Brian Williams ‘Misremembers’ but Social Media Reminds Him
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Avondale College ResearchOnline@Avondale Arts Papers and Journal Articles School of Humanities and Creative Arts 2-2017 Embedding, Embellishing and Embarrassing: Brian Williams ‘Misremembers’ but Social Media Reminds Him Sue Joseph University of Technology, Sydney, [email protected] Carolyn Rickett Avondale College of Higher Education, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://research.avondale.edu.au/arts_papers Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons Recommended Citation Joseph, S., & Rickett, C. (2017). Embedding, embellishing and embarrassing: Brian Williams ‘misremembers’ but social media reminds him. Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics, 14(1), 32-41. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Humanities and Creative Arts at ResearchOnline@Avondale. It has been accepted for inclusion in Arts Papers and Journal Articles by an authorized administrator of ResearchOnline@Avondale. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Sue Joseph ‘It felt like a personal experience that some- Carolyn Rickett one else wanted to participate in and didn’t deserve to participate in.’2 Here is the news In the opening chapter from What is happen- ing to news: The information explosion and the crisis in journalism, titled ‘The collapse of the old order’, Jack Fuller begins with a well-known quotation from Walter Lippmann who, in 1921, compared the press to ‘the beam of a search- Embedding, light that relentlessly moves about, bringing one episode and then another out of the dark- embellishing and ness into vision’ (Fuller 2013: 1). Underpinning Lippmann’s sentiments is an optimism about embarrassing: the capacity of the press to function beyond Brian Williams the reaches of institutions and media person- alities to produce clear and reliable news. More ‘misremembers’ but recently, in working towards a cogent defini- tion of journalism practice, Michael Schudson social media reminds argues: ‘Journalism is the business or practice him of producing and disseminating information about contemporary affairs or general public interest and importance’ (Schudson 2001: 11). Brian Williams enjoyed the trust of his organ- Here, Schudson points to the sociological and isation and audience for 10 years as NBC’s commercial underpinnings relating to the pro- Nightly News anchor and managing editor. duction and circulation of news. Usefully, too, But on the night of 30 January 2015 during Jay Rosen comments: ‘News is something that a broadcast, his high profile status began to news people make, but that does not mean unravel. Venerated as a reliable news source, they make it up. It simply means that stories Williams was forced to explain his legendary about what happened today are not “what story of survival one day in the skies above the happened today”’ (Rosen 2001: 3). But more Iraq War of 2003. His version of an attack on importantly, Rosen continues: a Chinook helicopter he was travelling in was circulated and valorised by his own corpora- How do we know when this art is serving tion for 12 years. But when American soldier a public purpose? ‘When it is accurate, fair, Lance Reynolds and other military personnel balanced, comprehensive and compelling’ is challenged the veracity of his version, the cor- the sort of answer most in the press would poration was forced to suspend him. Williams give. It is a good answer. But it does not say equates his rewriting and false reporting of much about the imaginative work journal- this historical event as an act of ‘misremember- ists do (ibid: 3). ing’. This assertion is a clear breach of the Soci- In thinking about the ‘imaginative work’ jour- ety of Professional Journalists’ code: ‘Ethical nalists perform it is important to acknowledge journalism strives to ensure the free exchange the significant and creative roles of investigative of information that is accurate, fair and thor- and literary journalists who, with moral imagi- ough. An ethical journalist acts with integ- nation and a steadfast commitment to facts, rity’.1 However, the focus of this paper is on the viral audience social media response and render a story in ways that can both enlighten the ways in which the production of mocking and, at times, entertain. However, this notion online tweets and posts served to critique and of the ‘imaginative work of the journalist’ can- ridicule Williams’s claim of ‘misremembering’, not ethically encompass a re-rendering of his- thus holding him to account. And as such, the torical detail so that once incontrovertible facts ongoing circulation and preservation of memes are morphed into a new and more exciting satirically re-appropriating historical moments, tale; the very kind of narrative conflation that continue to shame Williams and his journalism became Brian Williams’s professional undoing. practice. There have been several transgressive forays into ‘story’ within the media,3 world-wide. And Keywords: Brian Williams, ‘misremembering’, indeed, some may argue that corporate media ethics, NBC, rewriting historical events, memes, transgresses with the truth every day; Brian Wil- social media liams’ seemingly is yet another example. 32 Copyright 2017-1. Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics. All rights reserved. Vol 14, No 1 2017 PAPER Brian Williams ‘misremembers’ a door-gunner on the damaged Chinook, say Brian Williams is attending a Rangers-Cana- they all recall NBC reporting that Williams was diens ice hockey game at Madison Square Gar- aboard the aircraft that was attacked, despite dens in New York on the night of 30 January it being false. O’Keeffe says the incident has 2015. He invites Sergeant Major Tim Terpak to bothered him since he and others first saw the accompany him as a way of thanking him for original report after returning to Kuwait. ‘Over protecting him and his crew on that night in the years it faded,’ he says, ‘and then to see it the desert in 2003 when they were embedded last week it was – I can’t believe he is still telling on an air mission in Iraq, a fact the announcer this false narrative’ (Tritten 2015a). Travis Trit- at Madison Square Gardens shares with the ten tells the Washingtonian: huge sporting audience in a public tribute. The announcer says across the loudspeakers: These veterans, they told me they’ve been mad for a long time. Their perception was Ladies and gentlemen, during the Iraq inva- that it has been misreported from the first sion US Army Command Sergeant Major time Brian Williams said it. Over the years PAPER Tim Terpak was responsible for the safety you can find mentions of it, but this last of Brian Williams and his NBC News team time I think pushed some of them over the after their Chinook helicopter was hit and edge (Freed 2015). crippled by enemy fire. Command Sergeant Major Terpak was awarded three Bronze Williams posts the following apology to the sol- Stars for combat valor in Iraq, and recently diers on Facebook: retired after twenty-three years in the US Army. Both men, both Rangers fans have To Joseph, Lance, Jonathan, Pate, Michael been reunited for the first time in 12 years and all those who have posted: You are for tonight’s game. Please welcome Com- absolutely right and I was wrong. In fact, mand Sergeant Major Tim Terpak and Brian I spent much of the weekend thinking I’d Williams (Wemple 2015). gone crazy. I feel terrible about making this mistake, especially since I found my OWN Head of NBC News, 47-year-old Deborah Tur- WRITING about the incident from back ness, sees the story reproduced on Facebook in ’08, and I was indeed on the Chinook and ‘likes’ it, adding she thinks it is ‘very sweet’. behind the bird that took the RPG in the tail What she likes even more is its performance housing just above the ramp. Because I have once it was posted to Facebook, which she no desire to fictionalize my experience (we calls ‘extremely good’ (Burrough 2015). But all saw it happened the first time) and no the loudspeaker announcement and follow- need to dramatize events as they actually up news story proves too much for a band of happened, I think the constant viewing of soldiers, home from war. When members of the video showing us inspecting the impact the 159th Aviation Regiment’s Chinook under area – and the fog of memory over 12 years – fire on 26 March 2003, hear and then read the made me conflate the two, and I apologize. story on Facebook, they speak up. Lance Reyn- I certainly remember the armored mech pla- olds was flight engineer on the Chinook hit by toon, meeting Capt. Eric Nye and, of course, two rocket-propelled grenades. The night he Tim Terpak. Shortly after they arrived, so reads the report from the ice hockey match, he did the Orange Crush sandstorm, making writes to Williams on Facebook: ‘Sorry dude, virtually all outdoor functions impossible. I don’t remember you being on my aircraft. I I honestly don’t remember which of the do remember you walking up about an hour three choppers Gen. Downing and I slept in, after we had landed to ask me what had hap- but we spent two nights on the stowable pened.’ Christopher Simeone, the pilot of the web bench seats in one of the three birds. helicopter Williams was travelling in, responds Later in the invasion when Gen. Downing on Facebook: ‘Such a liar! He was on my air- and I reached Baghdad, I remember search- craft and we were NOT shot down. That was a ing the parade grounds for Tim’s Bradley to sister ship and a friend of mine.