I’m sure by now most of you know about Mike Daisey‘s amazing monologue about working conditions in Apple’s factory’s in China. It was adapted for This American Life, which sparked a huge new level of concern and awareness of such issues.
Then it came out that many of his facts (about his trip to China meeting the workers) were exaggerated or just plain fabricated.
Yesterday Ira Glass devoted his whole show to retracting the story. He interviews Mike Daisey in part to find out exactly WHY he did what he did. Glass says in the introduction that he hates to have to do this retraction, which I of course understand. But even so, the retraction episode is even more riveting and fascinating than the original story. It also demonstrates the high level of integrity at This American Life. And the fact that when necessary, Ira Glass can be such a ballsy interviewer, not letting his subject off easy even though he (in part) feels terrible for him.
I feel terrible for Daisey too. He is clearly conflicted and freaked out and (correctly) worried that his unmasking weakens the overall case for higher scrutiny of this issue. And that all of this discounts the quality, poetry and larger truth of his theatrical piece.
I highly recommend listening to the episode.
To me the most interesting section was a debate between Daisey and Glass about the issue of theater vs journalism and context.
Mike Daisey: I don’t think that label covers the totality of what it is.
Ira Glass: That label – fiction?
Mike Daisey: Yeah. We have different world views on some of these things. I agree with you truth is really important.
Ira Glass: I know but I feel like I have the normal worldview. The normal worldview is somebody stands on stage and says ‘this happened to me,’ I think it happened to them, unless it’s clearly labeled as ‘here’s a work of fiction.’
I don’t agree that those are the only choices. The tradition of memoirs that are “100 percent true, except for the parts that aren’t” is well established.
Mike Daisey repeatedly stands by his work but says his big regret was to put it on This American Life. I disagree. His mistake was to repeatedly lie, both overtly and by omission, about the fact that he was embracing that tradition of memoir. I suspect if he had put one line, like “parts of this story really happened, parts are dramatic constructions” in the program, Ira Glass might still have been interested to present it, as he has often presented other pieces that are not straight journalism (short stories, humorous memoirs, etc.) Glass then might have supplemented that episode with a segment like the excellent one in the retraction with Charles Duhigg about what the known facts are from a journalistic point of view.
Anyway, I am diehard fan of both Apple and of This American Life. And I am a storyteller by trade. So this whole drama is of great interest to me.
UPDATE 3/18/12: Now he’s made changes to his show, including a new introduction, and is challenging his translator’s version of events.
Well said David. I still want to see the show. Have you? What did you think if so? If not, would you now after all this?
I haven’t seen the show but very much still want to and intend to.
Just listened to the episode. Haven’t felt radio silence like that in a long time. Man! those pauses were tense. I’m now a little torn about seeing the show, though it may be more Daisey’s delivery than his twisting of the truth.
Hope all is well for yo and the Mrs. My best to you both!
Thanks Tim – same back to you!
When people wander into making social commentary, objective truth becomes important.
If Mike Daisey (who I’m unfamiliar with) is trying to educate or motivate others on an issue, then he needs full to give full disclosure. Otherwise it’s lying.
How obnoxious for Ira Glass to say his is the “normal” worldview! That just floors me. Ira Glass depends on artists for his show to be interesting and compelling year after year. And yes, artists depend on people with the more commonsense world view, like Ira Glass, to get the nuts and bolts practical stuff done. But you just don’t get the genius, compelling level of Mike Daisey’s work without living on the artist side of the street, where the beauty and the drama come first. Nobody goes out for a night of entertainment to listen to NPR marketplace read by one guy at a table with a spotlight on him, as they do for Mike Daisey’s monologues. The value of the “not-objective-truth-but-a-deeper-narrative-truth” approach to life almost always gets hidden. It is there–it is why we pay for HBO and not CNN. But the second there is blurriness between the two world views, the artist gets roasted on a spit.
The most interesting thing about this whole kerfuffle to me is that the previous literary writers in fabulation scandals–JT Leroy, the Million Little Pieces guy–were largely talentless and just sort of recycling vague ideas of literariness, whereas Mike Daisey–despite his obvious flaws and this massive, explosive, sort of lunatic gaffe–is actually an undeniable genius.
Mike Daisey is my hero for managing to get all of hipster Brooklyn mad at him at once! Go Mike!
To be clear, this isn’t a “kerfuffle” or “gaffe”, or about Daisey merely putting “beauty and drama” first in order to craft a more “compelling” performance. Please.
He lied, consistently and persistently – not just throughout his own show, and then on TAL, but in an op-ed that the NYT had the gall to run the day after Steve Jobs died (which has now been partially retracted), and in on-camera interviews all over broadcast and cable news (CBS, MSNBC, etc.) in pursuit of his own celebrity self-promotion.
Daisey is a fraud, plain and simple.
I know a lot of good people at Apple who were, let’s face reality here, collectively and systematically defamed by Daisey, and hurt by what he did in willful collusion with TAL and a host of other irresponsibly lazy media outlets that couldn’t be bothered to follow the first rule of Journalism 101: fact-checking through corroboration. (My degree is in journalism, btw.) This is the corrosive cancer of “truthiness”, and it shouldn’t be tolerated – esp. on a scale such as this, and on a broader subject so serious (labor conditions in China).
The irony (and truth) is that Apple is actually among the most responsible and transparent when it comes to labor practices in their supply chain – for example, they publish annual internal audits of vendors, disclose all their suppliers, and invite independent inspections from the Fair Labor Association. No other tech/electronics company does all that. There’s a bigger story here, but it’s been obscured and undermined because Daisey apparently thought he could sell more tickets (and get more press) by dishonestly and unfairly going after Apple and Steve Jobs (while Jobs was dying of cancer).
Having listened to both TAL episodes, I’m sickened. (Especially since Daisey seems determined to perpetuate his fraud, while TAL still hasn’t apologized to its listeners, not to mention Apple.)
I just listened to the TAL episode and for what it’s worth – and it’s worth something to me- Ira Glass did apologize to listeners, at least once.
Check again. I listened, and read the transcript (and his blog post, and their press release).
Glass says he’s “horrified” that he aired the piece, that it was a “mistake”, that they “take it very seriously”, that TAL “did not live up to [journalistic] standards”, that they “regret” what happened and if we, the audience, “feel betrayed”.
But Glass never actually says “I’m/we’re sorry”, or explicitly apologizes (as in “I/we apologize”).
But what Ira is saying at that moment is correct. And it’s “normal” in the sense that an overwhelming majority would agree with you.
By your logic, though, Daisey’s “genius” is indeed quite deniable, and it’s “obnoxious” of you to suggest otherwise.
This is a step beyond the memoir technique of making real events conform to story structure.
It was presented as journalism, likely because the story only works as journalism.
Its an expose of real working conditions in a real place in a real company about the real product I’m using right now. The entirety of his story’s strength relies on these events being factual.
He could and should have put a “part of this is dramatic construction” disclaimer on the work, but who’d want to see that?
I would, for one.
The story is a fascinating one and I think you’re right on target with most of your comments. I do think that there is a key difference between memoirs and what Mike Daisey is doing. Memoirs are largely about personal experience, the person telling the story is the subject of the story. But the subject of Daisey’s story isn’t himself, it’s Apple and their labor practices. And one you cross that threshold of subject, you had better get your facts straight.
Thank you for saying what I was trying to say, but much better than I was able!
I saw the show and also got through a 24-hour monologue w/ him and know how his mind works. Here’s what I feel to be true: He was fully aware he could be exposed and it’s all part of it. He wants to make us wonder “Does that make the experience any less true?” He wants us to be mad at him. The point is that he wants us to learn how to think for ourselves. It’s fucking theater and it’s damn good theater.
“Tomorrow, let’s stretch it a little (…) Sometimes the weakest stuff in a story is the shit with quotation marks around it. You got a guy telling how rough it is on the street, it really doesn’t have much pull. But if you can describe him as he really is, tell his story in moments … Tomorrow, just get out there in the soup kitchens and hang with folk. I don’t care if you file copy” (…) I’m not interested in what can be quoted or counted. I’m interested in what feels true.” – Gus Haynes, newspaper editor, Season 5 of the WIRE
I wrote about this on my blog too. I don’t think Daisey was only conflicted because he thought it would undercut the “cause” he was lobbying about. I think he saw his whole metier unraveling in front of his eyes. The dance he did with Ira was after he had already lied about not having his translator’s cell phone number – and he was already prepared for the fact Ira was going to grill him on the air. To be that unable to articulate a defense reminded me of Anthony Weiner — just say what happened right away. Be ahead of the story. The coverup is always worse.
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