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Image is everything, in journalism as well as politics, and here our Editor, Welshman Phil Parry says how during 23 years with the BBC, and a 39 year career in the media (when he was trained to use simple language, avoiding jargon), this has always been vital, but Labour’s may have been tarnished now by their ‘attack-ads’ against the Conservatives, and US President Joe Biden presents a poor one in right-wing UK circles.
Previously he has described how he was helped to break into the South Wales Echo office car when he was a cub reporter, recalled his early career as a journalist, the importance of experience in the job, and made clear that the ‘calls’ to emergency services as well as court cases are central to any media operation.
He has also explored how poorly paid most journalism is when trainee reporters had to live in squalid flats, the vital role of expenses, and about one of his most important stories on the now-scrapped 53 year-old BBC Cymru Wales (BBC CW) TV Current Affairs series, Week In Week Out (WIWO), which won an award even after it was axed, long after his career really took off.
Phil has explained too how crucial it is actually to speak to people, the virtue of speed as well as accuracy, why knowledge of ‘history’ is vital, how certain material was removed from TV Current Affairs programmes when secret cameras had to be used, and some of those he has interviewed.
Earlier he disclosed why investigative journalism is needed now more than ever although others have different opinions.
Everyone likes to be liked.
The Labour Party are desperate to present an appealing image to voters, and to plant in their minds a bad one of The Conservatives.
In short they want to turn the Tories back into the ‘nasty party’, but in fact may have turned THEMSELVES into that!
Under the heading ‘Why attack-ads can be counter-productive’, academics at the Warwick Business School analysed whether these things actually WORK, and they concluded that they DON’T.
In the usual academia-speak, they said: “Repeatedly attacking a concept and portraying it as a negative phenomenon without providing supporting information triggers individuals to feel a knowledge-gap between what they know and what they want to know”.
But Labour officials are convinced they are on the right track, and have implied (no scrap that, SAID) Prime Minister Rishi Sunak doesn’t think adults convicted of sexual assault against children should be jailed, and focused another attack on his wife’s former ‘non-dom’ tax status.
It was a bizarre thing to say, and a charge that the party have NEVER levelled at a leader of the Tories in days gone by.
This strangeness has only been underlined by the fact that when Sir Keir Starmer was Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) he helped frame the guidelines they were having a go at, when Mr Sunak, WASN’T EVEN AN MP!
The image of President Joe Biden was boosted in America, by his recent visit to Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, but tarnished in parts of the right-wing UK media, because he prioritised the republic over Britain (where he spent several days), and was photographed alongside a leading republican.
He is to be represented at the coronation, by his wife, Jill, and last week posed for a picture shaking hands with Gerry Adams.
This last bit appeared to be especially odd in senior circles at Whitehall, although there seems to be an acceptance it was more to do with electioneering than anything else.
One UK Government minister said wearily about his visit: “He (Biden) appears to have had a very powerful republican granny… this is about making sure the Irish vote in the US holds up”.
But Nile Gardiner (a former aide to Margaret Thatcher, and contributor to The Telegraph) said: “Joe Biden has gravely insulted Britain”.
It’s exactly the same in journalism.
You would want your image to be one of a fearless and independent seeker after truth, but those who were the targets as you conducted yourself, had the OPPOSITE picture of you!
When I presented the BBC Cymru Wales Current Affairs programme, Week In, Week Out, the interviewees (quite understandably) would also want to show THEMSELVES in the best possible light, but they would often have a self-image which was light years away from the reality.
For instance, without a camera, I once met someone in a pub who was going to give me crucial information.
“You can spot me because I will be wearing a brightly-coloured jacket”, he said.
In fact the jacket was so filthy that you couldn’t make out the colours at all, but the image he had of himself was that he always wore clothes that were brightly-coloured!
This is shown, too, by the fact that I endure constant abuse online, and my Wikipedia entry is regularly vandalised by those who have a quite different image of me from the one I possess.
The latest example of it, was that the person (who I think was a friend of a crook I have exposed) took out: ‘…online investigative website…’, and added: ‘…personal blog called…’. Bizarrely, though, in the ‘career’ section, it still said: ‘…launched his own investigative website “The Eye”…’.
This may sound insignificant, but actually it is VERY important, because it effectively says that a story does not contain facts at all, but is a ‘personal view’, and I am glad to say the new addition was quickly spotted, so that the entry could be put back to its original form by one of my supporters.
Other attacks have been cruder – in the past the word “knobhead” has been added after my name.
Another person who appeared to have an EXTREMELY poor image of me launched an obnoxious tirade online: “Your article on Ellie Pitt was bordering on mysogynistic bullying, a really pathetic article written by a bitter individual who was a complete failiure as a BBC correspondent and also loved bashing the Catholic Church with your disgraceful Panorama programme”.
I have been compared on Twitter to the comedy broadcaster Alan Partridge by a Sion Tomos Owen who describes himself in his blog as: “…a bilingual TV and Radio presenter, illustrator, writer and creative workshop tutor…”. Mr Owen said in Welsh: “There’s no way that this website (The Eye) is for real?! It’s as if a Take a Break (light magazine) story has been edited by Alan Partridge” (laughing emoji).
Indeed accusations of being ‘misogynistic’ (which is the CORRECT spelling!) or ‘misogynist’ are a constant refrain among those who fire off unpleasant statements, if factual stories are published with the focus of them happening to be women, yet these are potentially libellous words, and the description is provably wrong, showing that image for some people is an altered one.
I have been accused as well online (incorrectly) of being a “bastard” (many times), an “anti-devolutionist wanker”, “pure scum”, a “liar” (also many times) a “little git”, and (correctly) a “nosey git”, “irritating”, or a “nuisance”. But these insults come amid many others. Too many, in fact, to mention.
A conman I exposed called Howard Williams (who is now in jail), launched a furious diatribe against me – contacting as well my friends and family on social media. In one rant he wrote on Facebook (FB): “You write total lies about people (only facts are reported), bully to the point of harassment and suicide, and will not answer a direct email? This is not journalism this is a mixture of Phil Parry (The ex journalist) and (others) you are pure scum!!!!! Let it be publicly known that The Eye does NOT care about people it just lies to make fictitious stories up. BULLYING, LIES, MENTAL HEALTH ABUSE TO NAME BUT A FEW!!!!!”.
In another he said: “I am have contacted you (sic) numerous times before asking why you consistently, stalk, bully and harass me? … You so far have asked the following for comments:
Thief
Abuser (if this is meant as a sexual abuser, it has never been said).
Liar
Sex Offender (It has never been said that this man is a sex offender).
Drug user (It has never been said that this man is a drug user, just that he has dealt in illegal drugs).
This issue of image has, too, been thrown into stark relief by a threat being made on social media. After it was said that my reporting was “negative journalism”, a Marc Winchester, wrote on Twitter: “I’ll whack him (me)“.
It was described as a ‘joke’ by Mr Winchester, who has claimed he was a multi-millionaire but ran a convenience store, yet it was still reported to the police who mounted an investigation.
All of this reveals that the image you have of yourself is quite different to the one held by people in the firing line, and others.
Perhaps Labour Party officials should take note…
The memories of Phil’s extraordinary decades long award-winning career in journalism (when stories often upset his targets, who had a COMPLETELY different image of him) as he was gripped by the rare neurological disabling condition Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in a major book ‘A Good Story’. Order it now.
A different book, though, has not been published, because it was to have included names.
Tomorrow – how a formal request for information was made about whether a vote of confidence was held into the work of a controversial head of a Welsh university, where she declared she was quitting, but staff have admitted they are “too frightened to talk” publicly.
