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“CBS News [last] Monday rebuked one of its star morning anchors, Tony Dokoupil, over an interview that he conducted [the previous] week with the author Ta-Nehisi Coates, in which Mr. Dokoupil challenged Mr. Coates’s views about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Top CBS executives, on a newsroom-wide call, described the interview as falling short of the network’s editorial standards. The executives said their critique had been prompted by internal staff concerns.” New York Times
“Shari Redstone, the media mogul whose Paramount empire controls CBS News, criticized the network’s leadership [last] Wednesday for its decision to reprimand [the] star morning show anchor… ‘They made a mistake here,’ Ms. Redstone said.” New York Times
The left is generally critical of Dokoupil, and supports Coates.
“The problem with Dokoupil’s questions was not that they were tough. They were textbook, really. Even the mildest critics of Israel’s government are often asked whether Israel should exist. Coates responded to that question, appropriately, by saying he was skeptical of any nation that made ethnicity its highest principle…
“No, the really tough questions were those posed by Coates, who asked why there are no Palestinian voices in the upper ranks of the American news media; who asked why he recognized a superstructure similar to Jim Crow in Israel’s treatment of Palestinians; who asked why we should accept policies subjugating people based on race and ethnicity anywhere in the world. To these questions, Dokoupil and his co-anchors had no answers.”
Karen Attiah, Washington Post
“As he even told CBS, he never set out to write a detailed dissertation on every moment in the history of Israel, but rather provide a testimonial to give voice to those who have been overlooked, ignored, or erased from our discourse on the Middle East. When pushed on why it didn’t include more history on Israel, bombings of Israeli civilians or the Intifadas, Coates (rightfully) pointed out: ‘There’s no shortage of that perspective in American media.’…
“We are told consistently that there is no right way to speak out against a clear wrong because systematically every method of protest, from campus demonstrations to essays to books to social media posts to peaceful marches on the streets are framed as amorphous attacks on Jews everywhere as opposed to focused critiques of a specific wrong being perpetrated by a few powerful individuals… It is not antisemitic to defend Palestinian human rights.”
Meredith Shiner, New Republic
“Would Dokoupil say something like this to an author condemning apartheid in South Africa, bringing up the violence committed by some black South Africans in the course of ending that system, and the fact that some were officially designated terrorists? Would he ask for both sides of the issue to be given equal weight and suggest the author was biased against white South Africans?… Of course not.”
Branko Marcetic, Jacobin Magazine
Some argue, “Anchors — especially of morning shows — aren’t robots. They bring their personalities and their backgrounds to the enterprise. They show emotion. I might have advised Dokoupil to dial down his intensity a notch, or to leave more space for his co-hosts to pose their questions. But I did not see a red line crossed. What I saw was a prominent author challenged to defend his premises and doing so with conviction. It was good journalism, and gripping television…
“Imagine a gay anchor’s interview with an author hostile to LGBTQ+ rights. Or a Black interviewer pressing an advocate opposed to affirmative action or efforts to increase diversity. If they allowed some personal feelings to slip in, if they failed to check their ‘biases and opinions at the door,’ would they be greeted with a revolt among their colleagues and reprimanding by their bosses? I don’t think so.”
Ruth Marcus, Washington Post
The right supports Dokoupil, and criticizes Coates.
The right supports Dokoupil, and criticizes Coates.
“During the segment Mr. Dokoupil, who is Jewish, challenged Mr. Coates’s characterization of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Mr. Dokoupil did this forcefully but respectfully. Mr. Coates, who is black, answered with confidence and poise. He didn’t back down from his anti-Israel position. It was, as the diplomats say, a frank exchange of views…
“The five-minute conversation gave viewers the chance to see and hear Mr. Coates defend his positions against informed interrogation. In short, it was journalism. At CBS, that’s now a problem… Mr. Dokoupil told colleagues [last] Tuesday that he ‘regretted’ the position he’d put them in. What position is that exactly?…
“Those in positions of power in the American media should know better than to kowtow to the cancel mob. If they won’t stand up, they should stop calling themselves journalists.”
Matthew Hennessey, Wall Street Journal
“The internal uproar points out a phenomenon that is by now fairly obvious: there’s a sacred status afforded to figures like Coates, who are more symbols of ideology than participants in real debate. The contrast with another black thinker, Coleman Hughes, a writer who rejects the race-driven politics advanced by Coates, illustrates how this works…
“In April, Hughes appeared on The View to speak about his book, The End of Race Politics, and was attacked by Sunny Hostin, who told him: ‘Many in the black community […] believe you are being used as a pawn by the Right, that you’re a charlatan of sorts.’ There was no outcry from within ABC News, which airs The View, or the wider media… The media’s credibility is already teetering. Incidents like this will only push it closer to the edge.”
Ashley Rindsberg, UnHerd
“In what sense do Palestinians not ‘have a voice’? Unlike the Kurds, Copts, Uyghurs, and any number of other ethnic and religious minority groups, Palestinians have a chorus of vocal advocates in the United States, especially within elite media and academic circles…
“What of Coates’s assertion that too few Palestinians occupy powerful positions in Western media? It is almost too obvious to state, but one does not need to be a member of a group to advocate on that group’s behalf. Only die-hard adherents of ‘standpoint epistemology’—the idea that only members of oppressed groups can truly understand those groups’ oppression—would believe otherwise. Coates, who wrote a book about the Palestinians despite not being a Palestinian himself, certainly does not…
“The deeper issue with Coates’s response, however, is not the inaccuracy of his claims but his implication that championing a supposedly marginalized group justifies presenting a one-sided narrative… Instead of attempting to show that his assessment of the conflict is accurate, he argues that it is morally justified. But that merely amounts to suggesting that the ends justify the means: giving a voice to those whom he presupposes are oppressed excuses presenting misleading histories and half-baked analyses.”
Tal Fortgang, City Journal
UK zoo welcomes 2 endangered African penguin chicks.
New York Post
