Right on cue following yesterday’s blog entry, Tim Ireland has had further communication with Jeremy Reynalds, whose article about Glen Jenvey was recently removed from the ASSIST News Service:
I’ve just been in touch with Jeremy Reynalds, who insists that he has “no advocacy position” on Glen Jenvey, and claims merely to have given Glen Jenvey an opportunity to tell his side of the story, as he felt there was an imbalance in reporting at the time; in his own words, Jeremy Reynalds’ intention was to “present Mr. Jenvey’s response to the charges against him and to share some of his perspective about why they surfaced,” as he felt this had not been done…However, after delivering one side of the story, Jeremy Reynalds appears to have failed to keep up with both sides of the story, as he now claims not to have heard from our Mr Jenvey in a month, and to be unaware of any accusations of sex crimes…
As I blogged previously, Jenvey’s response to Tim’s investigation of Jenvey’s bogus posts to Muslims forums has been to threaten physical violence – and various random blogs have now received pseudonymous comments accusing Tim of being a convicted paedophile. Jenvey’s “side of the story” was that Guardian has sought to discredit him as a ploy to protect a Muslim columnist whom he alleged (with a few hedging question-marks) was the real author of the Muslim forum posts. The story was bizarre, and perhaps actionable.
Reynalds’ article can be seen reposted at Global Politician – it is 1352 words long, and Jenvey is not mentioned until after 445 words. It is obviously far more than simply “an opportunity” for Glen Jenvey to put his side; Reynalds himself provides most of the background context that supposedly supports Jenvey’s conspiracy theory, and even if Jenvey fed it to him Reynalds presents it in his own “voice” and has to take responsibility for it.
ASSIST’s target readership is unlikely to read the Guardian or Tim’s blog (or mine), so currently all they know of the controversy is what Reynalds has shared with them. I can understand Reynalds’ problem – he’s had links with Jenvey for some years, and his credibility is to some extent (perhaps to a great extent) tied up with Jenvey’s. But if Reynalds can’t do the right thing, isn’t it time for someone else at ASSIST to step in and make sure readers know the full story?
Filed under: Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
