Ta-Nehisi Coates Is Not Doing Journalism

Ta-Nehisi Coates speaking at Matthew Knight Arena / Jack Liu

“The propagandist’s purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.” —Aldous Huxley​

The following was originally a Note that has received almost 900 likes. I believe it resonated with people because I am not criticizing Coates as a Zionist, but as a journalist. I have written a review of his book, but I do not go into detail on that here. Instead, I make one simple claim.

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A friend recently sent me this about Ta-Nehisi Coates:

Honestly, read the book ... There is nothing ‘extreme’ or subversive about hanging out in the area for 10 days and describing what you see and hear. It’s called reporting!

I have read the book. All his books. And I am a reporter. And this is the opposite of journalism. I don’t want to get too pedantic, but what is journalism? It is absolutely not “hanging out in the area for 10 days and describing what you see and hear.”

Imagine going to Berlin for 10 days and talking only to Nazi Party members or German citizens on the street. They tell you life is great. They tell you everyone lives in peace thanks to the glories of the Third Reich. You meet Hitler and he talks about world peace. You meet Josef Mengele and he tells you about wonderful new medical advances made possible by bold new experiments. He doesn’t go into too much detail. You choose not to visit a concentration camp. You explicitly decide never to speak to a Jew or anyone who might counter the Nazi narrative in any way. People say this is a problem and you accuse them of Jewry. You write a book “describing what you see and hear. It’s called reporting!”

Journalism has a few core principles that must be followed. There are codes of ethics if people need to reference them. The Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics is one of the most respected. “Provide context,” it says near the very top. Another core principle it lists is this: “Hold those with power accountable. This includes the powers that be in Israel and Gaza alike. “Never deliberately distort facts or context,” it clearly states. But what is it, if not deliberately distorting context, when Coates says he has zero interest in speaking with anyone who has a different point of view on the matter? When he, as Bari Weiss so insightfully put it, writes a book on the Civil War and never mentions slavery?

Another core principle of journalism, in fact THE core principle, is the Truth. You get at this by trying to approach something like the scientific method. This means you observe and research, form a hypothesis, collect data, verify it, test it, report it, and reflect on feedback and corrections. Not all these steps can always be followed in journalism, but try you must. Yet Coates decides only to observe what supports his conclusion. He does no research. He collects only data that proves the point he wants to make. This is known as confirmation bias and is the opposite of journalism. He also rejects all feedback and correction.

Another core principle of journalism, in fact a sub-genre of Truth, is nuance. Low-resolution explanations are less honest. Journalists do not seek maximum nuance because it makes for better clickbait. In fact, clickbait is stripped of all nuance. Rather, journalists seek nuance because nuance is a fuller reflection of reality. Reality is complex. Wars are especially complex. Anyone who says otherwise is trying to sell you something.

As someone who has lived in Israel and spent a lot more time in the West Bank than 5 days, as someone who learned conversational Hebrew and made Jewish friends on the left and right, as well as Palestinian friends of the mainstream anddissidents, and as someone who has actually studied the two relevant faiths, and the history of these peoples, and the history and politics of their neighboring states, I can tell you this, and forgive me for being blunt, but Coates has no fucking clue what he is talking about.

This conflict is truly one of the most complex in history, but Coates says the idea that it is complex is “horseshit.” Rather than do the work, as they say, and educate himself, he wants to pretend it isn’t complex so that he can weigh in here because the pro-Palestinian movement is currently THE issue of the day. It is the Grand Unifying Topic. And if Coates is to have any relevance, he must step into the fray. But he doesn’t want to have to do all the work so he finds a way to relate it all back to slavery in America.

This is precisely like a kid who hasn’t read the book but now has to stand before class and give his report, so he relates the book to something that he does know and spends 20 minutes talking about that instead, hoping the teacher won’t notice. Fine, I suppose. But whatever the hell that is, it’s not journalism.