The New "New Journalism" Focuses on Itself...

They're dialoguing and discoursing over at the New York Times today, interrogating ideas about the recent newsroom upheaval and being thoughtful, beginning their work committed to widening sets of voices, elevating conversations and informing discourse...

You know, some people stumble on Twitter.  Some people -- in grasping for verbiage -- forget to keep it real, to use active verbs that matter.

Here, try it as straight text:

Kathleen Kingsbury@katiekings

Acting Editorial Page Editor, @NYTOpinion @NYTimes. Formerly: @BostonGlobe, @GlobeIdeas, @Reuters, & @Time, etc. in NYC + Asia.

If you'll indulge me a thread: 

We’ve spent a lot of time talking about what we stand for* in @nytopinion following our publication last week of Tom Cotton’s Op-Ed. The upheaval that followed Senator Cotton’s Op-Ed has generated a necessary dialogue about the dangers and merits of creating a forum for debate in a time of political division and misinformation. As we continue to interrogate these ideas and more as an organization, a number of our @nytopinion writers weighed in. Our work is just beginning**, and I'm committed to widening this set of voices. These perspectives, plus the thoughtfulness of my newsroom colleagues and outside writers, have elevated a conversation worth having and will help inform what discourse looks like in a polarized world. Finally, we owe a thanks to you, our readers, for adding your views on the Cotton Op-Ed and its fallout, and I encourage you to keep writing in. I look forward to more conversation and collaboration as we move ahead.

Kingsbury is James Bennett's replacement through the November election.  She is the new mouthpiece for A.G. Sulzberger, the young man who graduated from Brown University and inherited the NYT publishership from his Dad (who in turn, inherited his leadership job from his Dad... all white Jewish men. Not very diverse.)

The lady used a lot of pretty language, but she really doesn't say much substantive at all.  Don't let the wide array of verb choices confuse you:  there's no real solid action taking place there, not outlined in that "tweet".  Those are weasel words she's chosen to placate:  "dialoguing and discoursing, interrogating ideas, being thoughtful, beginning their work committed to widening voices, elevating conversations and informing discourse..."

We've been there before.  Nothing happens, true progress stagnates, and an awful lot of people reach the upper-middle class carrying water for others who benefit not by "white" privilege but by blatant economic privilege:  they use their connections, not skills honed in honest competition, to rise, and they "elevate" people around them to keep their privilege safe, and never challenge the economic system that disfavors working- and lower-middle-class whites as it does black citizens, and those imported here without citizenship for their necessary work skills, primarily by the upper, ownership classes...

A.G. Sulzberger -- like Prince William -- even in these diverse days, still sits atop the NYT throne directing action in the American kingdom, that has expanded well beyond New York City now.  His staff pushed for -- and got -- the racial war they were hoping fo. Plenty of us called that one coming...

Does he not understand his skin too is white?  That his privilege cannot be hidden? That violence and destruction are not the answer?  Not in his kingdom, not in our cities and neighborhoods?

Does he not understand that what he encourages in the masses today will one day likely come for him, and his own, too?  I would bet my life that his child does not inherit the publishership postition of the Times, and would bet money that Sulzberger does not serve out his full life term in that position.

There are simply others better qualified.
But I don't think Katie Kingsbury, the author of the word salad twittered above, is ever going to tell him that... likely, that's why she's in there.

Until the November election, at least.
----------------------

* and ** :

The trouble is, Kingsbury talks of figuring out principles, and beginning the work of racial (and economic?) diversity... you don't do that after the fires in the streets start, and the buildings are burning.  You set your principles IN ADVANCE, so that you can simply fall back on them in times of crisis.  For the NYT to admit they are just now "beginning the work", after having spent pretty much the entire Trump administration encouraging racial divisiveness, is laughable.

Trying to do "brain work" under fire, and establish principles that become instinctual in times of emergency, doesn't work.  You train your soldiers (and let's think of the the NYT activist journalists as soldiers, shall we?) in advance, so that when the battles begin, they know their roles and what to do when confronted by authority, and don't risk the lives of others because they think their lives are more worthy than the police, and security guards, and small-business owners protecting their own property.

By the way?  I didn't for a minute buy the bullshit that any NYT black staffers' lives were put at risk by Tom Cotton's editorial.  Maybe someday, Ms. Kingsbury will find the words to address openly that fiasco.  Tell us more about the black staff revolt that led to Bennett's firing, her ... "elevation", and A.G. Sulzberg's cowering.  (He reminds me so much of Mayor Jacob Frey -- so in over their heads in the real world, they are!)

It was kind of blackmail, wasn't it?  The digital production staff all calling in sick, because the union had crafted a message (it had to concern staff safety via union rules) that Tom Cotton calling in the military would somehow target the black workers at the New York Times, so it was wrong to run that editorial and put their lives at risk. (?)  Are all the blacks at the NYT comfortable playing along with that narrative, do you think?

How many staffers "at fear" will it take in the future to pull an editorial the nation needs to read?  Maybe, after the election, it will be safer to address the real issues people are talking about... at the NYT elite offices, and beyond.

Stay safe, everyone!, and have a healthy weekend!