[seattletimes.nwsource.com]

[www.cornish.edu]

This isn't so much about the bullsh*t story that Mike Daisy told on This American Life, it's about Seattle's Cornish College of the Arts.

Officials at Seattle's Cornish College of the Arts — where Daisey is slated to receive an honorary degree and speak at commencement this spring — echoed the writer, citing "the understandable confusion ... between art and journalism."

The college will proceed with its commencement plans.

"We're honoring Mike Daisey for the body of his work," Cornish President Nancy Uscher said. She said she and Cornish board chairman John Gordon Hill "stand firm together in supporting Mike Daisey as a very important artist in our time. We feel that he's had tremendous positive impact on the world of the arts, and he's an original artist. We feel that this attribute is extremely important to Cornish because Cornish stands for innovation, imagination, experimentation and contemporary thinking about the arts and life."

It isn't surprising, she added, that someone who's "bold and original" would be the subject of controversy.

"I think that it will be a wonderful learning and teaching moment," she said.

Stunning,

Ms. Uscher admits that telling bold face lies as part of a JOURNALISTIC piece (in the TAR story, the producers emailed Daisey during the run up to airing the story to confirm that this was a news story, not some theatrical interpretation of events...he said that the knew that) doesn't matter when it comes to getting an honorary degree.

I think we now know all we need to know about Seattle's Cornish "College" (giggle) of the Arts.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2012 01:49PM by beagledave.

Who would want to listen to ANYTHING this guy says?

I can't imagine that they'll go through with it....

She probably should have waited to hear the TAL retraction story before issuing that statement. I won't be surprised if this school changes its mind about Daisy.
It remains to be seen what impact these revelations have on the career on Mike Daisy. Interesting that he didn't get called out much on the earlier book he did on his work at Amazon, even though it was criticized and questioned by a variety of people.

Quote
Grace62
She probably should have waited to hear the TAL retraction story before issuing that statement. I won't be surprised if this school changes its mind about Daisy.
It remains to be seen what impact these revelations have on the career on Mike Daisy. Interesting that he didn't get called out much on the earlier book he did on his work at Amazon, even though it was criticized and questioned by a variety of people.

My 10 year old daughter was listening to the TAL story in the car on the way home from a parade. Even SHE got how much he was lying and how unethical he was.

Funny how this "college" just sums up his problems with... “We charge our students with being bold and original, and sometimes that leads to controversy"

Yeah that crazy Mike...being all controversial and edgy and whatnot.

Jayson Blair was guilty of doing exactly the same thing as Daisey. To me there is no difference between having the work printed in the New York Times or having it go over the air on Public Radio International. There are no coals hot enough to drag those guys across.

The retraction was very good indeed. It brought the facts out beautifully. I wish Glass and "This American Life" had taken the monologue as a starting point and done original reporting. I bet they wish that they had too.

I'll be interested to hear if theaters pull his "Agony and Ecstasy" performance, he's booked through the summer, and at some very high profile venues.

[mikedaisey.blogspot.com]

So Art students are encouraged to lie ? Wow..

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cbelt3
So Art students are encouraged to lie ? Wow..

Yep.

If it's "bold and original", it doesn't matter if you purposefully lie. That is the message that Cornish "College" wishes to communicate.

For those who have not heard the TAL retraction episode, here is the transcript.


Instead, we trusted his word. Although he's not a journalist, we made clear to him that
anything he was going to say on our show would have to live up to journalistic standards.
He had to be truthful. And he lied to us.

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cbelt3
So Art students are encouraged to lie ? Wow..

If doctors can be encouraged then offered immunity for lying to their patients, why not?

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cbelt3
So Art students are encouraged to lie ? Wow..

Well it is liberal arts .....

---

Kooper's Flute Thing cover

[www.freethegrapes.org]

norwegian wood reality TV

[www.youtube.com]

Now that you mention it-- I don't think this guy really looked like this.
I also think the background may be inappropriately dramatized, or possibly even taken from some other setting and placed behind the subject without any disclosure whatsoever.

---

MR/F Guestmap: [www.mapservices.org]

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cbelt3
So Art students are encouraged to lie ? Wow..

as a theatre major i have no problem with that on its own. art is illusion. illusion is a lie. however, if you claim it is truth - as Daisey originally did - then it is not art or truth; it's bullsh*t.

---

"Success isn't about how much money you make. It is about the difference you make in people's lives."--Michelle Obama



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2012 04:51PM by graylocks.

"Mike is an artist, not a journalist. Nevertheless, we wish he had been more precise with us and our audiences about what was and wasn't his personal experience in the piece."

The Public Theater, New York City, treading gently on a person who has made them a lot of money over the past few months.

[www.publictheater.org]

His show closes in NYC this weekend, it has been canceled in Chicago, it'll be interesting to see if he sells tickets for this going forward.

I'm a little uncomfortable with turning Daisey into a pariah. Although he used incredibly bad judgment and yes deception in dealing with TAL, and it now appears his monologues have always leaned toward BS stories, I feel like the baby is being thrown out with the bath water. I would prefer that he would start his monologues with a very clear disclaimer that they are a fracturing of the truth to make a point. The kind of disclaimer that the old Dragnet used to use, so to speak, only instead of changing facts to protect the innocent he could say he has changed the facts to advance his story. I am not real happy with the idea of an intellectual lynch mob over this. It's not like he was the anchor man of a news program or something, he is a performer.

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"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

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$tevie
I'm a little uncomfortable with turning Daisey into a pariah. Although he used incredibly bad judgment and yes deception in dealing with TAL, and it now appears his monologues have always leaned toward BS stories, I feel like the baby is being thrown out with the bath water. I would prefer that he would start his monologues with a very clear disclaimer that they are a fracturing of the truth to make a point. The kind of disclaimer that the old Dragnet used to use, so to speak, only instead of changing facts to protect the innocent he could say he has changed the facts to advance his story. I am not real happy with the idea of an intellectual lynch mob over this. It's not like he was the anchor man of a news program or something, he is a performer.

good points - I loved Spaulding Grey's monologues (Swimming to Cambodia and another about buying a cabin in the mountains that was an absolute disaster). I always assumed that they were a mixture of truth and fiction and good story telling...

PS: I give Cornish College of the Arts an "F" for spin. There was a lot of great language that could have been used to claim that the TAL incident has engaged the public in a dialogue about when art and truth collide, and is it ever okay to lie when attempting to change the way the public views something, and is it art if it isn't honest, and blah blah blah. What they said in their own defense was lame and doomed to unimpress.

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

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$tevie
It's not like he was the anchor man of a news program or something, he is a performer.

i think that's the crux of the issue, though. he portrayed his stories as journalism. if he had Dragneted them there wouldn't be this sense of sham. and it's not even that what he said may or may not have been true. he put the events across as what he had seen with his own eyes. his shows were successful partially because it was supposedly straight from the horse's mouth. turns out they it was coming from the other end of the horse.

---

"Success isn't about how much money you make. It is about the difference you make in people's lives."--Michelle Obama

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hal

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$tevie
I'm a little uncomfortable with turning Daisey into a pariah. Although he used incredibly bad judgment and yes deception in dealing with TAL, and it now appears his monologues have always leaned toward BS stories, I feel like the baby is being thrown out with the bath water. I would prefer that he would start his monologues with a very clear disclaimer that they are a fracturing of the truth to make a point. The kind of disclaimer that the old Dragnet used to use, so to speak, only instead of changing facts to protect the innocent he could say he has changed the facts to advance his story. I am not real happy with the idea of an intellectual lynch mob over this. It's not like he was the anchor man of a news program or something, he is a performer.

good points - I loved Spaulding Grey's monologues (Swimming to Cambodia and another about buying a cabin in the mountains that was an absolute disaster). I always assumed that they were a mixture of truth and fiction and good story telling...

Exactly! I was thinking about Spaulding Grey, as a matter of fact!

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

I don't have much of a problem making Daisey a pariah.

It's not just that he stretched the truth in telling the story, or went over the top with dramatic license.

If you actually listen to the TAL episode, there is something pathological in the way that Daisey responds to Ira Glass and the other folks involved with the piece, when they point out his lies and half truths. Time and time again, Daisey has the opportunity to come clean and fess up. It's when he doesn't really fess up that he loses any sliver of respect from me.

Again, listen to the podcast (not just read the transcript) to see what kind of a man Daisey is.

I plan to listen to the program and maybe it will sway me. I'm just wary that we are all more pissed at him for @#$%& with Ira Glass than for any more serious reasons.

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

"Following the success of The Last Cargo Cult, Mike Daisey turns his razor-sharp wit to America's most mysterious technology icon in this hilarious and harrowing tale of pride, beauty, lust, and industrial design. He illuminates how the former CEO of Apple and his obsessions shape our lives, while sharing stories of his own travels to China to investigate the factories where millions toil to make iPhones and iPods. Daisey's dangerous journey shines a light on our love affair with our devices and the human cost of creating them."

"I will never be the same after seeing that show." - Steve Wozniak, Apple co-founder

The problem when you use words like "investigate" is that you've entered the realm of journalism. He also referred to his work as "memoir," which is by definition supposed to be fact, not fiction.
The most emotionally poignant parts of his monologue are fiction, but he presents them as things he actually saw in China. I would like to hear from someone who paid money to hear this, thinking it was true, and how they feel about it now knowing that he made up significant parts of the story he tells. And would he have become famous telling this story if listeners knew beforehand that not all of it was true? He probably could have crafted a good story just with facts, but it would have lacked the emotional punch of something that enthralls audiences.
I think he abused his audience and the people who produced and hosted his show, he also damages the efforts of the legitimate journalists and investigators covering the Foxconn story. Even on this forum people want to use the Daisy story as a reason to reject any bad news out of China regarding factory workers.
I'm not feeling a lot of sympathy.

That was the weirdest interview today on TAL.

The guy is legitimately crazy.

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$tevie
I plan to listen to the program and maybe it will sway me. I'm just wary that we are all more pissed at him for @#$%& with Ira Glass than for any more serious reasons.

well, he messed with two icons - Ira Glass and Apple. Daisey has cashed in on connecting Apple, Steve Jobs, our lives and atrocities by saying he had seen the effects with his own eyes. would his show have been as successful if he had not used Apple & Jobs? i think not. can't get much of a headline or ticket sales if you harp on the HP or other products that FoxConn makes. like click @#$%& who put write about Apple because they know that's where the cash flows Daisey used those who bought his wares.

And Ira Glass is so sweet; how dare he jerk him around...

---

"Success isn't about how much money you make. It is about the difference you make in people's lives."--Michelle Obama

I do love Ira Glass, I have to admit. Among his attributes: he's a native of Baltimore!

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

Anyone who faked data for a term paper, thesis or monograph project, even for an art or theater class, would at the very least flunk the class and usually be expelled. And this guy's getting an honorary degree.

From Babe Ruth's time to this day, no longer actually being in Baltimore has often been a good career move for native Baltimoreans.

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RgrF
From Babe Ruth's time to this day, no longer actually being in Baltimore has often been a good career move for native Baltimoreans.

Tell that to John Waters.

Please don't get me wrong. I don't think he should get any kind of "honor" let alone an "honorary degree". My objection was to the idea that his shows should all be canceled and he should be run out of town on a rail. No, no, he shouldn't get an honorary degree, in my opinion, but I do think he should be given the opportunity to straighten up and fly right. Although he may not want to.

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

Just finished the retraction podcast.

WOW

Truth is a very, very complicated subject for this fellow.

Sounds to me like he just handed apple lawyers a slam dunk...

The most interesting hour of radio I've heard in a long time.

Quote
hal
Just finished the retraction podcast.

WOW

Truth is a very, very complicated subject for this fellow.

Sounds to me like he just handed apple lawyers a slam dunk...

The most interesting hour of radio I've heard in a long time.

Yep.

I mean seriously...

Rob Schmitz: Let’s talk about the hexane poisoned workers. Cathy says that you
did not talk to workers who were poisoned by hexane and were shaking
uncontrollably.
Mike Daisey: That’s correct. I met workers in Hong Kong going to Apple protests
who had not been poisoned by hexane but had known people who had been, and it
was like a constant conversation we were having about those workers. So no, they
were not at that meeting.
Rob Schmitz: So you lied about that. That wasn’t what you saw.
Mike Daisey: I wouldn’t express it that way.
Rob Schmitz: How would you express it?
Mike Daisey: I would say that I wanted to tell a story that captured the totality of 11
my trip. So when I was building the scene of that meeting, I wanted to have the
voice of this thing that had been happening that everyone been talking about.
Ira Glass: So you didn’t meet any worker who’d been poisoned by hexane?
Mike Daisey: That’s correct.

When you don't have a notion of what "TRUTH" is..there is something pathologic about you and ability to justify your actions.

I guess I disagree with $tevie. This was he chance (in this Retraction episode) to "straighten up" after lying about what he did for TAL.

He failed miserably.

Quote
hal
Just finished the retraction podcast.

WOW

Truth is a very, very complicated subject for this fellow.

Sounds to me like he just handed apple lawyers a slam dunk...

The most interesting hour of radio I've heard in a long time.

i just listened to it also. when Glass asked him what he was afraid might happen, for a split second in the silence that followed i thought he might honestly say I thought all the money and notoriety i was enjoying was going to go away. Guess not.

it's not that i doubt he believes in the importance of the issue. it's just that i find it hard to believe that he wasn't afraid his golden goose was in danger of getting cooked.

---

"Success isn't about how much money you make. It is about the difference you make in people's lives."--Michelle Obama

His show onstage is like Fox News trying to make you believe you are watching '60 Minutes".
On Stage is the world of suspended disbelief. On stage is the world you create and craft to make your points and observations on the human condition. Even one so supposedly clever as Daisy should know the difference between reality and illusion.

When he did the original TAL. he was aware that it was a journalistic effort, not an artistic one. He chose to carry his world of illusion into the world of facts, and he didn't care.

What I heard today, his avoidance of outright apology, was simply spin. Only political spin doctors are a lot better at it that Daisey. He seemed to honestly believe that the truth is his to use as he likes. He is wrong.

And it is wrong to get an honorary degree. If they want to offer a dishonorary degree, using his lack of morals and true character as a cautionary tale to the college's budding artists, then that's fine by me. Otherwise, I imagine there are hundreds of hard working, honest artists and art teachers within 50 miles of campus whose real life creativity and courage far outstrips this immature fool.

NOTE TO DAISEY: "The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars, but in ourselves."

It's too bad, but stuff like this really hurts honest charity efforts. The best thing would be for Daisey to disappear into obscurity. kj.

Well, after listening to the show, I now feel sorry for Daisey because I am convinced he is insane and not being treated for it. Good grief. He seems to honestly not know that just because he thinks it, it doesn't make it true.

EDIT: and I think TAL and Ira Glass handled an awkward situation very well.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2012 11:47PM by $tevie.

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$tevie
EDIT: and I think TAL and Ira Glass handled an awkward situation very well.

I agree. I would have been leaping across the broadcast table and strangling the guy. I probably would have broken a couple of very expensive microphones in the process.

This is a remarkable series of tweets by a reporter who has known Daisey for years. I think the series sums up a lot of people's feelings about this issue.

[blog.onbeing.org]

I seriously think Daisey is suffering from the same sort of illness that court psychiatrists cite for some murderers. The inability to tell right from wrong. He sounded to me like he was struggling to find the proper words to pretend that he recognized that he had done anything wrong. I think he still does not believe he has.

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"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

And yeah, if I was Ira Glass and had to sit there with that guy's fake gravitas and continued effort to spin, I think I would have felt like attacking him!

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

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Gutenberg
This is a remarkable series of tweets by a reporter who has known Daisey for years. I think the series sums up a lot of people's feelings about this issue.

[blog.onbeing.org]

interesting. in trying to justify what he's done when Glass confronted him Daisey talks about standing behind 'The Work.' it's theatre people speak i have always found compelling. you do what you must in service to The Work. it casts art on a higher calling level and i like that sense of significance. but it's equally important to remember that while The Work is to create a meaningful illusion that by no means assumes that the content is absolutely true and realistic. that's the line Daisey has crossed - he claimed his work, artfully delivered, was the god's honest truth. apparently Daisey has been banking on this method for quite a while.

---

"Success isn't about how much money you make. It is about the difference you make in people's lives."--Michelle Obama



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/18/2012 11:37AM by graylocks.

As for why he got away with it for so long, or why didn't Amazon or Apple go after him? Because there were enough shreds of truth that they wouldn't want to draw even more attention to, in terms of labor practices. Apples knows better than the public what goes on in their factories, so of course does Amazon. Drawing attention any of it is a lose/lose for them, Daisey has benefited from that, and banked on it.

His explanation as presented on TAL sounds kind of manufactured, maybe run by an attorney or PR person or theater director or two.
Sounding a little crazy or pathetic earns him some sympathy too.

Who knows what will happen next. I think it's a win for Ira Glass.
Mike Daisey - we'll see.

Not the managing director of the Public Theater, for sure:

[www.poynter.org]

Daisey's TAL interview is reflective of the initial public support he got from the Public Theater. But after hearing what Ira Glass and the Marketplace reporters and the Chinese translator had to say, tunes are changing.

Like Cornish College, I'm still wondering if these people don't wish they'd waited to hear the TAL retraction story before issuing public statements of support for Mike Daisey and his "art."

So it looks like all involved will continue forward, but with some very strange disclaimers...

Public Theater now has this 'statement' linked to the bottom of the web page:

In the theater, our job is to create fictions that reveal truth-- that's what a storyteller does, that's what a dramatist does. THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY OF STEVE JOBS reveals, as Mike's other monologues have, human truths in story form.

In this work, Mike uses a story to frame and lead debate about an important issue in a deeply compelling way. He has illuminated how our actions affect people half-a-world away and, in doing so, has spurred action to address a troubling situation. This is a powerful work of art and exactly the kind of storytelling that The Public Theater has supported, and will continue to support in the future.

Mike is an artist, not a journalist. Nevertheless, we wish he had been more precise with us and our audiences about what was and wasn’t his personal experience in the piece.

Artists are just strange... the statement clearly states that they fully support Daisey, but wish he was not a liar.

Daisey has posted this mp3 of his new 'prologue' where he further clarifies his confusion about truth. [option click to download, or just click to have your browser play the mp3 file] [mikedaisey.com]

We wink about the exaggerations and excesses of Hunter Thompson and Michael Moore because the outrageousness of their presentation lets us in on the joke. Daisey doesn't do that. His mistake.

I know Moore got criticized for fudging the timeline in "Roger and Me," but has he been accused of claiming he saw and heard things that never happened? Did he ever go on a news program and flat out lie?
I'm neither a fan nor a detractor of Michael Moore, I just don't know what he's done that's similar to what Mike Daisey did.

I don't think Gutenberg said they were the same as Daisey, her point was that they are not the same.

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"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

I wish people wouldn't make generic comments about "artists" when discussing Daisey. This is why I was expressing hesitation about the desire to shut him down altogether. I do believe that art can and will encompass untruths in order to display truth, like using religious icongraphy to express concepts, or melting watches, or apples on the heads of human bodies. Let's not demand that artists be journalists. Let's stick to demanding that artists be frank when they are using distortion to make a point. ALL Daisey had to do was let us know that this was his very personal and unreal take on a real situation and he'd have been okay. And TAL would never have broadcast his schtick. And this thread wouldn't exist.

Daisey the man has problems. Don't extend that into some sort of condemnation of artists, please.

---

"Stop thinking about art works as objects, and start thinking about them as triggers for experiences." ~ Brian Eno

Quote
Gutenberg
We wink about the exaggerations and excesses of Hunter Thompson and Michael Moore because the outrageousness of their presentation lets us in on the joke. Daisey doesn't do that. His mistake.

Daisy messes with the boundary between truth and fiction in a way that misleads his audience. He does this deliberately, and that is where the problem lies.

There are many conventions of theater that he could have used that would have indicated to the audience that his piece dealt with "artistic" truth rather than journalistic (absolute factual) truth. He says he did not use these devices because he wanted to make his emotional message as strong as possible.

Although he is a skilled performer, he is not a skilled artist -- a skilled artist would have found a way to make a compelling story within the conventions of the fictional forms.

Mike Daisey: Yeah. We have different worldviews 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 feel like I have the normal worldview" is a line that will live, or deserves to.


James Fallows of The Atlantic has written a good piece on this.
[www.theatlantic.com]

The objective "truth" (lower case) just seems like some mere inconvenience for Daisey's narrative of his TRUTH.

We really can't expect Mr. Glass or the rest of us mere mortals to grasp the totality of that which is the DaiseyTruth™.