Farrow's Botched Journalism is Bad. The Response Is Worse

On J anuary 9th, during jury selection for the sex-assault trial of Harvey Weinstein, Ronan Farrow tweeted that a "source" with knowledge of the proceedings had told him that "close to 50 potential jurors have been sent home" because they'd read his book, Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators. In fact, the number of jurors sent home for that reason was two, as a New York Times reporter had already noted. Source involved in Weinstein trial tells me close to 50 potential jurors have been sent home because they said they'd read Catch and Kill. ? Ronan Farrow (@RonanFarrow) January 10, 2020 Twitter typically isn't journalism, and Farrow wasn't tweeting in his capacity as a reporter. But the fact that he believed the vastly inflated figure to be accurate, saw fit to boast to his followers about it, and even stood by the number when later challenged on it, is indicative of his robust sense of self-regard and the ease with which he is seduced by dramatic but dubious narratives. As … Read Full Article »