The Norwegian news media regulates itself through its own ethics watchdog, PFU. I'm not enthusiastic about PFU. It's a non-optimal solution to the problem of media power. We'd be better off with more diversity of opinion and more amateur media, so that whenever one media abused its power, other media (competitors, magazines and blogs) would be eager to point it out.

The recent scandal with 60 Minutes and the forged Bush documents is a perfect illustration. Diversity motivates people to look for flaws in stories they don't like, and amateur media allows this to happen at a scale not otherwise possible, with a good observation being able to flow from the lowliest web forum poster to the largest news media in hours.

We don't have that diversity in Norway. We have PFU. So I support Ester Kristoffer's decision to take her accusations against NRK to PFU. PFU is required to take those accusations seriously, which is more than the media have done, except for blogs and conservative Christian newspapers.

You can read Ester Kristoffer's complaint to PFU here, NRK's reply, and a follow-up from Kristoffer. All the documents are in Norwegian, they're too long to translate, but I'll try to sum up what they're arguing about.

Ester's case is pretty much what I've written earlier: NRK reporter Eirik Veum deceived her and others by promising to present her criticism of the media's Israel coverage in a fair or positive way. Veum placed loaded words like "network" into her mouth during the interview, and used manipulative editing to make her appear as the spokesperson for an Israeli network among Norwegian Christians, dedicated to defending Israel's policies, and reducing Norway's sympathy for the Palestinians. NRK did this knowingly, with no regard for fairness or truth.

Those are strong accusations. Deception and dishonesty, the kind of corruption PFU is meant to fight. According to the code of ethics PFU enforces,

3.3 Good press conduct requires clarification of the terms on which an interview is carried out, as well as in relations with sources and contacts in general. .. 4.1 Make a point of fairness and thoughtfulness in content and presentation. .. 4.2 Make plain what is factual information and what is comment. .. 4.14 Those who have been subjected to serious accusations shall at the same time, if possible, be given the opportunity to make a counterstatement containing the actual facts. .. 4.15 Those who have been subjected to attacks shall, as soon as possible, be given the opportunity to respond, unless the attack or criticism are parts of a running exchange of views. ..

Not listed, because it's taken for granted: Don't make stuff up. Most of these rules have been broken. NRK has not, for instance, allowed to Kristoffer to respond to their accusations.

NRK's defense is that they did not deceive Kristoffer during the interview, that they did not explicitly say all the things they're accused of, and that what they did say was supported by what they were told. It was all in good faith, and Ester Kristoffer has gotten all worked up about nothing. They showed her on TV! She has nothing to complain about.

NRK writes:

[Ester Kristoffer] is a psychologist, and has among other things done a large research project among Israeli terror victims in Jerusalem. She has also written a book about the suffering of civilian Israelis as a consequence of Palestinian terrorist attacks. The editor of Norge I DAG and Et Ord fra Jerusalem, Finn Jarle Sæle, writes in an editorial (EOFJ 03-2004) that the book is published by Norge IDAG. Sæle and his publications belong to the Christian segment of the pro-Israeli movement.

Yes, he does. Finn Jarle Sæle is fairly good at keeping religion and politics separate in his views about Israel, but he's well known for having strong views about both religion and politics. Ester, to my knowledge, has never spoken publicly about religion. Never mentioned it with a word when I worked with her on the anti-terror meetings. I've been told by others that she is a Christian, but you'd never guess that from talking with her about Israel.

The reason her book was published by a Christian publishing company is that only Christians were interested in what she had to say about Israel. The large publishers didn't want it. That's sad, but not very sinister. NRK is playing guilt by association.

About the deception:

Kristoffer was told that she would be asked questions about the contact the network has with the Israeli government, and a series of critical questions about how she can work for an occupation power.

This is a lie, according to Ester, and I believe her. She left the interview convinced that Eirik Veum would present her in a positive light. She says she was not told any questions before the interview, nor that these questions would be critical. And questions about "how she can work for an occupation power"? Please. This is defense by incompetence. NRK wants us to believe that, not only did they warn Ester that there would be critical questions (which would be plausible). They even revealed to her that she would be accused of working "for an occupation power". I challenge NRK to prove that any such phrasing was used during the interview. Eirik Veum is dishonest, but he's not incompetent.

On the contrary, he's quite skilled at his work:

After the interview, the agreement was that the NRK team would take part in one of the meetings of the network. Before these recordings, the journalist had to explain to the activist group (8-10 peple) what the recordings were about. It was explained that NRK wanted to focus on Israel's supporters in Norway.

Well, that's an understatement. Here's my recollection of that meeting. This was in an early phase of the project, in late March, when many new people were signing up. It was an unorganized process, people knowing people. I had joined a few weeks earlier, and had brought Lars Ruben Hirsch with me. In the first part of the meeting, the one NRK filmed, there were six new people plus me, Lars Ruben, Ester and the project leader, Jan Olav Arnegård.

Ester Kristoffer and Eirik Veum arrived with a camera man, and Veum told us what kind of story he was working on. He had watched an anti-Israeli demonstration at the embassy earlier, and had been struck by how much the protesters seemed to hate Israel. This has bothered him and made him anxious that perhaps media criticism of Israel had gone too far, and that NRK was guilty of encouraging hatred against Israel. The story he was working on was his way of countering that. He wanted to explore the views of people like Ester Kristoffer, who had accused the media of being excessively critical of Israel. And he was interested in what he saw as a new kind of pro-Israeli movement that had begun to take form in Norway, with a broader appeal than conservative Christians. And that was where we came in.

I thought it was a bad idea to let NRK film the meeting, because our project wasn't primarily about Israel. I also suspected that Veum was lying to us. But he was a good liar, I'll give him that. Eirik Veum is a born manipulator.

After explaining his purpose, Veum asked if he could get a few shots of people talking, to use (without sound) in his report. And because this was the first time a lot of people saw each other, we did a round of introductions. Everyone said a few words about themselves and their motivation for joining the team. That's what I'm doing in the two-second shot you see of me, I'm just saying who I am. No sinister brain storming about how to deprive Palestinians of media sympathy, just hello.

As it turned out, three of the new people were students connected to Israel in various ways, and they mentioned Israel as the reason they were interested in the project. Others were cued by that to discuss their own views of Israel.

So in a sense it's true when NRK writes:

Recordings were made during the meeting to document what was being said. The main subject when we were there was the biased media coverage of the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis, and terrorism against Israel.

But remember that what NRK was recording was not the meeting itself, which began after NRK left, but a round of introduction, done purely for NRK's sake. They asked us to do that, as a favor. I never even saw most of the new people again, including the three students.

When NRK left, about 15 people who had not wanted to be filmed came in and the real meeting began. Israel was not a topic here. I still have Jan Olav Arnegård's summary of that meeting, and I know that he mailed that summary to Eirik Veum so he wouldn't get the wrong impression. We talked about contacting the embassies of countries that had experienced terrorism (Spain, Russia, the US), about how to find sponsors (thanks NRK for screwing that up!). We talked about who to invite as speakers to the main anti-terror event, (politicians, a psychiatrist, humanitarian organizations), artists for the concert, and a lot of practical details about resources and responsibilities.

Actually, Israel was a topic. Some people didn't like that we were also holding a meeting against anti-semitism. This was a left-over from the earlier, more Israel oriented agenda of the project, which had been abandoned a few weeks earlier. They believed we should cancel that meeting, because anti-semitism had little to do with terrorism, and it would be seen as a pro-Israeli meeting in disguise. I remember agreeing with that, but adding that it was too late to cancel it. Tickets had already been sold, guests and artists had already confirmed they would be there, and so on. We would just have to make clear - and we did, as often as we could - that the meetings were distinct, and had different agendas. This was clumsy and amateurish, but that's all you can accuse us of.

About the "secrecy" of the project:

We were made to promise not to reveal the location of the meeting. In the criticism against us, it is focused on how we said that this network is "mysterious and secretive". This impression has been created by the network itself.

It's very simple. We held the meeting at Jan Olav Arnegård's workplace. He figured that his employer would not want to be associated with a potentially controversial project. He was right. I understand they gave him a hard time after the NRK report aired.

Nowhere in the report does it say that Ester Kristoffer has any "official affiliation with the Church or other religious groups. .. Lørdagsrevyen did not claim that this was a secret and hidden network, nor that this network was controlled by the Israeli government. Through the report it is made clear that the network has a cooperation with the Israeli embassy in Norway, which Kristoffer confirms. .. Nobody has claimed that conservative Christians make out most of the network Kristoffer is part of, but she says herself that Christian groups have given strong support to the network.

They're right. NRK never said these things. But as I made clear in my analysis of the report, NRK implied all of this and more. Only by reading the transcript carefully can you see that NRK never says this. For instance, they don't say that Ester Kristoffer's network is connected to Christian pro-Israeli groups. But that's the impression they leave.

I talked to a close friend of Ester on the phone. He sent me one of the documents I've published here. When he saw that NRK report on TV, he was shocked and angry. He called Ester and began to chastize her for getting involved with that kind of people. NRK had fooled even him. I believe they fooled many more. There's just no way a casual TV viewer can watch such a cleverly edited report and be able to separate the actual claims, many of which are true, from the obvious implications, most of which are not.

This report was designed to deceive. If PFU has any value as a media watchdog, they will acknowledge that.

As for NRK, there is one simple way of proving that they treated Ester Kristoffer fairly, and that is by releasing the unedited interview. Ester Kristoffer has asked for this. NRK has refused. As long as they do that, it's word against word. Did NRK lie about their intentions? Did they reveal their questions and angle in advance? Would they allow her to watch the report before it aired? Which words were Ester's own, and which were placed in her mouth? Ester says one thing, NRK another. And the choice between Ester Kristoffer's word and Eirik Veum's word is simple.

Bjørn:

I suggest you also send your opinions to PFU, if you have not done so already. Another thing worth trying is contacting or sending an op-ed to Journalisten - the newspaper of the Norwegian journalist union.

It will be interesting to follow this case.

Øyvind

Complain BS. But what did you expect? I mean, how gullible is it possible to be? OF COUSRE NRK were going to misquote and distort her words, they are feeding their target audience; secular, pacifist, and (largely) anti the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Norwegians. If you could interview Chairman Mao how would you portray him? As you said there is no such thing as unbiasedness, ESPECIALLY not in the media. Ms. Kristoffer is a victim of the ruthless struggle to acquire viewers, too bad for her. Did it harm her? Perhaps, it could be worse. Remember Tønne? or Dr. Kelly? These are REAL victims. Besides NRK is right as well, Ms. Kristoffer got her 5 minutes of fame, now eat it and live it darling.

Geir:

I would not call most Norwegians pacifists. NRK is a major television channel, not Balder Magasin

Objective media is a fantasy, have always been a fantasy and will remain a fantasy. Instead of pretend objectivity journalists should make their own opinions clear.

Then people can judge for themselves.

Øyvind

Geir: Yes, Ester was naive. Many others (Christians, pro-Israelis, etc) were contacted for an interview, and most of them said no because they were suspicious of NRK's motives. They knew better from past experience. Ester did not.

My own view is that people who have controversial views should make an audio recording of all interviews, which they can use to prove what they actually said. In this case, NRK sits on the only unedited version of the interview, and they refuse to release it.

Ester shouldn't have expected to be treated fairly. I agree. But you can't seriously believe that she deserves no sympathy, and that NRK does not deserve to be criticized for what they did. If dishonesty is rampant in the media, we need to expose that dishonesty, and that is what I'm doing here. Not because this is a worse case than what happened to Tønne, but because I know it from the inside. I have information others don't have, which makes me qualified to report on this.

Geir,

Not to make it my business to confront your comments consistently, but are you contending that NRK has committed no real offense here? You say "OF COUSRE NRK were going to misquote and distort her words, they are feeding their target audience; secular, pacifist, and (largely) anti the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip"... to which I say, you should consider whether you have cause and effect askew here. Serve their market?... or serve the opinion menu upon which the "market" will dine...

Or is it the case, that Norwegians... are whatever NRK and its stunningly one-dimensional mainstream media partners... say they are. The expression "you are what you eat" has always been a little overdone to me. But that your opinions are much formed by what you see... can be stated in terms of existential fact, no?

Is it not the very real and indeed critical responsibility of journalism in a free society... to report? Using your example of how I would "portray Chairman Mao" I would answer... that I would "portray" him as accurately as I could, which should be my goal as a journalist. If some of my disdain for him leaked through, it would be the result of my own failures and where it was so, I would take it as a humbling experience and one to be learned from for the future. (In the specific case, I would assume that the simple truth of Mao, would say all that needs to be said to those who wish to explore what it was... that he was.)

I don't think I'm describing an ideal world here. But it is certainly one that seems laughable in a world where journalistic "ethics" are post-moral and framed by convoluted legalisms. And where "duty"(puhlease) to ones profession is defined by conformist and in my opinion mostly illusory, ideological imperatives.

It is MOST certainly laughable where a deliberate distortion and propagandistic hit job like this piece can be fobbed off on a trusting public as though it were not only journalism... but "news". This piece was as much a "documentary" as was Farenheit 911 (which in any case got 6 stars in every major newspaper review in Norway... co-incidentally).

This.... was not bias. And where you scoff at the idea that Ester should be offended after the media elites at NRK were kind enough to grant her "5 minutes of fame" (actually unjust notoriety would be more accurate... but whats the difference right?)... she is actually concerned that they... simply lied.

Thats a principled position. Do you get that?

Kevin McDonnell

Trackback URL: /cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/805