What the Hell is Journalism Even: part 1

So, recently, Boston Magazine published a colorful piece about me after an extensive set of interviews – which were entirely ignored for the sake of making people angry instead of getting them to chill.

The article quotes me of course (sparingly), but, often in contexts that allow the author to pretend I’ve said or done the exact opposite of what I’ve actually said or done.

Now I know what you’re thinking. “Why the hell would you still trust journalists”



And the answer to that is: I don’t, really. I’ve already learned to approach with caution.

The problem, is that they always seem more willing to misrepresent their intentions and integrity than I am to presume malice on either their part, or their editor’s. And I mean that in the functional sense. The more cautious I become, the more they misrepresent.

On the bright side though, this means the difference between what they post, and what is true, becomes proportionally more hilarious.

With that, I’d like to present, the story behind the latest piece – “Game of Fear.” By Zachary Jason.

(Note: I will unfortunately, not be able to correct the most problematic issues with the article, as, thanks to the magic of prior restraint, I am not legally allowed to defend myself against the most concerning and defamatory accusations – but there’s still an awful lot of baaaad journalism here to work with!)





We begin, at the beginning. The very first sentence, in which I am, ostensibly, fond of telling people about how much I’m not allowed to do what I’m about to do.

The first thing Eron Gjoni said after sitting down across from me at Veggie Galaxy in December was that he would probably violate his gag order if he talked to me. Then he talked for the next three hours, and again and again over the next three months.

Supposedly, purely of my own initiative, I have been speaking to this journalist for three months.

***

An honest account of my story? How wonderful. What could the odds possibly be that we would end up here – two sentences into the article ultimately published, and already misrepresented.

For you see, I did not tell Zak I would probably violate my gag order if I talked to him, I told him someone overly eager to make that case, might try to make that case, if he went on to publish what I’d said. But, an in-person conversation would be fine.

I tell Zak that I am uneasy about doing this. I tell him, I am willing to talk to him and answer any questions he has for me, but that it would have to be off the record, as I do not wish to run the risk of complicating matters with my gag order.

(Oh, sorry. “Restraining Order” you see, apparently calling it a “gag-order” is far too blunt, and I should instead be opting for the one that creates “bad PR.” If you don’t get this joke, don’t worry about it. But anyway, if the only reason you got something to silence someone is to silence someone, and the only grounds on which it was awarded had only to do with speech – it’s a gag-order.)

I tell Zak it’s up to him how interested he is in talking to me off the record, after I explain things at a cafe.

***

Zak tells me he would be just as leery about a stranger picking at his past. I interpreted this as sympathy, instead of a warning.





Zak brings the laptop. The first thing I do as soon as I meet him, has in fact nothing to do with how much I’m planning to like HARDCORE violate my gag order. Since I don’t intend to. And in fact, never go on to.

The first thing I do, is use his laptop, and log on to my facebook account. I tell him that I want to get it out of the way that “yes, in fact, all of the logs in thezoepost are true.” I tell him I have been appalled at the number of journalists who have written pieces implying any of what I said was in any way untrue, without so much as reaching out to me for comment. I show Zak the logs.

Zak, for his part, goes on to mention nothing of this. He could probably manage to frame it to help his case – that I am a sociopathic genius – but to give the world any additional confirmation of the log’s validity would still be counter to the narrative he’ll go on to spin.

Only after that is out of the way, do I sit back down to answer Zak’s questions. I remind him that they are off the record for now. That he can use them as a launchpad for further research and inquiry if he wishes, but he shouldn’t quote me on anything. If he wants to use anything I give him, he will have to make sure it is also available elsewhere.

This conversation does indeed go on for 3 hours. It would have to, of course. He was asking about a very long blog. Often, I intersperse with jokes and asides. I am not entirely comfortable, but Zak seems eager to put me at ease.

He says lunch is on the company.



As we leave the restaurant, I try to get a sense of what Zak’s going for with this. How he could possibly make an honest story of my relationship worthy of entry into an official publication for general audiences. Who would care?



Zak tells me his interest was piqued because his sister has been dating a pathological liar, and that it’s made him very sympathetic to my situation.

I offer him some advice to pass along to his sister (I’d been reading a lot on related topics), and waive goodbye as he hops into an Uber.

I am still uneasy about this. Zak seems like a good enough guy, but the situation doesn’t make an awful lot of sense. I don’t worry too much about it though, it’s off the record anyway.

Zak goes on to conveniently reduce the three hour, probing conversation of that meeting into a couple of sentences:

Gjoni can be relentless that way. And in others. He maintains incessant eye contact from behind a tangle of dark, wavy hair. He is intensely focused.



Alright,

1. I was playing with my food. Prolonged eye-contact makes me feel like I’m in a soap opera. Where is he getting this?



2. I have ADD. The only thing I’m “intensely focused” on is whatever is distracting me.

Further on in the article, Zak goes on to bring up the setting again

There’s a haunting resonance to Gjoni’s choice of location for our meeting. This is where he and Quinn first hung out in person: It’s where his obsession with her began.

1. Actually, that haunting resonance amounts to “I am vegan, and there are only so many places I can go for food.” Also, this article is a drinking game now. Take a shot every time you see the word “obsession” (or an equivalently loaded phrase) – Actually, better make it a half-shot.

2. I don’t even know man. He’d already acknowledged in the article that we first hung out at a dive-bar. But now apparently we first hung out at Veggie Galaxy? I mean, it’s not a major point but still – shoddy work, Zak.

The next morning, Zak emails me again. He’d like to interview some of my friends.

I give him Ben’s contact details, and tell him I’ll ask a game-dev friend from college if she’d be comfortable with an interview. I remind him that he is proceeding under the risk that my portion of the interview may have to remain off the record.

From his interview with that female game-dev, he quoted only that I was

“a very intellectual person with semi-decent people skills,”

This is perhaps, not so out of context as to be egregious. The problem comes, with just what else was omitted from the context. What the actual picture was, and how he chose to paint its opposite.

With the dev’s permission, here’s the question and its corresponding answer in full. (her interview was conducted over email)

To what extent did you know Eron Gjoni and Zoe Quinn? What did you think of both of them as individuals? What did you think of their relationship? How, if at all, has your esteem of either of them evolved since you’ve met them?



Eron I first met in college. We were both in the same class at school and hung out with the same group of people between classes. I struck up a friendship with him. I always saw Eron as a very intellectual person with semi-decent people skills. He was always super friendly and everyone had good things to say about him.

Zoe and I met through working in games in Boston. I believe we had actually first connected through Twitter. She was new to the area and had tweeted that she was going to something I was also attending. It happened to be my first (or maybe second) time going. I introduced myself and thought she was nice. After that, it was mostly through Twitter that we chatted, or I would hear about her through friends working with her. She never did anything to me that made me think poorly of her when I first met her. Though, I had heard some rumors from her time up in Canada. I didn’t think much of it. I had also heard that she was a bit flakey when it came to helping out with events she said she would help out with. But, as I said previously, I really didn’t think too much negatively on it. She was nice to me.

When I heard they were both dating, I was really excited! I thought that they were both nice people and had similar interests. I thought it would be a great relationship. Boy did that turn out to be wrong. Before Eron even started writing “The Zoe Post” he reached out to me. He wanted to make sure he was thinking clearly about this situation and what he should do about it. I ended up doing my own research asking people who knew her more in-depth about her… seems that Eron was not alone in being manipulated by her.

I need to go work on other things now. Part 2 is coming up at some unspecified point in the future probably. But just so no one gets carried away in the interim – Zak does go on to get my permission to put my interviews with him on the record, so long as they don’t contain any new information about certain persons. The point of my noting that I told him “interview must be conducted off-the-record” is not to claim he violated it.

I will try to make the next posts as entertaining as the article calls for, but I am too tired for jokes at the moment.

Peace out.





Update: Part 2.