The Guardian … again!

What happens to a newspaper that continues to insult the intelligence of its readers? What happens to a newspaper that does not realise that times have changed and that clever-clever opinions of its writers are of less interest to the readers than honesty? Ask the Guardian. The Guardian is a newspaper with a relatively modest circulation. In fact I am chairman of an organisation with more members than the Guardian has daily sales. The Guardian continues to lose circulation as it has been doing for some time.

Some time ago I, myself, was stupid enough to think that the Guardian could not really be as stupid as I thought it was. So I agreed to an interview. The resulting interview is so full of inventions, inaccuracies and rubbish that I intend to publish an 'annotated' version to be given to schools and universities with media departments who want examples of journalism at its lowest level.

Most newspaper readers are genuinely interested in what is going on in the world. Now you might think that the following matters might be of interest to readers of the Guardian.

*The teaching of just six hours of thinking to unemployed youngsters in the government's New Deal programme, increased their rate of employment five fold! How did this happen? Why did this happen? What did six hours of thinking do that ten years of education had failed to do? Was it an increase in self-esteem? Were youngsters who had been labeled as failures by education shown that they were not stupid at all. There are a lot of potentially interesting points. After all, this is probably a more dramatic effect on employment than anything ever tried before. Were the Guardian readers made aware of this through the interview? - of course not.

*In Finland, ABB (a large corporation) used to spend twenty days on their multi-national project discussions. Using parallel thinking they found they could do it all in just two days. This is a dramatic improvement in productivity. Other organisations have had the same experience. Maybe 'argument' is a primitive and old-fashioned way of proceeding. Were the readers of the Guardian given the opportunity to ponder such possibilities? - of course not.

*In the U.S.A. the judiciary in several states is interested in carrying through a pilot project in which jurors would be trained in parallel thinking. This removes the influence of egos and personalities and gives a better framework for objective exploration. This is a profoundly important question from a justice point of view. Does justice depend on the 'relative' stupidity of jurors? Could the readers of the Guardian be given the opportunity to think on this question? - of course not.

*In San Diego in February 2000 I was asked to give the opening talk at a special meeting organised by the American Bar Association on how lawyers could be made more creative. The difference between the legal mind-set of 'judgement' and the different mind-set of 'designing a way forward' was very apparent. An interesting matter: should lawyers be made to be constructive? Guardian readers might have liked to think this through. Were they given the opportunity? - of course not.

*In the United Arab Emirates, from this September, the basic CoRT programme for the teaching of thinking is becoming mandatory in schools. Why is the U.A.E. ahead of the U.K. in this respect? Should the Guardian readers know about such things? - of course not.

*In June I was asked to give a keynote address to the European Association of Venture Capitalists (EVCA) in Paris. There were some 700 people present and they invest about Euro 25 billion in Europe. The key question was: should investment be made on track record or the value of the concept? A matter of considerable interest. Could this have interested Guardian readers? - of course not.

*In March I was made chairman of an organisation that has 500,000 youngsters (across Europe and including Russia and Israel) as members. What is this organisation and what does it do? Should Guardian readers have been given a chance to find out? - of course not.

*In May, in Jordan, I was asked to lecture to the educational committee of the Palestinian Authority responsible for the education of 400,000 youngsters in refugee camps. They intend to teach thinking to these youngsters. Could this have been of interest to Guardian readers? The interviewer thought not.

*In February 2000 I was invited to Israel to receive a special award as a pioneer in the teaching of thinking. The Branco Weiss Institute in Israel was set up to teach this material in schools and elsewhere. Again, such matters are of no concern of Guardian readers.

So if these potentially interesting matters did not appear in the interview that what was the interview all about. It seemed to be all about whether the interviewer liked me and whether I talked too much about my achievements. Such childish nonsense. If I did not talk about all these things then how would the interviewer know about them? It is possible that I could be the world's biggest braggart but still be doing very interesting things. The interviewer complained that she was not able to insert questions. This is a feeble excuse for any experienced interviewer.

All the above is only half the story. The Guardian is insulting the intelligence of its readers by assuming they are more interested in whether the interviewer likes me than in the important things that are going on.

There are hundreds of thousands of people who know my work through books, seminars, university etc. etc. When they read the rubbish put forward in the Guardian their opinion of the interviewer ad the Guardian can only be lessened. They know what I am about so the interview is seen as prejudiced and feeble.

It is easy enough to give the wrong impression through omissions, fabrications, inventions and subjective impressions. That is insulting the intelligence of readers and contemptuous of their interested. Any editor who endorses such behaviour in doing his or her newspaper no great service.