Sunday, February 29, 2004

MORE ON SAUL, GLOBALISM AND NEWSPAPERS

I now have a copy of the Ralston Saul article (see Friday's post below) but haven't read it yet. Regardless, I see today that, as usual, the Toronto Star shows more discretion and responsibility with regards to this issue. In today's Toronto Star Richard Gwyn puts forward a well reasoned balanced criticism of JRS's Harpers article.

Why is this more appropriate?

The Globe and Mail devoted lavish amounts of editorial space to attacking JRS thereby making the issue one of The Paper vs. Ralston Saul: an institution against an individual. By contrast The Star rightly recognized that there was no need to editorialize on this topic but provided an opportunity for one individual to comment on the political opinions of another. The editorials of a paper are supposed to be the space where the paper pronounces its positions on major issues. The opinion and commentary page are a forum for public debate. The writings of one man in one magazine should be engaged with on the opinion page, not pronounced against in an editorial.

Posted by Matthew @ 1:23 p.m.