Those who recall the furore over the hoax of Keith Windschuttle and Quadrant earlier in the year might be interested in reading an article by the hoaxer in question, Katherine Wilson, in Meanjin, wherein she discusses her motivations.
Tag Archive for 'Katherine Wilson'
Folks might recall the criticism from Jason Wilson bloggers were subjected to over the Windschuttle/Wilson hoax. John Quiggin has written an excellent post in response to the implicit claim that bloggers are “lazy amateurs”. In so doing, he also highlights the invalidity of one of the premises of the interminable “journos v. bloggers” arguments – the assertion that journalists report news and bloggers provide opinion. Go read!
In an earlier post riffing off the Katherine Wilson hoax on Keith Windschuttle and Quadrant, I made some comments about the absence of any real political force representing small l Liberalism, to the consternation of some commenters on the ensuing thread. It would seem that I’m not alone in holding this view, judging by Norman Abjorensen’s article in Inside Story today. I wouldn’t necessarily agree with Abjorensen’s dichotomy of romantics and realists, but I think he’s close to the mark here:
And herein lies a lesson for the modern day romantics on the centre-right who dream of an impending epiphany in the Liberal Party: there is simply no constituency for it. Sure, there are the disgruntled social liberals still in or close to the Liberal Party, the former Democrats without a home and fragments of an uncommitted middle class. But this is a small and probably shrinking constituency, as the Australian Democrats discovered to their peril.
Abjorensen is sceptical about the claims sometimes made about an enduring Deakinite liberal tradition, pointing out that Deakin himself succumbed to the “ruthless game of hard-headed pragmatism” a century ago.
Continue reading ‘What comes after the Democrats? (And “new” Labor?)’
I’ve made the case before that the unintended upshot of the Katherine Wilson hoax on Quadrant was to expose that tawdry publication as a complete joke. So perhaps its continued Australia Council funding can be justified as a source of pure comedy gold. [Via Grodscorp] – apparently this is the outcome of “reflection” on Australia Day:
here is a partial list of the things the Left hate about Australia:
Australia Day, Anzac Day, people who live in the suburbs, people who live in the country, farmers, fishermen, dams, Quadrant, Australian history, the flag, the constitution, Andrew Bolt’s readers, The Australian, Liberal voters, National Party voters, Family First voters, One Nation supporters, the RSL, McDonald’s, McMansions, plasma TVs, Australian Idol, big business, small business, monolingualists, Christians, our last prime minister, liberal democracy, capitalism, lamingtons, Australians, the national coat of arms, the Samuel Griffith Society, soldiers, conservatives, musicals not about Australian Left politicians, commercial television, non-indigenous trees, dog owners, cats, non-Left talk back radio hosts, timber workers, plastic bags, Howard’s battlers, climate change sceptics, white people, commercial radio, America (pre-Obama), sovereignty (ours), realistic paintings (especially by Albert Namatjira), the Big Banana and other Big Things, cultural dissidents, men, sprinklers, green lawns, cars (other peoples), wood fires, rednecks, Sir John Kerr.
Hmmm, let’s see. I like the Big Banana and other Big Things. Lamingtons. Cats. Am a Catholic. Fan of Australian history. Have had a few beers in an RSL Club, and seen some bands at… have lived in the suburbs for more than half my life, have rellos who live in the country, etc., etc. Oh, I don’t know what the Samuel Griffith Society is, so perhaps I hate that. But generally I don’t try to define my politics in terms of hatred. It seems to me that the only people who do talk in those terms are, well, you know who…
“Australia’s leading journal of ideas”? I’m surprised even Windy isn’t embarrassed by this sort of nonsense.
I feel like I’m flogging a dead horse here a little, but there are still some interesting posts being written on some of the issues arising out of Katherine Wilson’s hoaxing of Quadrant [see past LP posts here]. Most of the focus is now on the role of the blogosphere in revealing her identity, as Don Arthur at Troppo reacts to Jason Wilson’s claims of unethical behaviour at Gatewatching [here, here and Wilson's response to Arthur is here]. Meanwhile, more positively, Legal Eagle discusses why she thinks blogging is different from journalism, and some of the overlaps, and Margaret Simons reflects further on some of the issues.
A salient point in reply to Wilson’s claims about the obligations of bloggers regarding fact-checking might be synthesised from Legal Eagle’s post and a comment on Simons’ thread from Mediamook. Continue reading ‘Wilson/Windschuttle Quadrant hoax: the links continue!’
There’s an interesting debate proceeding on a post by Jason Wilson at gatewatching on Katherine Wilson’s hoaxing of Keith Windschuttle and Quadrant [previous LP posts here]. I think there’s some useful clarification of some of the ethical issues in the thread, and it also goes to my contention that the bloggers v. journos frame really should be put to bed. In the process, I think some of the gaps in current academic research about blogs and blogging are being highlighted, which hopefully will be a useful (if unintended) contribution from the whole exercise.
Meanwhile, John Quiggin looks at Windschuttle’s political trajectory.
In that vein, it’s worth noting that the culture wars have largely been fought between ex-lefties and – in the Australian context – liberals masquerading as “the left”. I don’t think David Marr and Robert Manne actually are “the Australian left” in any meaningful way, and I think it’s significant that Manne comes from a background as a cold warrior. What all this implies is that the targets and the terms of culture wars debates have always been both illusory and disconnected from political reality. There’s also a certain style of debating and argument which is usually ad hominem, full of rhetorical trickery and dedicated to sniffing out secret or hidden allegiances. For a range of reasons, I think Wilson has written herself into this script. I also think that this whole episode should demonstrate just how irrelevant and fundamentally pointless the culture wars are.
I’m of the view too that Crikey editor Jonathan Green is right that there’s something awry with Wilson’s approach to “activist journalism”. While the word “ethics” has been tossed around with gay abandon in all these conversations, I think there are significant questions about the politics of the hoax – its motivations, target and efficacy – which have been glossed over by all the side taking and point scoring. Some relevant questions could also be asked about whether journalism and activism go together.
Elsewhere: More from Margaret Simons.
Update: New post with more links around the ethical issues here.
One of the ironies of the Windschuttle kerfuffle is that Alan Sokal has a new book out. Perhaps all those Sokal analogies will help his sales. At any rate, blogger and UPenn cultural studies prof Michael Bérubé has some very interesting things to say in a review of Beyond the Hoax: Science, Philosophy and Culture in the American Scientist. Go read!
Years ago, I used to read Quadrant – incidentally before Robert Manne became editor, if I recall correctly. Back in the day, there was a sense that there was some sort of contest of ideas, and thus there was some purpose to reading, or at least casting a glance across a range of “little magazines”. I think that time ended a long while ago. Certainly, I stopped reading Quadrant over a decade ago, and I can’t say I feel there’s some huge gap in my life.
After all the brouhaha about the Katherine Wilson/Keith Windschuttle hoax dies down, I suspect the most lasting insight to be derived from all the kerfuffle is that Wilson’s target had already disappeared into a long twilight of irrelevance. For mine, John Quiggin’s point about the saga is among the most telling – Windschuttle’s own credibility on the issue which has been central to the recent stages of his career – Indigenous history – lies in tatters because of his own inability to substantiate the claims he made many years ago now with further research. The biggest hoax, Quiggin argues, is Windschuttle’s own contribution to “the history wars”.
After a number of folks actually had a look at what’s published on Quadrant’s website these days, it’s painfully obvious that there’s very little credibility there to be undermined. Egregious grammatical errors, bizarre rants with scant evidence of an elementary ability to construct a coherent argument, to be sure.
So the other motto we might draw from the hoax affair is that it’s drawn attention to the absence of both standards and relevance in most of what Quadrant has to offer. Continue reading ‘English language, partisan misuse thereof, etc.’
Apparently it’s now the question on everyone’s lips – apropos of the Keith Windschuttle Quadrant hoax. “Sharon Gould” was the pseudonym used by a hoaxer who submitted an egregious article embodying “outrageous propositions” about GM research and splicing human genes into food to Windschuttle, which he published. Crikey revealed the hoax. Don Arthur, writing at Troppo, doesn’t know the answer to the question of the moment, but he links to some people who have some ideas, and has done a bit of googling off his own bat. Both Jason Soon and Nexus6 believe they have identified Katherine Wilson as the hoaxer. I offer no opinion on the matter.
But I wanted to clarify something – in comments at Troppo, mel wrote:
I wonder if Wilson tipped Mark Bahnisch off about the hoax …..? AFAIK he was the first blogger to flag the issue.
Aside from – as appears to be his wont – making false and self-serving statements regarding moderation on this blog and throwing in a bit of personal abuse for good measure – never a good start – mel is committing a post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, which abounds these days. I posted about the Crikey story because I happened to be online when I received the Crikey email. That’s all. That was the first I’d heard of it. I don’t read Quadrant as a rule, and I’m actually not all that exercised about this whole affair.
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