Washington Post Shuts Down Blog

Billosaur writes "C|Net has an article by Katharine Q. Seelye of The New York Times, which indicates that the Washington Post is having to close one of its blogs, due to 'too many personal attacks, profanity and hate mail directed at the paper's ombudsman.' It seems that Deborah Howell, the newspaper's ombudsman, wrote an article on the Jack Abramoff scandal which elicited a storm of protest and led to readers using profanity and making unprintable comments, which the paper had to take extra care in removing. This was apparently more based on the issue at hand, as the Post's other blogs have not experienced similar problems." What kind of precedent does this set for other mainstream news sites? What we'd consider a normal day around here has to look fairly intimidating to the average newspaper editor. Will this dissuade news sites from blogging in the future?

Re:turn off comments

[MikeFM]

Or implement Slashdot like karma so users can moderate each other's comments. Works fairly well. A lot better than trying to have a single moderator.

Different from hate "snail" mail?

[Brown Eggs]

Most of these journalists probably used to recieve a handful of actual letters detailing how stupid their article was back in the pre-web days. Really the only difference here is the volume and the anonymity (boy that doesn't look spelled right). Even if they were particularly nasty before, I doubt the editors or the powers that be ever decided to yank the articles. Don't see why it should be any different now. That being said, I know when someone posts mean things about me on a message board I curl into a little ball under my desk and cry.

so what's the problem?

[max born]

Brady wrote that he had expected criticism of The Post on the site but that the public had violated rules against personal attacks and profanity.

Profanity? Wow, that's fucking serious.

What did he expect? Rather than shutting down why not set up a rating system like slashdot's so that trolls can be modded out of sight?

Re:The actual comments

[crmartin]

They talk about that at WaPo. What you're seeing is the outcome AFTER they spent hours trying to delete the worst stuff as fast as it ws coming in.

Re:Never Quote Facts....

[pomo monster]

Yeah, seriously. I'll never know what so enrages them when we teach our children the fact that God created the universe 6,000 years ago. Or the fact that homosexuals are child molesters by nature. Or the fact that we were greeted as liberators.

Who wants to bet...

[NeuroManson]

It was done by Freepers, www.freerepublic.com? Sounds like the sort of thing they would (and have) done.

Re:Never Quote Facts....

[Anonymous Coward]

Those of us on the "whacky left" are far more interested in facts and reasonable discussion than most of the right wing, which relies on a steady diet of whacky stuff from Limbaugh, Savage and others of their ilk.

I'm a liberal, but that is an outrageous sweeping generalization about people that disagree with you, with which you put yourself in the group not interested in facts an reasonable discussions. Unless you have solid undisputable facts and reason to back up the claim that _most_ of the right wing are far less interested in facts and reasonable discussion than the "wacky left". You certainly presented nothing else than an inflammatory fact less claim, not unlike what you criticize others for.

Re:Rules for hateful posting

[tool462]

I would argue that perceived anonymity is more important than whether it really exists.

People will do some crazy stuff when they think nobody is looking...

You mean the Post has never heard of .....

[i_want_you_to_throw_]

comment moderation? Newspapers don't publish every single letter that gets sent to them so I'm not sure why ever comment posted needs to even be published. Oh yeah I know someone is going to say that's abridging someone's speech but fuck it...It's a blog, not a democracy.

Re:From my reading, the ombudsman was the problem

[sammy baby]

So now you get one side pissed off because of a percieved inaccuracy (and literally, they are right), and the other side feeling like they have to defend themselves (which they should), and then it's a flame war and OMG! LIKE THE END of the WORLD or something!

For disclosure: I tend to lean leftwards, and most of the time will side with Ds over Rs. With that in mind, this is an example of how trying to go the middle route can leave you with the wrong idea.

Yes, it's true that some of Abramoff's clients (specifically, I'm referring to the Indian tribes involved in the Casino scandal) donated money to Democrats. However, that's neither surprising nor even suspect, although many find it distateful. After all, the tribes are one of the parties which apparently got bilked by Abramaoff.

The issue is that Abramoff seems to have been involved in money-laundering and outright vote-buying schemes. These activities seem to have included Republicans, and only Republicans. And before I'm accused of partisan Republican bashing, reflect for a second on why the dirty parties might all happen to be Republicans in this case:

1. Jack Abramoff is a die-hard, lifelong Republican. Why would he be funneling money to the other side?
2. The Republicans control the House, Senate, and White House. Why would you funnel money to someone who can't deliver what you need?

The sad truth of the matter is that the current state of affairs can be traced back to the Congressional ascendency of the Republican Party back in 94. Tom DeLay (you may have heard of him [google.com]?) then started the "K Street Project," in which lobbyists were pressured to hire Republicans (and only Republicans) if they wanted access to party leaders, and to give money to Republicans (and only Republicans). Since that sort of political patronage is the lifesblood of Washington, it wasn't too long before the Democrats were more or less frozen out of the process.

Anyhoo: The Washington Post actually does have a quick primer [washingtonpost.com] on the project up. But for consistantly good reporting on the subject from an honest to god journalist who knows how to keep a good blog, you should check out Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo [talkingpointsmemo.com]. (Warning: Marshall is pretty obivously anti-Republican, but he's also pretty obviously completely fair in his reporting. Once you get around the sarcasm.)

Re:Rules for hateful posting

[lymond01]

With public boards allowing people to go through other users' old posts, "anonymity" is fading, and you're composed of not just the thoughts in your current post, but of your past posts (should anyone take the time to check...and they do). If you have a tendency to exaggerate, people will take note. If you preach uncited "facts", people will always question you. So while you as a person remain message_board_user_045, message_board_user_045 does have a history, a personality, a fanbase (or detractors).

makes her job easier

[itcomesinwaves]

Just in case anyone was wondering, it's the job of the ombudsman to deal with complaints. At a newspaper they are also meant to review the paper's reporting. So this lady makes an glaring inaccurate statement (which it is her job to guard against) and when met with the initial round of complaints she defends the statement, which causes further (more outraged) complaints. What does the lady do (remember it's her job to deal with reader complaints)? She freaks out and shuts down the comments. I can kind of understand a normal reporter not wanting to deal with complaints, but it's her job! In this case being thin-skinned == being under-qualified for the position.

Re:From my reading, the ombudsman was the problem

[tenchiken]

So the $500,000 To democrats, and the $50,000 to Harry Reid were just business as usual? For that matter, the entire rise of K street under the Clinton Administration was accidental?

There is no doubt that the Republicans need to clean ship, before the next election, or the voters will do it for them. But for Democrats to act like they arn't also affect by this, didn't go to the Signature resturant, or didn't stop by the sky boxes is pushing truth past the spin zone.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:From my reading, the ombudsman was the problem

[sammy baby]

So the $500,000 To democrats, and the $50,000 to Harry Reid were just business as usual?

As I said in my post: they were donations from the tribes to the Democrats. Distasteful maybe, but that's lobbying in Washington these days. Illegal? Definitely not. And this isn't just an ethics issue, this is a straight-up pay for play indictment issue.

Or put differently: Republicans and Democrats both got paid. But Republicans got paid more, and the money they got was gotten illegally. To quote Marshall, whom I referenced above, "to the best of my knowledge no credible claim has been made that any Democrat is even under investigation in the Abramoff scandal, let alone facing potential indictment. At least half a dozen Republicans have been so named in press reports, with varying degrees of specificity."

For that matter, the entire rise of K street under the Clinton Administration was accidental?

Are you suggesting that the GOP's largely successful plan to lock in lobbyist jobs and lobbyist dollars to the Republican party is Clinton's fault?

That's a new one.

There is no doubt that the Republicans need to clean ship, before the next election, or the voters will do it for them. But for Democrats to act like they arn't also affect by this, didn't go to the Signature resturant, or didn't stop by the sky boxes is pushing truth past the spin zone.

So far, it doesn't look like there's anything to accuse them off except impropriety. And that's just sleazy, not breaking the law.

Like I said: the Democrats don't have clean hands on this. In fact, near as I can make out, nobody in Washington does. But so far, it looks like no Democrat broke the law with regards to the Abramoff issue, and unless that changes, the insistence that this is a "bipartisan scandal" is best confined to obviously partisan talking heads...

But wait, what am I thinking? You just used the phrase "spin zone."

Re:Rules for hateful posting

[ChrisGilliard]

Yep, it's a bunch of BS. The major newspapers see blogs as a threat because people read blogs. This is just an attack piece on blogs to say that the blogosphere is just filled with a bunch of idiots. What they don't know is that they do this to their own peril. Media outlets that allow participation will thrive and those that do not will go out of business. This is really inevitable.

Re:Rules for hateful posting

[westlake]

the blogosphere is just filled with a bunch of idiots.

"Blogosphere?" Guilty as charged. Case closed.

A newspaper is defined by the quality and character of everything that makes it into print.
That is why it has an editor. A strong editor will not allow op-ed debate to degenerate into unitelligible, libelous, mush.