The Knight Foundation, a Washington-based non-profit that exists to advertise quality journalism, has expressed regret for paying a disgraced journalist $20,000 to talk at a lunch event.
In a blogpost published late on Wednesday night, the institution said it were “inappropriate” to pay Jonah Lehrer, who fabricated quotes from Bob Dylan for a book and recycled previous work in blogposts for the hot Yorker.
In a speech on the Knight Foundation’s 2013 Media Learning Seminar, Lehrer issued a public apology and tried to elucidate his fall from lauded young journalist to poster boy for media plagiarism.
The next day, the Poynter Journalism Institute revealed the price in a report of the speech on its website, prompting a wave of criticism.
At first, the Knight Foundation stood by the price. Alberto Ibargüen, president and CEO, told the Washington Post that the associated fee was commonplace and that it sometimes paid more.
But it later backed down. “On reflection, as a foundation that has long stood for quality journalism, paying a speaker’s fee was inappropriate,” Knight said within the Wednesday blog post. “Controversial speakers must have platforms, but Knight Foundation don’t have put itself right into a position tantamount to rewarding those that have violated the elemental tenets of journalism. We regret our mistake.”
The foundation also reiterated its statement that “the price was commonplace for a well-known author to handle a wide conference” but said that it’ll not were paid to Lehrer.
“We continue to support journalism excellence within the digital age. And we don’t want our foundation partners to think that journalism controversies are too hot for them to deal with. Instead, we wish to send the message that after things get it wrong the appropriate action is to confess the mistake and come again to work.”
Lehrer was revealed in June last year to have recycled material from his previous work in blogposts for the hot Yorker. The subsequent month, writer Michael Moynihan found that Lehrer had made up Bob Dylan quotes in his book Imagine: How Creativity Works.
When Forbes journalist Jeff Bercovici asked Lehrer what he would do with the cash, Lehrer said: “I read your article. i’ve nothing to assert to you.”
Bercovici’s article about Lehrer’s apology: “Jonah Lehrer Thinks He Can Humblebrag His Long ago Into Journalism,” echoed many recaps of the speech, which have been mainly critical.
“Lehrer was humbled, and yet nearly every bullet in his speech managed to fireplace in both directions,” Daniel Engber wrote in Slate. “It was a wild display of self-negation, of humble arrogance and arrogant humility.”
As Lehrer delivered the apology on the Knight Foundation seminar, live tweets assessing the speech were displayed on a screen behind him. They were mostly of a critical nature.
Lehrer said in his speech that he desired to focus on what he learned from his public downfall and to carry himself in charge of his mistakes. Lehrer said:
My failures were my fault alone. But I’ve come to believe that, if i’ll regain some semblance of self-respect, then i want the assistance of others. i would like my critics to inform me what I’ve gotten wrong, if only in order that i’m able to show myself i can listen. That’s the test that matters – not the absence of error, but a willingness to address it.
He also shared anecdotes about scientists he’d encountered while engaged on pieces and concluded with a Bob Dylan quote; “one he actually said.”
