New York Times editor admits paper should be more 'discerning' on labeling liberals
Law professor Jason Blackman challenged the New York Times over inconsistent use of conservative and liberal labels, and a top editor acknowledged it.
A New York Times editor acknowledged during an interview on Thursday that the paper applied political labels to analysts and professors inconsistently after a law professor challenged the newspaper's decision to identify him as a conservative.
Patrick Healy, the assistant managing editor for Standards and Trust at the Times, said during the "Sound Off" podcast that law professor Josh Blackman reached out after he was labeled a "conservative" in Times reporting twice within 24 hours.
"Josh, you reached out after the Times twice described you as a, quote, conservative, end quote, law professor. And you said the conservative label was accurate, but that The Times applies labels like conservative and liberal inconsistently to law professors and analysts, and that a scholar’s view should speak for itself," Healy said.
Blackman described the issue as a longstanding grievance with all major media outlets and said he was quoted twice as a "conservative law professor" in New York Times articles in February.
"I just thought that was strange. So I went through the Westlaw archives and just sort of searched for 'liberal' law professors and 'conservative' law professors in the New York Times database, and it was far more likely that you’re identifying a conservative than a liberal. And those numbers are stacked because liberals are quoted even more often. So the numbers even have a greater disparity," he said during the conversation with Healy.
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"And this sort of reinforces, I think, a perception that both the academy and, frankly, the media views a liberal position as a neutral position. And the conservative position is the other, the outlier. And that’s why you have to have this sort of nomenclature, this sort of adjective to describe it," Blackman said.
He said he wrote a letter to the editor in February and the Times didn't publish it, but added that he appreciated Healy reaching out to him about it.
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Healy went on to acknowledge the validity of Blackman's critique: "I think there’s real truth to your critique and it’s something we need to do a better job on."
"It can come off like The Times treats liberals as normal and conservatives as unique and worthy of labeling," Healy said. "In the legal academy, there are a lot of liberals, but that doesn’t justify it. I think we need to be more discerning about it."
Fox News Digital reached out to the New York Times for comment.
Blackman argued that the label should reflect a professor's involvement in an issue rather than their political affiliation. He said, "And some of your reporters have said, well, 'Professor Blackman has filed briefs in support of the Trump administration', or 'has filed a brief in opposition to the Obama administration on health care,' or, you know, 'has filed a brief in support of the Texas attorney general' — whatever it happens to be. That's actually a data point that's useful because it shows a person has sort of a dog in the fight."
He said broad labels, such as conservative and liberal, don't tell the reader much.
"So it presumes that, well, because he’s conservative, you know, you should discount his views supporting Trump, or conversely, because the person’s liberal, you should perhaps discount their views supporting President Obama or President Biden, whoever it happens to be. I would — if you’re trying to build up trust and standards, I would focus on the potential reason for a conflict or bias, and not just how the person identifies politically," Blackman said.
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Curtis Houck, a managing editor at NewsBusters, told Fox News Digital in a statement, "It seems like Healy is aiming to go to Halloween parties this weekend as Captain Obvious. It's one thing to recognize you have a problem, but as most people are aware, that's only step one, and it can often be used to punt or not actually follow through on changes."
Houck added, "Healy, if pressed on camera, would probably try to back off or memory hole this conversation instead of making any concrete commitment to The Times doing any better. He's probably more upset that someone reached out to catch the paper red-handed instead of the fact that he — through his own journalism career — and his colleagues have spent more than a lifetime burying and/or smearing conservatives."
The Wall Street Journal's assistant editor to the editorial page, James Freeman, praised the NYT in a piece on Monday, and credited them for acknowledging a source's criticism.
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