<\/p>\n
Take up the White Man\u2019s burden\u2013
\nIn patience to abide,
\nTo veil the threat of terror
\nAnd check the show of pride;
\nBy open speech and simple,
\nAn hundred times made plain
\nTo seek another\u2019s profit,
\nAnd work another\u2019s gain.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nSo reads the second stanza of what may be the most politically incorrect poem in the English language. Interpretations of what Rudyard Kipling meant by his 1899 poem \u201cThe White Man\u2019s Burden<\/a>\u201c, written in the wake of the American annexation of the Philippines, have differed sharply. From Henry James and Mark Twain to the denizens of Lit-Crit faculties today, many have objected to the poem as racist and condescending. Others, especially as of the time of its writing (Theodore Roosevelt for example) saw in it an expression of a Christian duty to bring the light of civilizations to the darker corners of the world.<\/p>\n
The era that produced \u201cThe White Man\u2019s Burden\u201d also formed the tenets of classical Angl0-American journalism. Motivated by many of the same moral imperatives that under girded Anglo-American imperialism, the liberal school of journalism sought to civilize the newspaper profession, replacing\u00a0 partisan, hysterical, \u201cyellow journalism\u201d with an impartial, scientific, and honest retelling of the news of the day.<\/p>\n
The mission of classical liberal journalism was summarized by the editor of the Manchester Guardian<\/em> C.P. Scott in 1921. \u201cComment is free, but facts are sacred.\u201d While on the editorial page he said: \u201cIt is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair\u201d.<\/p>\n
Scott\u2019s dictum guides the writers at GetReligion. Yet this view is not universal. It is disappearing within the American newspaper guild and is all but gone in Europe. Yet not all agree that this approach to journalism is possible or ideal. Seeking balance and fairness in reporting is viewed (charitably) as being quaint, and (more commonly) as naive. It exhibits, the critics say, the same sort of condescension that makes Kipling\u2019s poem so execrable. When truth is relative, this line goes, claiming to possess the sole truth is illusory \u2014 or an arrogant manifestation of a journalist\u2019s \u201cWhite Man\u2019s Burden\u201d.<\/p>\n
This philosophical conflict can be illustrated by my critique of an article in the Observer<\/em>, the Sunday edition of the Guardian. <\/em>The article entitled \u201cChurch backs Vladimir Putin\u2019s ban<\/a> on Americans adopting Russian children\u201d tells the story of the Russian Orthodox Church\u2019s response to the passage of a law by the Duma that prevents Americans from adopting Russian orphans. Here we have a formidable caste of bogeymen \u2014 Vladimir Putin, Vsevolod Chaplin, the Russian Orthodox patriarch Cyril \u2014 playing off against orphans, Pussy Riot, and liberal democracy. What right thinking person would back KGB hacks and creepy clergy against orphans?<\/p>\n
Before answering the question, let\u2019s look at the article. It begins:<\/p>\n
The Russian Orthodox church has been attacked for supporting a new law banning Americans from adopting Russian children, at the end of a year that saw it plagued by scandal and accusations of collusion with an increasingly authoritarian Kremlin.<\/p>\n
Father Vsevolod Chaplin, a high-ranking priest and a spokesman for the church, said the law was \u201ca search for a social answer to an elementary question: why should we give, and even sell, our children abroad?\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking to Interfax, a state news agency, last week, Chaplin said the path to heaven would be closed to children adopted by foreigners. \u201cThey won\u2019t get a truly Christian upbringing and that means falling away from the church and from the path to eternal life, in God\u2019s kingdom,\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
This is a strong opening. It asserts the church has been \u201cplagued\u201d by scandal and is in bed with Russian strongman Vladimir Putin before moving to a second hand quote from a church spokesman that is wonderfully awful (to Guardian<\/em> readers). It then introduces a voice offering an opinion in line with the editorial slant of the story.<\/p>\n
Critics say the church\u2019s support for the law is the latest example of its submission to the Kremlin, in which it acts more like a government ministry than an independent spiritual body. \u201cEverything is repeating \u2013 it\u2019s like the 19th century, when the church lay completely under the state,\u201d said Valery Otstavnykh, a theologist and Kremlin critic. \u201cEverything was calm and fine until churches started getting blown up in 1917 and they all asked, \u2018Why\u2019?\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
As an aside, I do not care for the word \u201ctheologist\u201d \u2014 it is an uncommon word that is most often used in a pejorative sense. That may not be the case here as the statements of the theologist are in line with the views of the article, but it nonetheless is an ugly word.<\/p>\n
The article then lays out the 2012 church scandals: Pussy Riot<\/a>, the wandering watch<\/a>, hit and run priests driving BMWs, church involvement in politics and suspect financial dealings. It then closes with a gratuitous unsubstantiated accusation and a plea by the outside commentator for the church to clean up its act.<\/p>\n
Two weeks later, the state news agency RIA-Novosti cited an anonymous source as saying that a bordello was uncovered in a Moscow monastery.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe church has also done a lot of good,\u201d said Otstavnykh. \u201cBut the church as an organisation must change.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
There is no balance to this story. No facts are offered in mitigation nor voices in defense or explanation of the church\u2019s actions. It may well be these actions are indefensible, but the reader cannot know this from this story. Throwing in the bordello line without further corroboration was improper.<\/p>\n
The quote offered by Fr. Chaplin, who is a character about whom I have written<\/a>, is taken from a Russian language story<\/a> and is abbreviated in such a way by the Observer<\/em> as to not allow for any nuance. The tail end of the first quote in the Observer<\/em> story \u2014 \u201cwhy should we give, and even sell, our children abroad?\u201d \u2014 continues in the original with a statement by Chaplin that Russia must take care of their own at the level of the family as well as at the local, state and national levels.<\/p>\n
I would translate the second passages as:<\/p>\n
As he noted, the adoption of children by foreign couples in most cases means \u201cthey can not get a truly Christian education, and thus fall away from the Church and from the road to eternal life in God\u2019s Kingdom.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOrthodox people should remember and take seriously the words of the Lord Jesus: \u2018He who has faith and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not have faith will be condemned\u2019.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The shading of the Observer\u2019s<\/em> version may leave the impression that children taken from Russia will go to hell because they have been taken from Russia. However Chaplin\u2019s meaning is they may wind up raised in homes where the Christian faith is not practiced.<\/p>\n
Chaplin\u2019s views about the necessity of a Christian upbringing do not find favor with the Observer<\/em>. In a Twitter exchange about the article, the author of the story responded to a critic who defended Chaplin by writing<\/a>:<\/p>\n
Your attempts to justify his statement as holding any logic or good will confound me.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The author may well think that, but should she have commented in public? If this article was in the op-ed section, I would say it would be appropriate for her to make this statement. But is it appropriate for a news story?<\/p>\n