 NEW YORK
NEWS |
Revealing Jayson
Blair
by JAMAL
E. WATSON
Special to the
AmNews
Originally posted 3/10/2004
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In his much-publicized
memoir, the self-professed fabricator and
plagiarist Jayson Blair cuts right to the chase.
He bypasses excuses, and holds only himself
responsible for the journalistic fiasco that he
created after he falsified and fabricated events
and quotes in several dozen New York Times
articles.
Blair, who is Black, was eventually
forced to resign, and the paper’s top two editors,
Howell Raines and managing editor Gerald Boyd,
followed suit.
The 27-year-old former
journalist, who fabricated throughout his career
at the Times, has written a candid book telling
readers how he tricked them into believing that he
was writing stories from places that he had never
visited.
“I lied and I lied – and then I lied
some more,” Blair writes. “I lied about where I
had been, I lied about where I had found
information, I lied about how I wrote the story.
And these were no everyday little white lies –
they were complete fantasies embellished down to
the tiniest made-up detail.”
But in “Burning
Down My Masters’ House,” the 298-page book
published by New Millennium Press, an apologetic
Blair comes clean, helping the readers to
understand the rationale for his deceptions. And
he acknowledges that the scandal has created a
tense environment that has made it more difficult
for African Americans working in mainstream
newsrooms like the New York Times.
“I am not
the poster boy for what went wrong with
affirmative action,” said Blair in an interview
with the Amsterdam News. “Diversity is still
needed in America’s newsrooms.”
But some have
charged that Blair was a recipient of special
affirmative action programs – that he only
advanced to the New York Times because of the
paper’s intended desire to bring in young, African
American reporters, a charge that Times editors
dismiss.
Tomorrow, Blair will talk about the
scandal at Hue-Man Bookstore in Harlem as part of
his national tour that has taken him on the
“Today” show and “Larry King Live.”
In the
well-written memoir, we are confronted with a
journalist who cuts corners, deceives the public
and struggles with substance abuse, suicide and
mental illness – issues that still remain way
under the radar screen as topics of discussion in
the African American community.
In truth, much
of the Black community pretends that mental
illness doesn’t exit. In this context, Blair’s
powerful testimony can encourage a national
discourse around the issue and inspire African
Americans who are battling the deadly disease to
get the help that they need.
“This book was
really about my own personal therapy,” said Blair,
who has maintained a distance from drugs and is
currently on medication to help treat his mental
illness. “It was an excuse for me to look at
myself, my own character.”
While the New York
Times has denounced the book and others have
criticized Blair for writing the memoir, saying
that the former reporter is merely seeking to make
a profit from its sales, there appears to be a
double standard of sorts at work.
Blair has
received much more scrutiny in the mainstream
media than other white reporters and columnists,
such as Stephen Glass and Michael Barnicle, who
committed similar atrocious acts of journalistic
fraudulence.
In fact, both Glass and Barnicle
have gone on to close lucrative deals following
their falls from grace. Glass has written a book
and has been portrayed on the movie screen, and
Barnicle has been a frequent television
commentator and has recently been asked to write a
column for another newspaper.
There’s
something quite believable about Blair’s
insistence that the book was written so that
others could “learn from it.”
“I think
throughout the book there are many teachable
moments,” Blair said. “Here, there is no happy
ending. It was a very painful process to write
this book.”
Blair certainly can’t undo his
past, but his future is by no means over. While
reading the page-turning memoir, it becomes
immediately clear that he can write, and he can
write well.
And while efforts to demonize him
will continue, it’s also clear that if there is
any group of people who understand the importance
of redemption and forgiveness, it’s Black people.
And just by standing up and agreeing to face
the wolves by offering what is certainly a sincere
apology, it seems that Blair certainly deserves a
bit of that forgiveness.
Jayson Blair will
speak and sign copies of his book “Burning Down My
Masters’ House” on Friday, March 12, from 6-8 p.m.
at Hue-Man Bookstore located at 2319 Frederick
Douglass Blvd. in Harlem.
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