MediaBite - 'Balancing' the Climate Consensus - An Interview with John Gibbons Options

[Emersberger]

MediaBite - 'Balancing' the Climate Consensus - An Interview with John Gibbons
Posted by David Manning on March 8, 2010, 7:33 pm

'Balancing' the Climate Consensus - Part 1

An interview with John Gibbons, formerly of the Irish Times

John Gibbons has covered the issue of Climate Change for the Irish Times for the past two years. Several weeks ago his weekly column abruptly came to an end. In his final piece Gibbons took the mainstream media to task over their climate coverage:

“Ireland’s most senior climate expert, Prof John Sweeney of NUI Maynooth, acknowledged last week that climate-change deniers were “winning the propaganda war”. Chief among them, he added, were deniers from the ranks of journalism and lobbying.

“A media and telecommunications industry fuelled by advertising and profit maximisation is part of the problem,” Lewis and Boyce point out.

In Ireland, this even extends to the State broadcaster. The boom years swelled its coffers with an advertising bonanza, and much of this found its way into the pockets, not of lowly researchers, but of elite broadcasters. Millionaire “journalists” have a profound yet undeclared personal vested interest in the consumption-driven economic status quo upon which their wealth is predicated. As, of course, do billionaire media proprietors. They in turn seek out affirmation of their own biases, and ridicule dissenters. These value systems are internalised just as thoroughly as those of the editor 56 years ago and his papal hiccups “scoop”.

The next time you hear someone in the media drone on about having a “balanced debate” on climate change, sustainability or resource depletion, keep in mind the wag’s definition of a well-balanced Irishman: he’s the one with a chip on both shoulders.” [Media's misplaced 'impartiality' on Climate, John Gibbons, Irish Times, 4/2/10]

Along with Tony Kinsella, a colleague of Gibbons', the Irish Times has found itself two journalists down. Two journalists who had, coincidentally, frequently challenged some of the dominant myths of modern journalism such as the persistent threat of 'Islamic terrorism' and the sacredness of financial markets.

So on the occasion that Ireland's respected 'liberal' newspaper becomes that much less diverse, we'd like to thank John Gibbons for offering us the opportunity to discuss the issue of media bias in relation to the issue of Climate Change.

continued...

http://www.mediabite.org/article_-Balancin..._760894276.html