Friday, January 27, 2006

Truth trumps "variety's sake" at Sundance but not in the New York Times



Sometimes in odd ways the mainstream media obsession with evenhandedness begs the question of truth. Truth, after all, was once the purpose of journalism - or so I thought. In a recent NYT article covering the Sundance Film Festival, A.O.Scott says:

"It would be nice, if only for variety's sake, to encounter a pro-war or pro-death-penalty documentary here, but that seems unlikely."

In one breath, I want to say: Why in the world would it be nice? Since when does "variety's sake" trump truth? In the next breath, my choice is to say: Aren't we lucky that it "seems unlikely?"

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