July/August 2000 | Contents

CASE STUDY:
Manhandled Complaint Of Sexual Harassment in the Army

BY GENEVA OVERHOLSER

Ours is a craft rightly famed for defensiveness. We can make or break an enterprise or a reputation, yet we're inexcusably reluctant to acknowledge our errors, and ridiculously modest in presenting corrections when at last we do. Lately, though, it looks to me as if we're improving.

The Los Angeles Times, of course, showcased the dickens out of its media reporter's lengthy look at the Staples mess. The New York Times reliably confronts nettlesome questions about its own practices, going well beyond corrections of fact into errors of tone, omissions, and even misleading juxtapositions.

And The Washington Post, whose reporters have long been known for the "defensive crouch" that former executive editor Ben Bradlee used to urge them out of, recently showed how powerful a personal acknowledgment of poor journalism can be in rectifying a bad situation.

There was plenty of rectification to be done. The story in question concerns the sexual-harassment allegation made by Lieutenant General Claudia Kennedy. The Washington Times broke the story, and The New York Times and other papers had advanced it, by the time the Post entered the fray on April 1 with a piece by Thomas E. Ricks.

It was awful. To be fair, much of the information that was to make the Kennedy saga eminently clearer was still to emerge -- the name of the general being accused, Major General Larry G. Smith; the fact that Smith's intended promotion was to the job of deputy inspector general where he'd be responsible for investigating accusations (including sexual harassment) against senior officers; and, of course, the fact that the Army would eventually substantiate Kennedy's charges.

The Ricks story created a very different picture: the Army's highest-ranking woman was making sexual-harassment complaints against another general concerning an incident from "several years ago," brought forward formally only now -- "after the man she had accused was promoted."

"It is extremely unusual for charges to be brought by one Army general against another," said the story. "More than most institutions, the Army values discretion, especially at the top."

Further, "There was widespread irritation within the Army at Kennedy yesterday," which Ricks proceeded to amplify without benefit of attribution. He told us that Kennedy's "work as chief of Army intelligence has won few admirers. Pentagon insiders also speculated that Kennedy may be acting now because she recently lost out in a competition for one of the top slots in the Army."

Also, "Kennedy . . . may have been taken aback by the internal criticism that emerged against her when her name was raised for the post at Training and Doctrine Command." On went the nameless criticism, courtesy of "many people inside the Pentagon." A retiree who remembers Kennedy "from her younger days" as a very impressive officer provided the sole balance -- in the final graf.

In one of those all-too-common journalistic phrases that virtually define self-actualization, Ricks told us, "The high-profile confrontation appears likely to bring a sour note to the end to the thirty-one-year career of Kennedy."

Post readers being a keen-eyed group, they howled. "My take on the Post story, as I reflect on it, is that the flavor was that of 'scorned woman takes revenge, files sexual harassment charge,'" said one. "The more I consider the piece in the Post, the more outrageous it seems."

Another said the article "should be required reading in every course on sexual harassment. This is exactly why women are hesitant to complain about harassment, let alone file charges. Various other Army officers decided to circle the wagons and trash the victim, and the Post was a willing participant. When enlisted women see that this can happen to someone as high up as a lieutenant general, well, then, do you really believe they are going to file complaints?"

The good news is those complaints were well aired -- in a Sunday ombudsman's column taking a hard look at the offending piece. What was even better (and far more unusual) is that Ricks and a Post editor were forthrightly regretful in discussing the work with the ombudsman, E. R. Shipp. "Clearly, in retrospect, the tone of the story was off," Ricks said. "The person I trust most was my wife, and she said that it was striking."

"It's fair criticism in retrospect that readers thought we were trying to blame the victim. That was not our intent," said Liz Spayd, an editor on the national desk. Ricks spoke of lessons learned, and of exactly what he might have done differently. Spayd and Shipp noted that the rest of the Post's reporting on the matter broadened the context and balanced the picture.

But plenty of our subjects appear in the news only once: they have one shot at balanced treatment. Far more often than we like to admit, it isn't a fair shot. Making that admission -- and making amends -- is something we badly need to get better at.

Geneva Overholser (genevaoh@aol.com), a syndicated columnist for The Washington Post Writers Group, writes regularly for cjr about newspapers. Among positions she has held are editorial writer for The New York Times, editor of The Des Moines Register, ombudsman for The Washington Post. She also served nine years on the Pulitzer Prize board.

 

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