Former TV Critic Still Wants to Practice “the Craft”
Ken Parish Perkins, in his first interview since resigning last week as television critic at Texas’ Fort Worth Star-Telegram over plagiarism charges, said today his fateful duplication of paragraphs was the result of failing to rewrite material he gathered for his story. He said wants to continue “the craft of writing,” and that the most surprising part of the experience has been the “lies” told about his career.
“I’m shocked. Also, maybe I’m naive in thinking it may not have hit the fan this way. In this technology world, it snowballed,” he said of the Internet coverage of the situation. . . . I’m a critic, I can take the heat. I just can’t take the lies.
“You can’t read it,” he said. “I didn’t want to get it into my psyche.” He said his wife, Kim, kept up with it for a while, and “it knocked her off her feet.”
Perkins resigned last week after an editor at the rival Dallas Morning News, in the words of Star-Telegram Executive Editor Jim Witt, “pointed out that one paragraph in Perkins’ story Nov. 10th about the ABC series ‘Lost’ was repeated verbatim from Entertainment Weekly with no attribution. A further check of Perkins’ stories and columns from the present to July 2003 revealed several instances where Perkins either used a whole sentence or long phrases in sentences verbatim without giving credit or attribution, a violation of the Star-Telegram’s ethics policy.”
Perkins, 46, was one of only four African American television critics at a daily newspaper, and was well-regarded as a writer, critic and mentor. Witt called him “a great writer and idea person, a tireless worker and overall excellent employee.”
The fateful story was an overnight review. “I grabbed it from a Web site,” he said of that paragraph. “I just needed the information. I had a lot of notes. I stuck that copy with my copy and just kept going and didn’t change it. . . . I had stuck it there and I was going to recast it and I didn’t.”
Later, when his editor reached him by cell phone as he was picking up his children, “as soon as he said it to me, the first thing I said was, f—. It was like, oh, s—. At that moment, I knew it was over.”
As for the previous cases – where a sentence or long phrases in sentences were found to be duplicates of others’ work – Perkins attributed that to his writing style. “When I write, I do what’s called a fast write. I sit down and write and write until I can’t write any more. I don’t self-edit. I get down everything I want to say, then I go back and start self-editing, and then it becomes a story. For me, one of the drawbacks is that I’ve read things, it could have been long ago, and I don’t know whether I’ve read it somewhere else.”
The process Perkins described matches procedures that experts say can lead to trouble. Aly Colón, reporting, writing and editing group leader and diversity program director at the Poynter Institute, and formerly the school’s ethics group leader, told Journal-isms last week: “I do think people can almost absent-mindedly aggregate material. When the material becomes ingested into our minds, it becomes ours,” Colón said. “Then the challenge becomes, how can we separate what’s truly ours? If we were strict about this, all of us commit plagiarism constantly.”
One way to make the separation, Colón said, is for writers to review what they have written, as they do for spelling and grammar, and check for what is original and what is not.
On the listserve of the National Association of Black Journalists, Stephen C. Miller, assistant to the technology editor at the New York Times, suggested this when pulling material from the Internet: “IMMEDIATELY, drag the URL into your notes as well. You can copy and paste, but I just go up to the address bar and, in Internet Explorer, drag the icon in front of the URL into your notes; it will copy it there. The advantage is that you will notice that it’s not your stuff and where it came from. Secondly, you can go back to the site and find more information if needed.”
Perkins said he was still working on a couple of freelance pieces and agreed with the suggestions: “I am going to go over each line and make sure it’s a completely original thought.” In fact, he said he wrote a strongly worded piece this morning about his situation that he said he submitted to the local public television station, KERA.
“The Star-Telegram circled its wagons and went into defense mode,” it says.
“Then attack mode.
“Had to protect its credibility.
“I was gone in days.
“And so began my demonization.
“First by my own newspaper. Then by my former newspaper.
“Then by the bottomless pit of the Internet.
“I know, I know. It was my own rope that hung me.
“I have no quibble with that.
“But who’s tightening it now?”
One piece about Perkins’ career that has circulated appeared Monday on the Web site referencetone.com. Written by John Cook, a former Chicago Tribune television writer, it was headlined, “How the Chicago Tribune Swept a Fabricator Under the Rug.”
It says Perkins made up quotes in Chicago and “was removed from the critic job in December of 1994, ostensibly to get more reporting experience in Metro. He declined the demotion and left the Tribune shortly thereafter.”
The critic tells a different story. “I’ve never invented quotes, nor done anything like that,” he said. But the Chicago experience “got off to a real bad start” and continued that way.
First, he said, the Tribune public-relations people wanted to promote him as a graduate of the Robert Taylor Homes housing project, and he refused. Then, he said, the paper, criticized for a lack of women and people of color, decided to begin using all the critics’ photos, starting with him. Not having a photo was one of the things he liked about the paper, he said. Once the photo is there, “They see a black man, they think he’ll be a certain way.”
When he objected, it was “who’s this uppity nigger?” Perkins said. “I never really got traction at that paper. Never made friends, couldn’t get any kind of allies going. I was isolated because of these things.
“They didn’t remove me from the TV critic’s post,” he continued. “I said let me take some time to think about this.” When he returned, “They said, ‘we want you to work nights in Metro.’ They just wanted me to leave.”
He landed at the Star-Telegram.
“I love being a writer. I love criticism,” Perkins said. He took to television criticism because “you’re basically all over the place. Everything comes across television. I could write about culture, I could write about trends. I’m a writer first and foremost.”
He said he understood why a newspaper would want the resignation of someone accused of plagiarism. “It goes to the heart of a writer’s credibility,” he said; it would have been easier to stay on the staff had he committed murder.
Dallas Morning News Arts Editor Rick Holter was the one who told Perkins’ boss about the duplicated paragraph in the “Lost” story. “I don’t know what to think about that,” Perkins said, hearing of it for the first time. “I don’t think I want to go there, with conspiracy theories.”
Perkins also said he was thankful for the “tremendous” support he has received. “I’ll always remember that.” For now, he said after a few days of introspection, “I’ll just put one foot in front of the other and keep going.”
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Ex-Amsterdam News Editor Faces Menacing Charges
The former executive editor of the New York Amsterdam News faces a Jan. 10 court date on misdemeanor charges of menacing, unlawfully imprisoning and harassing his ex-girlfriend, a spokesman for the Brooklyn, N.Y., Criminal Court said today.
The editor, Jamal Watson, who also faces grand larceny charges for allegedly stealing checks from summer interns, had told Journal-isms that the ex-girlfriend had decided not to pursue the charges, which stemmed from their breakup. A trial has been scheduled on the grand larceny charges for March 7, the New York Daily News reported Monday.
In October, according to the complaint, Watson “grabbed informant and threw informant on the bed and pinned informant’s legs and hands down and then the defendant [hid] informant’s cellular telephone so that the informant could not call the police and blocked the doorway so that the informant could not get out of the apartment.”
On Nov. 20, 2001, the Boston Herald reported that Watson, who had worked for the rival Boston Globe, “was ordered to pay $435.45 restitution and the case against him was continued without a finding for a year after he admitted to sufficient facts for a finding of guilty on charges of larceny, credit card fraud and receiving stolen property.
“Watson, you may recall, was accused of stealing a wallet from his former co-worker and ex-friend, Boston Globe reporter David Abel, and using Abel’s credit card to buy a Palm Pilot and some gasoline.”
On April 18, 2002, the Herald reported that “Watson yesterday had his court-appointed lawyer enter a not guilty plea to charges he harassed a Northeastern University coed and violated a restraining order.” NU, which employed the ex-Globe reporter as a journalism instructor, kicked him off campus for alleged ‘repeated inappropriate interactions and conduct’ toward one of his students.”
On Monday, Watson denied wrongdoing in the case of the student interns’ checks, saying the students had all been paid. He told Journal-isms he had spent that day “talking to high-profile African American investors about starting a Black daily newspaper in New York that can be easily accessible to African Americans across the country.”
Watson replies to this item at the end of today’s posting.
- Erik German, Newsday: Ex-editor pleads not guilty in theft case
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Philly Daily News Farewell “Felt Like a Funeral”
While the Philadelphia Inquirer was saying farewell to 70 journalists last Friday, as reported on Monday, its sister paper, the Philadelphia Daily News, was losing 25.
“It was tough seeing 25 very talented people walk out of the door,” Editor Michael Days told Journal-isms tonight. But, “I was heartened by the fact that the paper continues to be very good, and a whole lot of people want to remain to fight the good fight and continue to make Philadelphia a better place to live.”
The Inquirer and Daily News, both owned by Knight Ridder, a chain that itself faces an uncertain future, announced on Sept. 20 they would slash 16 percent of their newsroom staffs through buyouts or layoffs.
Among those who left the News last Friday were Wayne Bush, Yvonne Dennis, Wayne Faircloth, Myung Oak Kim, Yvonne Latty, Sono Motoyama, Earni Young, George Miller and Yvonne Weston, an editorial assistant.
“We had a party and it felt like a funeral,” Latty told Journal-isms. “There was no music and no speeches” at the affair, held at the Pen and Pencil, a journalism bar. Former editor Zach Stahlberg and former columnist Linda Wright Moore returned. “Everybody was giving each other hugs; I couldn’t wait to get out of there.”
Latty said she has a deadline in a week for a book about Iraq war veterans, “In Conflict: Iraq War Veterans Speak Out on Duty, Law and the Fight to Stay Alive,” to be published by PoliPoint Press. She continues to promote last year’s “We Were There: Voices of African American Veterans, from World War II to the War in Iraq” (Amistad/HarperCollins), which she said has been “my life for the last three or four years.”
Latty spent 13 years at the paper and is a Philadelphia native. “I wanted to cover black people and go into poor neighborhoods. I got to do it at the Daily News,” she said.
- Donna Goodison, Boston Herald: Globeâ??s arts section hit as staffers take buyout
- “The Scoop,” Hartford Advocate: Tribune Trials and Tribulations (on Hartford Courant)
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Les Brownlee, Pioneer Chicago Reporter, Dies at 90
“Les Brownlee, the first African-American reporter for white-owned media in Chicago, died Monday at the age of 90,” Susan S. Stevens, who works for the Chicago Headline Club, wrote today in the Chicago Defender.
“He was the first African-American member of the Society of Professional Journalists and later was president of its local chapter, the Chicago Headline Club.
“He had been ill with congestive heart failure and cancer, spending his last three weeks in Evanston Hospital. Shortly before his death, he finished his autobiography, which is tentatively titled: Les Brownlee, Autobiography of Pioneer Black Journalist and His ‘Fairy-Tale Life.'”
- Barbara Sherlock, Chicago Tribune: Trailblazing journalist taught students the way
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Mark McEwen Expected to Recover from Stroke
Mark McEwen, who spent 16 years on CBS-TV morning television before moving to Orlando, “is expected to make a full recovery from a stroke he suffered last week, but will not be back on the air until at least January, news director Skip Valet said,” Breuse Hickman wrote in Florida Today.
In Orlando, McEwen, 51, anchors the CBS affiliate’s “Local 6 First News” and “Local 6 News at Noon.”
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NABJ Awards 6 Grants from Katrina Relief Fund
“The National Association of Black Journalists has begun issuing financial grants to NABJ members directly affected by Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath,” the association said in a news release.
“Six NABJ members — five from New Orleans and one from Metairie, La. — have each received checks for $500 from NABJ’s Katrina Relief Fund, established in September to help journalists and students affected by the disaster. The members benefiting include a working journalist and five college students.
“‘We had members who Katrina knocked down,’ said NABJ president Bryan Monroe, assistant vice president/news at Knight Ridder, ‘I’m glad we are able to begin to help them back on their feet.’
NABJ has raised nearly $19,000 to help members from the Gulf Coast region, including individual donations from members and contributions from other journalism associations. Contributions are still being accepted at www.nabj.org.
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Mexican-Based Paper to Debut in Fort Wayne
“A free weekly newspaper focused on the Hispanic community will make its debut in Allen County on Dec. 8,” Nicole Lee wrote Monday in Indiana’s Fort Wayne News-Sentinel.
“Fronteras de la Noticia, which will be distributed by Fort Wayne Newspapers, is a tabloid primarily written in Spanish and will feature news about Mexico and Central America, in addition to local content.
“U.S. newspapers choosing to deliver news to the Hispanic community through media vehicles such as Fronteras recently drew the ire of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.
In California, the San Jose Mercury News announced last month it was closing its own weekly Spanish-language publication, Nuevo Mundo, to import Fronteras, which allocates two to four pages for local content.
In Fort Wayne, “Fronteras’ debut will be followed by Latino Monthly, which will hit local newsstands in January. Latino Monthly is a partnership between Vince Robinson, editor of INK Newspaper and co-owner of Diversity Media Group Inc., and Salvador Soto, owner of De Soto Translation & Marketing in Fort Wayne.”
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To Blog or Not to Blog: Is It Heat vs. Light?
Media critic Amy Alexander is taking heat for a commentary last week on National Public Radio’s “News and Notes With Ed Gordon” in which she said, “as I read the growing numbers of blogs, it seems to me that the ones that have gained the most popularity in recent years, such as Daily Kos and Atrios, are big on promulgating the same kind of back-slapping, mutual admiration society, white-guy networking that drove me nuts back when I worked in newsrooms, same elite dynamic, different medium.
“Not all blog readers know the difference between pure unfiltered, unedited opinion and good old-fashioned solidly reported news,” she wrote. “Much of what appears on many blogs is speculation, however well-informed.”
At the Greensboro (N.C.) News & Record, however, Editorial Page Editor Allen H. Johnson wrote that he wished more people would blog. “Blogs are a very effective way to explain votes, explore issues and hold dialogues with others without having to be in the same room, the same zip code or even the same hemisphere,” Johnson wrote Sunday in a blog on his paper’s Web site.
Two journalists Johnson said he wished would join the movement are Nat Irvin and DeWayne Wickham. Irvin, “a weekly columnist for the Winston-Salem Journal, teaches future studies at the Babcock School of Management at Wake Forest University. He is witty, topical and entertaining.” Wickham, “the director of the Advanced Journalism Studies Institute at N.C. A&T is a columnist for USA Today, a former president of the National Association of Black Journalists and the author of several books. He’s got a lot to say. But he is not a fan of blogging, which he dismisses as a waste of journalists’ time. It wouldn’t be a waste of his.”
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Short Takes
- “Teen People nixed a story about Hitler-loving teenybopper twins Prussian Blue – amid outrage that the glossy had promised to avoid the words ‘hate,’ ‘supremacist’ and ‘Nazi’ in its piece on the racist singing sisters,” Bill Hammond and Nancy Dillon wrote today in the New York Daily News, referring to 13-year-olds Lynx and Lamb Gaede. “A Web-based teaser for the February story originally called the hatemongering duo ‘aspiring musicians’ and compared them to wide-eyed sensations Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen.”
- “We aren’t certain that threatening e-mails sent to CBS 3 reporter Todd Quinones came from members of Club Kama Sutra, but it sure wouldn’t surprise us,” Dan Gross wrote today in the Philadelphia Daily News. “Monday evening, Kama Sutra owner Alan Tizer sent an e-mail to members saying that CBS 3 ‘broke the law by secretly taping us, should be punished to the fullest extent under the law and should be disgraced . . .” Among ‘guilty parties,’ Tizer listed Quinones and “the undercover bitch that apparently taped us.”
- In the Philippines, “Unknown assailants shot and killed two journalists in separate incidents over a three-day period,” the Committee to Protect Journalists reported Monday. “Newspaper reporter Robert Ramos died Sunday night after being shot twice in the head outside a market in Cabuyao, Laguna province, 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of the capital, Manila. Radio announcer Ricardo ‘Ding’ Uy, known for his leftist political activities, was killed by a gunman outside his home on Friday morning in Sorsogon City, Sorsogon.”
- “I remember 40 years ago when we (Indians) didn’t have an author who was one of us, one who could write a book from an Indian perspective and believe it or not, an Indian does see things in a whole different way than a non-Indian,” columnist Tim Giago wrote Monday in Native Times, speaking of Vine Deloria Jr., the writer who died Nov. 13 at age 72.
- “Jerry Mitchell, an investigative reporter for The Clarion-Ledger newspaper of Jackson, Miss., has been named the 2005 winner of the John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism,” the Associated Press reported Tuesday. “Mitchell, 46, will receive a $25,000 prize during the award presentation Nov. 29 at Columbia University. Reporting by Mitchell has focused attention on decades-old civil rights murders and renewed investigations by prosecutors.”
- “Gathered together at the World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis last week, international leaders such as UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and African Union President Olusegun Obasanjo argued for a bridging of the so-called digital divide between regions rural and urban, rich and poor,” the UN Integrated Regional Information Networks reported Tuesday from Dakar, Senegal. “The digital divide is gaping across most of Africa where a population of nearly one billion accounts for less than 3 percent of the world’s Internet users.”
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Letter from Jamal Watson: “Recycled Rumors”
After this column was posted, Jamal Watson, who edited the New York Amsterdam News, asked that this letter be posted in reply.
I am disturbed that “Journal-isms,” which I assumed was supposed to be a useful space for reporting about journalists of color, has become nothing more than a mouthpiece for right-wing tabloids like the Boston Herald and the New York Post that routinely attack Black journalists each week in their newspapers.
In reporting on my case, I was disturbed that you merely lifted information from a gossip column [hardly a reputable ones at that] from the Boston Herald in recycling rumors from four years ago. At a time when African American journalists need the support of each other, I can not understand the need to perpetuate racist reporting that seek to demonize Black men as thieves and abusers. There are far too many images of black men portrayed in this manner in mainstream media.
We are all presumed innocent until proven guilty. I have never been convicted of any crime. Relax and calm down. I write a weekly column for the New York Sun. Rarely have you reported about my column on the pages of “Journal-isms.” Nor, have you reported on the handful of initiatives that I started as the editor of the Amsterdam News and how I transformed a newspaper that many had given up on to a readable newspaper free of grammatical errors.
Take a breath. Let us not jump to judgment. These are merely charges.
Jamal Watson Harlem
Nov. 23, 2005
