Can too much balance be bad for you? Balance in media reporting is one of the core principles of Western journalism, so this may seem a very odd thing for an ex-BBC correspondent (and proud of it) to suggest.
However, the sad fact is that the Western media’s focus on balance is routinely exploited by those who see it as a way of helping maintain their bodyguard of lies. On the face of it nothing seems more obviously fair than giving both sides their say, but in reality, there is an assumption that both sides accept an unwritten rule of the game, and that they tell the truth, albeit adding their own interpretation.
But what if they don’t play the game and just flat out lie? And, regardless of the evidence, keep lying? Do we stick to the rules and keep, in the name of balance, reporting their lie?
Because that is what the media generally do, notably but not uniquely, the BBC. Recently, as Iranian-supplied Shahed 136’s slam into Ukrainian infrastructure, it reported without qualification, ‘Iran says it is not supplying UAV’s to Russia’, just as Russian routine denials of its atrocities are reported with a straight face and voice.
Sure, the detail of the longer stories may implicitly give the lie to the Russian lies, but the pattern is clear enough and stretches back years to stories like the downing of the Malaysian airline, MH17 and the Salisbury poisoning, where Russian denials are reported as if they have some weight or value.
As I wrote this, I was hearing a story being reported of Russia accusing the West of ‘nuclear rhetoric’, denying Russia’s own nuclear rhetoric, and repeating Russian claims of Ukraine preparing a dirty bomb. The report highlights the claim are ‘unsubstantiated’, and of course it is worse than that. They are lies, made up as part of an information war. So why are they even being given significant airtime and discussed seriously? Calling them ‘unsubstantiated’ really does not cover it, implying in time they might become more credible.
It’s all in the name of fairness and balance – definite virtues – but the fact is that those who do not believe in those virtues are using them against us.
The Russians and others have effectively upended the rules of the game, not just for journalists but for spokespeople – spin doctors if you like – as well. Having worked both sides of the track I see this very starkly.
When I was a spokesman there was a standard process when you screwed up or your team got caught out doing something wrong. It was simple: 1. Get the facts fast and get them out; 2. Quickly say you’re sorry, and what you’re going to do about it. The principle was that bad news got worse with delay so sort it out fast and move on. It had the benefit of also being morally right as well as best practice. It is always good if doing the right thing is also most the helpful to your cause.
But what has happened is that the less scrupulous have discovered that deny, deny, deny actually works rather well. Put up a smokescreen of obfuscation, changing stories, lies, and just wait for the media wagon train to move on. And when lying achieves better results than virtue then lying will tend to win.
And a simplistic attachment to balance is also a handy crutch for lazy journalism. Just reporting the claims and avoiding any risky judgements is the safest way to go. How often have we seen the piece to camera at the end of a report that effectively says, ‘A says B, but C says D, and what the truth is only time will tell.’
Wearing my former BBC Defence Correspondent’s hat, I had to walk that line. Balance mattered, but it could not be a refuge from the obligation to make often difficult judgements on what I saw and what was happening. Fairness, not balance was key, and although they might overlap, they were not the same, just as impartiality is about rigour in reporting the situation, not playing ping pong between competing claims.
Besides, are we meant to be balanced between good and evil, between Churchill and Hitler – or between Zelensky and Putin?
This can all get quite philosophical, and why not? Issues of fairness, balance, truth are of profound importance, just as a free media and access to accurate information are core components of democracy. But at a more pragmatic level we need to work out how to deal with groups, not just Russia, who, to their own ends, are exploiting and undermining aspects of our own standard operating procedures.
So, what to do?
First of all, realise there is a problem. A big one.
Margarita Simonyan, head of Russia’s main international propaganda outlet, RT, has been open about the fundamental challenge they pose to basic assumptions of Western media, saying, “There is no objectivity – only approximations of the truth by as many different voices as possible.” Having created a cacophony they then exploit it. Speaking to a Russian internet outlet about why Russia needs RT, it was not just as another international news service, “For about the same reason as why the country needs a Defence Ministry. The information weapon, of course, is used in critical moments, and war is always a critical moment. And it’s war. It’s a weapon like any other.”
So, in the face of this kind of attack, the default balance template no longer works against those who don’t care about the truth and will keep denying, keep lying and keep changing their lies and story as each one is knocked down by fact checkers.
It therefore requires a change of mindset – to accept that some of those the media in the Western democracies report on are actively working to undermine its whole operating system. They are not just seeking best advantage within the rules but playing an entirely different game.
So, at some point media outlets need to start applying a more sophisticated judgement, be bolder and braver, and be prepared to defend that stance openly. This can’t be done by just another template, but through active monitoring, internal discussion, and strong leadership.
This is not easy. Fairness, balance, impartiality, respect for facts, are all fundamentals of public discourse, of a functioning democracy, and they are all being eroded. The challenge for the media is huge but to use Simonyan’s language it is a war, and it will have to be fought in little battles every day.