of the sponsoring agency. The complainant, Lorraine Cohen, questioned…
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…