Analysis: The Case of Jayson Blair

At 27 years old, Jayson Blair was caught showing a blatant disregard for journalism ethics as he became a dark spot in the 171 years of publishing at the New York Times. The ethical issues occurred in the late 90s and early 2000s when Blair lied about source interviews, story details, and expense sheets, all while committing acts of mass plagiarism. This essay will first define the ethical case of Jason Blair, then define the ethical violations that Blair committed, and finally, discuss solutions for publications to avoid future ethical disasters.

The former Chief Representative of Newspaper Recruitment at Maryland University, Christopher Callahan, said, "Mr. Blair is the most promising journalist, at his age, that I have encountered in my career in journalism and journalism education." (Folkenflik, 2004) According to an article by the Baltimore Sun, Blair would work under Callahan at CNS before receiving a student editor position at the Diamondback newspaper. Afterward, Blair would move on to prestigious internships at the Boston Globe and Washington Post. After just over three years at the University of Maryland, Blair withdrew from his studies to take a full-time internship with the NYT. (Folkenflik, 2004) While there is no ethical violation present, his hastiness would become a trait that would help Blair self-justify his catastrophe. (Grant, 2013)

Despite a higher-than-average correction rate for an intern, the NYT promoted Blair to full-time staff reporter after two years. (Jrank) Seth Mnookin said in Blair's documentary that one of Blair's stories, about a Madison Square Garden Concert, "looked like something that should have been in the Onion." The story contained the incorrect ticket price, Blair misquoted President Clinton, and Blair even said that Bono and the Edge appeared when they did not. These high correction rates prove that Blair violated the SPJ code of ethics by allowing speed to excuse inaccuracies. However, editors consistently used his immense writing talent as justification to overlook ethical issues and give him the benefit of the doubt. Blair soon realized that if he stopped reporting his corrections, nobody would have known to correct them. (Grant, 2013)

Blair's idea to stop self-correcting became a self-described "slippery slope" that caused him to develop a process so he would never have to leave New York City again. According to Blair, He would plagiarize small parts of many different articles, expand on details he felt they missed, and then publish the story. Blair said this method would only draw people to similarities but never to the conclusion of plagiarism. (Grant, 2013) According to a New York Times report on Jayson Blair's ethical catastrophe, his most infamous acts of mass plagiarism and fabrication were about "emotionally charged moments in recent history, from the deadly sniper attacks in suburban Washington to the anguish of families grieving for loved ones killed in Iraq." (Barstow, 2003) Blair also got away with not traveling by utilizing new, simple technology to lie about his expense sheet about where he traveled. Failure to verify his writing origin and expense sheets provides evidence of failure within the NYT verification process.

When Blair was assigned the story of the missing soldier Edward Anguiano, his house of cards collapsed. A reporter for the San Antonio Express, Macarena Hernandez, was also assigned the story. When Hernandez first saw Blair's story in the NYT, she was upset, not because she recognized plagiarism, but because Blair did not call her while in Los Fresnos. A few hours later, Hernandez's editor called her phone. Hernandez's editor, only referred to as Dan in the documentary, made a highlight comparison of the Blair and the Hernandez story. Another editor of the San Antonio Express, Ron Rivard, said the similarities between the two stories "was remarkable, there was indefinite articles changed, verb conjugation, but it was literally word for word." Hernandez was shocked, and Blair knew plagiarism meant the end of his career. (Grant, 2013)

Blair soon resigned from the NYT, and the newspaper launched an investigation into every story Jason Blair ever wrote. According to the former Chief Editor of the NYT, Howell Raines, the investigation was like "pulling a thread." (Grant, 2013) Blair had a total of 725 stories with the publication, and according to his documentary, his first public plagiarism was an article he published in high school. The investigation found violations throughout high school, internships including the Boston Globe, and of course the NYT. While Blair blatantly plagiarized Hernandez, Blair often knew how to plagiarize and fabricate small details, making the investigation a tedious nightmare.

Blair did several interviews less than a year after being caught, including one with Katie Couric of NBC. During his interview, he discussed the stress of the industry, coupled with his drug addiction. Blair detailed how he would sit at home analyzing other stories, trying to piece together different articles, and fabricating details he felt they missed. Several times Blair described himself as "self-destructing"; however, he felt he could not ask for help. (Couric, 2004) By isolating himself, he utilized the decision-making process that Sissela Bok refers to as, conscious. Blair consistently failed to seek help from his family, friends, or professionals, thus relying on his conscious as his only reference for decision making. Bok outlines how this decision-making process is the most prone to ethical errors due to ease of justification and calls the process the least effective way to make decisions. Blair also exhibits Bok's narrow vision, where an individual looks at short-term goals while ignoring long-term consequences. One example of Blair's narrow vision was Blair justifying fabrication "just to make it another day." (Grant, 2013) Bok again says this is ethically ineffective.

Now that we have defined the case of Jayson Blair and further analyzed how his decision-making process and vision towards goals was ethically ineffective, we will discuss the specific ethical violations Blair committed. The first and most prominent ethical violation in journalism is plagiarism. Not only is it one of the most prominent ethical violations we discuss in class, but it is also sufficient to expel someone from both university and the journalism profession. Blair plagiarized throughout his entire career, as outlined in his documentary. Under the same category of plagiarism is the fabrication of a story or details. According to the NYT report, Blair wrote stories that appeared to be from "Maryland, Texas, and other states" when he rarely left his apartment in New York. By recreating moments, he had never experienced, he fabricated feelings and details within one of the most respected national newspapers. (Barstow, 2003)

Blair also violated more SPJ codes of ethics than he followed. One of the codes Blair violated was never to allow speed to excuse inaccuracies. Blair often lied about expense sheets and chose to write stories from his apartment. Although these acts saved Blair time, the acts also created a slew of inaccurate reporting and fabricated details. Even before Blair committed mass plagiarism at the NYT, Blair's extremely high correction rates provided evidence that Blair was more concerned with writing the story than telling the story.

Another SPJ code Blair did not just violate but blatantly ignored was never deliberately distorting facts. Beyond Anguiano, Blair provides further evidence of distortion when he lies about his cousin dying in the attack of 9/11. This lie got him out of writing a memorial with other reporters at the NYT. Furthermore, his exceptional writing ability likely drew more attention to a false story than the hundreds of real stories. This example provides evidence of Blair breaking the following SPJ codes: 1. Never distort facts 2. Give a voice to the voiceless, 3. Boldly tell the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience, and 4. Minimizing Harm. The one that stands out most is minimizing harm because his actions blatantly disregarded the voiceless and instead took away attention from mourning families processing acts of terror. Furthermore, by fabricating a memorial story, he lied about the depth of the human experience, selfishly adding tragedy to one of the most tragic days in American history.

The Blair case further provides evidence for James Fallows' theory on the credibility gap between the press and the public. To fully outline how Blair contributes to James Fallows' theory of the credibility gap, we must look at Fallows' definition of the roles of the press. The first role of the press is to gatekeep mass amounts of information to determine what is essential for the public to know. By recreating moments Blair did not attend, Blair could not have known what to disclose beyond other public records, thus Blair relied on other journalists to gatekeep for him. Blair opens his documentary trailer and book by saying, "I lied, I lied, and then I lied some more." By doing so, he failed Fallows' second function of the press, the quasi-civic function. Fallows outlines the press's obligation to provide objective information for society to be a self-governing democracy. By fabricating details, it becomes clear that not only did Blair violate journalism ethics, but he also had no regard for being an ethical journalist.

While there are many more ethical violations to discuss, Blair's failure to Seek Truth and Report it, is the last significant violation this essay will overview. Since Blair never left his apartment, he was not interviewing sources in person and not attending events he reported on. Blair did not seek the truth; thus, he was not reporting the truth. In summary, Blair committed several ethical violations, including failure to seek truth and report it, failure to minimize harm, failure not to distort details, failure to be a watchdog in the press, and failure to show any concern for journalism ethics. Blair committed countless ethical violations in his very short career, and in order to repair the damages caused to the credibility of journalism, this essay has compiled three solutions.

The first solution would attempt to mitigate what Blair describes as a "self-destructive" mentality and implement mandatory monthly mental

health checks. While many companies have open resources, some people will not request the help they need. By having a third-party therapist come in for monthly evaluations, publications will be more likely to recognize somebody going through a mental collapse. This idea is becoming more attainable amongst many corporations today and thus would also be logically attainable.

The second solution is a more extreme version of what the NYT did after the resignation of Jayson Blair. The solution involves major publications creating a department of ombudsman and press critics. With a 24/7 news cycle, no one person can sift through every story posted about a single topic. Thus, the solution would have prominent publications such as the NYT create a team of ombudsmen and press critics for each paper division. These divisions include but are not limited to, political, police, feature, and all other types of news.

The third solution ties back into a solution from memo #1. Before publishing a story, reporters must provide immediate verification of the location, writing origin, and sources to their direct editor. As previously discussed, some sources must remain publicly anonymous; however, a journalist can still provide proof of the source to the editor while maintaining the source's public anonymity. Verification of writing origin can be as simple as using Turnitin.com to cross-reference

articles, as we do for students. Finally, since all journalists have mobile devices today, requesting a selfie with a time stamp for expense verification would be very easy. One or all of these measures would have prevented Blair from writing 725 stories for the NYT and mitigated the damages Blair caused to journalistic credibility. This essay offers a unique solution because nothing has reversed James Fallows' theory of the credibility gap; thus, a unique and drastic solution may be necessary.

In conclusion, Jayson Blair is a cautionary tale of executives allowing talent to supersede ability. While Blair was an exceptional writer, he was not prepared for the job he undertook and slowly justified unethical methods of accomplishing his work. His ethical compass either disappeared or never existed, and his talent led him to be a national horror story for the journalism profession. It is not just a warning for individual journalists either; Blair is a large piece of the credibility gap between the press and the public that has led to the press

boycott theory by James Fallows'. Today, journalists must recognize the flaws of Blair and other unethical journalists to attempt to restore our role as watchdogs and objective information providers for a self-governing democracy.

Bibliography:

Barstow, D., & Jonathan. (2003, May 11). Times reporter who resigned leaves Long Trail of Deception. The New York Times. Retrieved October 29, 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/11/us/correcting-the-record-times-reporter-who-resigned-leaves-long-trail-of-deception.html

Couric, K. (2004). A question of trust. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/wbna4457860. Retrieved 2022.

Folkenflik, D. (2019, January 30). The making of Jayson Blair. Baltimore Sun. Retrieved October 29, 2022, from https://www.baltimoresun.com/bal-as.blair23-story.html

A Fragile Trust. (2013). A Fragile Trust: Plagiarism, Power, and Jayson Blair at the New York Times. Retrieved 2022.

Jayson Blair Biography - joined staff of the New York Times, covered d.c.-area sniper shootings. Joined Staff of the New York Times, Covered D.C.-Area Sniper Shootings - Reporter, Stories, Story, and Journalism - JRank Articles. (n.d.). Retrieved October 29, 2022, from https://biography.jrank.org/pages/2500/Blair-Jayson.html

Spj. (n.d.). Ethics case studies - Society of Professional Journalists. Society of Professional Journalists - Improving and protecting journalism since 1909. Retrieved October 29, 2022, from https://www.spj.org/ecs13.asp

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