You might say that the Fox Corporation got off easy when it agreed this past week to settle Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation suit out of court for $787.5 million. Rather, Rupert Murdoch and his minions who repeated what they knew were lies about Dominion’s voting machines flipping Trump votes to Biden ought to have been put in the stocks — yes, let’s bring public shaming back — at the entrance to Central Park, say, or in front of the Fox building on Sixth Avenue, for however long those lies were aired, which reportedly were for weeks.
But no, I take that back. Who knows what would happen to people placed in the stocks these days. Perhaps more than the removal of their shoes and the tickling of their feet.
That the amount of the settlement indicates an admission of guilt is cold comfort, as is the so-called apology, to wit, that “certain claims” were false. Certain claims. What were they? And by whom were they made? By so-called reporters of or commentators on the news, I would guess. I’ve always understood that in journalism you’re supposed to do your level best to tell the truth. And, yes, mistakes are made, many, though to know something’s untrue while saying for weeks that it is true ought to be anathema in this business, a mortal rather than a venial sin. These people, Murdoch et al., should at least have been made to confess their sins publicly, on television. They should have been truly held accountable.
Montaigne has a whole chapter on liars. Let’s see what he says. . . . “Once let the tongue acquire the habit of lying and it is astonishing how impossible it is to make it give it up.”
My nephew tells me Fox is the most-watched network in the country. That bodes ill for America. There have always been journals of opinion, on both sides of the aisle, The Nation and the National Review come immediately to mind, but, as in debates, arguing for or against a point of view in these publications has presumably been linked to considered views, well-considered views one hopes, not to inflammatory surmise.
So, what does the settlement, said to be the most severe ever meted out in our history, tell us? That lying improves ratings. Listen well, children, listen well.