It took only days from Uri Berliner’s publishing his fiery essay about his employer, NPR, to his suspension, to his resignation in a blaze of bad-faith glory.
“You knew the martyrdom was coming,” was how journalist Issac Bailey put it.
And that’s a shame, because every news organization – National Public Radio included – could benefit from more self-scrutiny, more openness to criticism, more willingness to change.
Berliner’s critique made some points worth pondering as he professed how much he loved the place he had worked for decades but with which he had become disillusioned. He called for a diversity of viewpoints to accompany – or counter – NPR’s pursuit of other forms of diversity.
Berliner charged that the network was “telling listeners how to think” and has lost audience – and trust – because of a liberal agenda.
He also made some shaky arguments that undercut his musings and seemed intended to signal his readiness to having his words weaponized by the right wing of American politics and media. Dan Kennedy of Northeastern University eloquently critiqued Berliner’s complaints about “Russiagate”, Hunter Biden’s laptop and the origins of the Covid pandemic.
Whatever Berliner’s good intentions may have been months and years ago – he claims he tried internal channels first – the way he went about his complaint last week made it clear he was no longer interested in constructive criticism. He wanted a viral parting shot.
Mission accomplished.
“WOKE NPR EXPOSED,” shouted one Fox News on-air banner. “LIBERAL DISINFORMATION MACHINE,” Donald Trump wailed on social media. And relentless cries of “defund NPR” rang through the rightwing echo chamber. As NPR’s media reporter David Folkenflik noted in his coverage, government funding contributes less than a single percent to the national network’s funding; however, local affiliates, which are extremely important in the diminishing local-media landscape, depend on it more.
Consider the venue Berliner chose: the Free Press, a media outlet founded by anti-establishment provocateur Bari Weiss – no ingenue in the career-enhancing art of noisily quitting a legacy-media perch. (Hers was the New York Times in 2020.)
Berliner surely knew when he went that route that his days at NPR were numbered. When NPR suspended him without pay a few days later, management said that was because he had broken a rule that requires permission before publishing elsewhere; that, surely, was only part of the problem.
Berliner’s resignation letter singled out the new CEO, Katherine Maher, something of an odd choice for NPR since she came from tech rather than journalism. One wonders if the network did its due diligence before making the hire; her years-old social media posts call Trump a racist and seem to shrug off the rioting during social justice protests.
Meanwhile, it’s no surprise that the anti-wokeness activist Christopher Rufo, who has claimed that schools can be “hunting grounds for sexual predators”, is leading the call for Maher’s ouster. Rufo’s craft is well-honed; he did the same with Claudine Gay, the former Harvard University president, and she resigned her post in January.
Berliner admitted to Folkenflik that he was fed up. “It’s been building up and it became clear” that the moment for quitting had arrived.
The network’s staff – present and past – are understandably upset at having their journalism disparaged. One former NPR insider, Alicia Montgomery, wrote in Slate about how NPR journalists were encouraged during the 2016 campaign to “make sure that any coverage of a Trump lie was matched with a story about a lie from Hillary Clinton”. When a colleague asked what to do if one candidate just lied more, the response from newsroom leadership was silence.
That defensive tendency toward false equivalency – still rampant in mainstream media’s politics coverage – is also a critique worth pondering.
Something else that needs to be acknowledged is the transformation of American politics – particularly the descent of the Republican party into dysfunction and cult-like obeisance.
“The core editorial problem at NPR is, and frankly has long been, an abundance of caution that often crossed the border to cowardice,” Montgomery wrote.
A few days ago, newsroom leader Edith Chapin launched an effort to critique NPR’s journalism on a regular basis, including examining viewpoint diversity; that’s been in the works, but the timing strongly suggests it came to fruition because of this whole very public mess. Something positive could result, after all, if those sessions are honest, open and wide-ranging.
That’s possible. But one thing is certain. You’ll be seeing Uri Berliner on a rightwing talkshow or a conservative opinion page near you.
Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist
