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| OK, not quite... |
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| Bit more like it... |
On
March 21, NZ investigative journalists Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson released a
book entitled Hit and Run. The book alleges that NZ SAS troops,
stationed in Afghanistan in 2010, had killed civilians during the course of an
attack on a village that was retribution for the death of a NZ soldier, and
that the NZ Defence Force then covered up this war crime. One of the first NZ
politicians interviewed about the book – Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett,
spoken to by Guyon Espiner on RNZ’s Morning Report – immediately attempted to discredit the claims
by dismissively referring to Hager as a ‘left-wing conspiracy theorist’.
Bennett’s slur echoed the unofficial National Party line on Hager that was
adopted when his last book, Dirty Politics (which exposed political
skulduggery at the heart of the National Party apparatus), became a cause
celebre of the 2014 general election.
The
National Party’s attack line on Hager (and Stephenson, although he is less
high-profile than Hager and therefore mentioned less in these debates) is,
therefore, that his investigative journalism is a form of conspiracy
theorising, given a degree of credibility by the fact that it is presented in
the establishment garb of public interest journalism. This association makes sense in terms of prima
facie, ‘common sense’, ‘man and woman on the street’ type thinking (of the
populist kind to which politicians always seek to appeal). Isn’t a ‘cover-up’
just a different term for a conspiracy? (well, it’s certainly a type of
conspiracy - subject for another post though). Hasn’t Nicky Hager made a career
out of exposing political cover-ups in NZ? (well, yes, he has of sorts,
depending on how you define ‘career’). And doesn’t Nicky Hager do all this
because he is some far-left radical, trying to bring down the National
government by any means necessary, as shown by the fact that he released Dirty
Politics on the eve of the 2014
general election in a deliberate attempt to sway the electorate against that
nice Mr Key (well, if he did it wasn’t a particularly successful strategy…)
On a
somewhat more substantive level, a formal comparison of the intentions and modus
operandi of investigative journalists and conspiracy theorists suggests a
blurring between the two categories. Both groups believe that political and
economic power is readily abused by those within such systems, and that such
corruption needs to be brought to the attention of the wider public in respect
to values such as accountability and transparency. Both groups are suspicious
of official versions of events, regarding these as smokescreens and
distractions covering up the ‘real truth’. Both groups endeavour to uncover the
‘real truth’ through intensive research that often involves digging out obscure
and suppressed information; ‘reading between the lines’ of officially released
info; and relying on anecdotal ‘insider testimony’ by the likes of alleged
participants and whistleblowers. Certainly many conspiracy theorists consider
themselves to be engaging in investigative journalism. A particularly
interesting example is NZ’s own Ian Wishart, who was a bona fide investigative
journalist – ‘breaking’ the Winebox conspiracy about corporate tax dodging in
the 1990s while a journo for TV3 – before becoming a born-again Christian at the
end of the millennium. Although Wishart has subsequently continued to present
his political writing as ‘investigative journalism’, notably in the title of
his current affairs magazine Investigate, his investigations are
indubitably shaped by his Christian fundamentalist worldview which draws on
conspiracist tropes typical of American far-right fundamentalism (e.g. his 2013
tome Totalitaria, which peddled end-times conspiracism centered around
President Obama as some kind of antichrist figure).
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| Hmmm...somehow I suspect we're not going to see Ian Wishart's 'Trumpocracy' anytime soon... |
The
main point I’m building up to here is: in light of such comparative reasoning,
what are the factors that constitute Nicky Hager as an investigative journalist
and not a conspiracy theorist? (and, more generally, that may serve as a means
of distinguishing investigative journalists from conspiracy theorists?)
Obviously
whole books and articles can be written about this distinction (undoubtedly
there are a score that I am unaware of and can’t be arsed to research for the
purposes of a blog post). So, some musings on a few factors that would seem to
be fairly central in this regard:
1
– non-partisanship. Nicky Hager is undoubtedly a leftist in his commitment
to the ideals of social democracy – transparency, equality, justice etc.
However, this does not mean that he comes across as a blind supporter of leftist
political parties. While Dirty Politics and The Hollow Men have
been about the National party, Hager’s 2002 book Seeds of Distrust made
claims that the then incumbent Labour party had covered-up issues relating to
the release of genetically-modified organisms in NZ, claims that were also
politically embarrassing for Labour in an election year. So my impression of
Hager is that, even if a hard-left party like the Greens were in government, he
would still undertake investigative journalism critical of them if he thought
that they were abusing their political power. In this respect Hager is
diametrically the reverse of the standard conspiracy theorist, who usually has
some extremist idee fixe against particular political perspectives,
parties, and personalities (Hilary Clinton is a member of the Zionist
Illuminati! Donald Trump is agent for Communist NWO!) that is readily apparent
within about 30 seconds of engaging with their websites, YouTube videos etc.
2
– social and cultural context. An extension of the above theme: Hager’s
investigative journalism is positioned firmly within the contexts of
contemporary NZ mainstream politics, justice, and social values. The reader
doesn’t need knowledge of any other areas or subjects to make sense of, or give
validity to, Hager’s claims. By comparison, the work of fellow NZ
‘investigative journalist’ Ian Wishart only really makes sense if the reader
shares Wishart’s Christian fundamentalist worldview. Example: why were Wishart and
Investigate magazine so concerned about proving that ex PM Helen Clark is a
closeted lesbian? Answer: because lesbianism goes against the ‘family values’
ideology central to his fundamentalist worldview, and reinforces fundamentalist
beliefs in moral corruption of contemporary society etc. Similarly, the claims
of most other contemporary conspiracy theorists such as Icke, Alex Jones, and
Jeff Rense derive from fringe/alternative/non-mainstream worldviews and belief
systems such as the American patriot movement, Neo-Nazism, ufology, and the New
Age. While specific threads or tropes of
such conspiracy theorising filter out into the mainstream, such as chemtrails
and the ‘eye in the pyramid’ on American currency, they usually don’t make much
sense unless the reader has wider knowledge of the conspiracist belief systems
involved.
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| Helen Clark's husband has a gay friend shock! Those heathen Labourites obviously haven't read their Leviticus... |
3
– fact-checking. Hager has a reputation for being as thorough as possible
in his research, because he knows he is making politically controversial claims
that, if proven to be heavily embellished or outright fabrications, would not
only ruin his credibility as an investigative journalist but could also open
him up to legal action based on libel. Primary research sources are key to such
work: for instance, Hit and Run was written based on Jon Stephenson’s
first-person on-site investigations as an independent war correspondent in
Afghanistan. Without Stephenson’s primary research it is unlikely both Hager
and himself would have written the book because of the lack of adequate
evidence to back up the assertions therein. Similarly, Dirty Politics was
based upon e-mail correspondence between several National Party insiders
provided to him by a hacker (as it was, Hager’s decision to override the
illegal provenance of this material and publicise it in the wider public
interest had repercussions, in the form of a police raid based on complaints
that he had violated the privacy of the figures involved). By comparison, the modus
operandi of most conspiracy theorists is to cherry-pick any old crap that
might provide possible support for their claims, most typically in the form of
secondary and tertiary sources i.e. the writings of other conspiracy theorists.
To be fair, conspiracy theorists like David Icke do try and use primary sources
for their claims, albeit that the people and claims involved are generally so
well outside the cultural mainstream –
“multiple personality disorder and MK Ultra victim Arizona Wilder told me that
she had seen George W. Bush change into a reptilian” – that the readers
acceptance of them ultimately depends on belief rather than reason.
