Bruce Parry Tawai - The Guardian review by Leslie Felperin and Censorship of Fair Comment.

I posted this as a response to Leslie Felperin's review of Bruce Parry's new documentary Tawai. The Guardian moderators swiftly censored it. Why?

Here it is:

A lot of people are angry at this review. Here’s why:

Essentially, this review is deeply problematic because it undermines and stultifies the positive impact that this documentary could have on society and the environment.

By way of logic, let me clarify this point:

(1)   A documentary has been made which would have a positive impact on society and the environment.

(2)  This bad review will deter people from going to watch the documentary, and from spreading the word, having a negative knock-on effect on viewership. Depending on how many people read The Guardian, and how many ‘word-of-mouth’ suggestions branch out from this single review, this could mean we’re talking about millions of people.    

(3)   Therefore – if the review is in any way erroneous or misleading – it will have a negative impact on society and the environment, i.e. an opportunity cost.  

With power comes responsibility – and this review is highly irresponsible.  

Furthermore, I find the review rather trivialising, obfuscating and patronising to the plight of the people given a voice in the documentary. For example, when the author puerilely refers to the palm oil industry as ‘evil’, she constructs a false dichotomous Straw Man which is never portrayed in the documentary in such a simplistic way. Further, there’s the sense that her reference to the ‘wisdom’ of the hunter-gatherers is an underhanded cynical put-down, a brush off, as if the author feels entitled to dump gratuitous and self-congratulatory scepticism on the notion that indigenous peoples have anything to offer us.

I would even go as far to say that this review is oppressive and racist – or, at least, it leaves a nasty aftertaste of imperialistic and neoliberal indifference and arrogance. Replace ‘Hunter Gatherer’ with any of a number of politically-salient ethnic or marginalised groups and there would be a public backlash to this review, and rightly so. To offer a telling example, neither the reviewer nor The Guardian has corrected the wrong spelling of the key tribe featured in the film – even though the mistake has been highlighted many times. Do they even care?   

If The Guardian or its moderators censor this criticism, it’s ignoring a very serious issue. The Guardian stakes a claim that all articles belong to them on ‘their’ platform. But this is false, not only because the review is in the public domain and has been handed down in a top-down, arrogant and authoritarian way - i.e. ‘’we are the Gatekeepers Of Truth and this is the last word on this topic’’ -  but especially because the review in question is false and/or misleading. The Guardian’s moderators sometimes hubristically censor profoundly intelligent and nuanced comment, yet doggedly and obsequiously protect the right of its authors to write profoundly unintelligent and inaccurate articles. The ethical bankruptcy and double standard is astounding.      

If The Guardian and its moderators spent just a fraction of the time it spends editing comment sections on making sure its writers remain respectful and professional, the world would be a better place. In other words, before you tell readers to be respectful and abide by your community standards, you should make sure that your writers remain respectful and abide by ethical, and heartfelt, standards.  

All this, of course, and we’re not sure if the reviewer even watched the film! There has been some suspicion raised in the comment threads as to whether the reviewer might have just watched the trailer or, if she did watch the film in its entirety, she was so distracted by other things at the time that her lens of objectivity and awareness was fogged. If either is the case, that’s just downright dishonest.   

I will take a screen shot of this post for the purpose of posterity. Then, if the moderators decide to delete this comment, there will be solid proof that this – a serious and relevant complaint and objection to this review – has been made. This will be forwarded to the editor in charge of CIF for The Guardian.

It’s not the job of moderators to act as babysitters to protect authors from feeling offended. Society and the environment are sacrosanct - 'not causing offence' isn’t.  

It’s not the job of a moderator to thought-police comments in a censoring way that would make George Orwell turn in his grave – ‘bravely’ deciding what ideas are allowed whilst cloaked in anonymity a thousand miles behind the front line, seething in a smug echo-chamber of ego-dystopic mania.

It’s not your right to robotically decide what ideas are, or are not, relevant. Given the bewildering complexity of society, the burden of proof rests squarely on you, not the commenter. YOU must show why something is ‘off-topic’. If you don’t understand the logic of this point, it worries me to think of the unintelligent and extreme narrow-mindedness of the moderators working at The Guardian.      

Your job isn’t to protect politically-correct sensibilities, or to nanny elitist authors, or to obsequiously acquiesce to the vested corporate interests of The Guardian. Your job is to do what it says on the tin – to be a guardian(!) for society and the environment!