Quote:
Originally Posted by jfman
A classic example just coming up there from a journalist in the Scottish press briefing.
At one level serving alcohol is permitted with a substantial meal. Now, any reasonable person would concede the intention isn't to spend 12 hours in a pub with a packet of crisps or a sausage roll.
However here in the UK we will see many people flouting this until they put it in legislation.  |
Sad to say but this sort of thing is actually taught and encouraged by journalist training centres (yes, they do exist, and very few hacks won’t have been to one, especially if they started on local or regional press as I did).
British journalism has an enormous narcissistic streak, it is enamoured of its own legends and traditions, and the behaviour of the “press pack” at a news conference is very much one of them. The game in a briefing like this is to catch out the person giving the presentation. If this can be achieved, you have a ready-made political story of incompetence. The Downing Street coronavirus briefings quite early on restricted each hack to one question (normally a follow-up question would be allowed) because they got sick of reporters trying to play “gotcha” rather than engaging with the unfolding crisis itself. Idiots trying to pick holes in the precise difference between a substantial dinner and a pie with 12 pints is just par for the course.