Award-winning German journalist fired for lying about Americans

[A Voice from the Mountains]

But one of the awards was given to him by CNN, so....


Germany’s Der Spiegel Says Reporter Made Up Facts

The disclosure came after a colleague raised concerns about a recent piece on Trump supporters in rural America

https://images.wsj.net/im-43703

By Bojan Pancevski and
Sara Germano
Updated Dec. 20, 2018 3:26 p.m. ET

BERLIN—Europe faces its largest journalistic scandal in years after Der Spiegel, the continent’s biggest-selling news magazine, said one of its star reporters fabricated facts in his articles for years.

The magazine’s disclosure, which came after a colleague raised concerns about a recent piece on supporters of President Trump in rural America, was made as Europe’s established media faces attacks by populist forces at home and abroad.

Claas Relotius, an award-winning journalist, resigned from the magazine last week after admitting to making up parts of his reporting in the past decade, Der Spiegel said late Wednesday.

Mr. Relotius couldn’t be reached for comment.

[...]

But in a separate video interview on the magazine’s website, a colleague said he raised an alarm in November about some facts in an article he and Mr. Relotius co-authored about a pro-Trump militia, which the article described as hunting down immigrants along Arizona’s border with Mexico.

On Wednesday, the magazine launched what it called a transparency campaign, pledging to investigate Mr. Relotius’ entire body of work and publicize the results. It said it had so far found made-up facts in 14 out of nearly 60 articles.

Stefan Niggemeier, an independent media blogger in Berlin and a former Spiegel journalist, said some of the articles at issue appeared to confirm certain German stereotypes about Trump voters, asking “was this possible because of an ideological bias?”

A spokesman for Der Spiegel said that the magazine is investigating what if any role potential bias may have played.

[...]

In an article Wednesday, Der Spiegel wrote that Mr. Relotius “distorts reality” in the article about Fergus Falls. A spokesman for the magazine said that Der Spiegel’s fact-checking process “does not include contacting any subjects of articles,” adding that the department reviews each story sentence by sentence for accuracy and plausibility, followed by a review between the department and the story’s author.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/germanys-der-spiegel-says-reporter-made-up-facts-11545334314

Bias involved in European media? Ahh no, I'm sure there is some other explanation.

Seriously though, as someone who read French and German blogs, the media situation in Europe is pure cancer. If you think the British propaganda arm known as the BBC is bad, just imagine what opportunities the language barrier offers. I've seen blatant misquotes and mistranslations in Le Monde, France's biggest newspaper. And listening to German media is like stepping into the Twilight Zone. They paint a picture as if everywhere outside of Germany is in chaos, meanwhile Germany itself is in cultural and political chaos. :ROFL:

And the above reflects what kind of "reporting" even the most "reputable" German news outlets are feeding their people. They gave this guy awards for his superb work spreading hatred and bigotry towards rural Americans. Who needs enemies when you have "allies" like this?

[meeradas]

[...] And the above reflects what kind of "reporting" even the most "reputable" German news outlets are feeding their people. [...]

Spot on (especially "reporting" & "reputable" - beautiful).

"Der Spiegel" now can make use of a very welcome "reality distorting" patsy to launch a "transparency campaign" [lmao]...

to counter their ever dwindling number of subscribers;
i predict it won't work out for them, as they're in exactly the same "business" (for decades)... :bounce:


PS: I'd remove "about Americans" from the title... his fabrications seem to have a wider scale

[Pam]

But one of the awards was given to him by CNN, so....


Germany’s Der Spiegel Says Reporter Made Up Facts

The disclosure came after a colleague raised concerns about a recent piece on Trump supporters in rural America

https://images.wsj.net/im-43703

By Bojan Pancevski and
Sara Germano
Updated Dec. 20, 2018 3:26 p.m. ET

BERLIN—Europe faces its largest journalistic scandal in years after Der Spiegel, the continent’s biggest-selling news magazine, said one of its star reporters fabricated facts in his articles for years.

The magazine’s disclosure, which came after a colleague raised concerns about a recent piece on supporters of President Trump in rural America, was made as Europe’s established media faces attacks by populist forces at home and abroad.

Claas Relotius, an award-winning journalist, resigned from the magazine last week after admitting to making up parts of his reporting in the past decade, Der Spiegel said late Wednesday.

Mr. Relotius couldn’t be reached for comment.

[...]

But in a separate video interview on the magazine’s website, a colleague said he raised an alarm in November about some facts in an article he and Mr. Relotius co-authored about a pro-Trump militia, which the article described as hunting down immigrants along Arizona’s border with Mexico.

On Wednesday, the magazine launched what it called a transparency campaign, pledging to investigate Mr. Relotius’ entire body of work and publicize the results. It said it had so far found made-up facts in 14 out of nearly 60 articles.

Stefan Niggemeier, an independent media blogger in Berlin and a former Spiegel journalist, said some of the articles at issue appeared to confirm certain German stereotypes about Trump voters, asking “was this possible because of an ideological bias?”

A spokesman for Der Spiegel said that the magazine is investigating what if any role potential bias may have played.

[...]

In an article Wednesday, Der Spiegel wrote that Mr. Relotius “distorts reality” in the article about Fergus Falls. A spokesman for the magazine said that Der Spiegel’s fact-checking process “does not include contacting any subjects of articles,” adding that the department reviews each story sentence by sentence for accuracy and plausibility, followed by a review between the department and the story’s author.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/germanys-der-spiegel-says-reporter-made-up-facts-11545334314

Bias involved in European media? Ahh no, I'm sure there is some other explanation.

Seriously though, as someone who read French and German blogs, the media situation in Europe is pure cancer. If you think the British propaganda arm known as the BBC is bad, just imagine what opportunities the language barrier offers. I've seen blatant misquotes and mistranslations in Le Monde, France's biggest newspaper. And listening to German media is like stepping into the Twilight Zone. They paint a picture as if everywhere outside of Germany is in chaos, meanwhile Germany itself is in cultural and political chaos. :ROFL:

And the above reflects what kind of "reporting" even the most "reputable" German news outlets are feeding their people. They gave this guy awards for his superb work spreading hatred and bigotry towards rural Americans. Who needs enemies when you have "allies" like this?


Brick by brick we are witnessing the slow implosion of the pillars of our social structure. Another card pulled from this house of cards. It seems like the momentum is picking up speed. I wonder how long it will take for the house to fall down?

[Hervé]

...


Remember that guy: Udo Ulfkotte (http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?89230-When-Vested-Interests-Take-Education-over...&p=1170448&viewfull=1#post1170448) ?

[A Voice from the Mountains]

...


Remember that guy: Udo Ulfkotte (http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?89230-When-Vested-Interests-Take-Education-over...&p=1170448&viewfull=1#post1170448) ?

Yeah, it really shouldn't be surprising to anyone.

Then again, the sheep who still glue their gazes onto these talking heads always get that glassy look in their eyes when you try to emphasize the full implications of what those types of revelations actually mean. Orwell described these types pretty well in 1984.

[ripple]

I had heard that rumour that Prince Harry had a second job as a hack on Der Spiegel .
I wonder who put the knife in ? Wife or Duke Phil ?

[A Voice from the Mountains]

Der Spiegel may have finally thrown this guy under the bus because he's facing criminal charges for embezzlement, not just accusations of making up news stories:


Relotius wrote that city administrator Andrew Bremseth had never been with a woman and had never been to the ocean, claims that were easily debunked by a photo on Bremseth’s Facebook page that showed him standing next to the ocean with his long-term girlfriend. Relotius mentioned looking through the windows of a local diner and seeing a power plant billowing out steam, which would have been impossible since the plant in question is hidden behind a tall hill more than two miles away. And he described a sign at the entrance to town that said, “Mexicans Keep Out” — something that community members didn’t recall ever seeing.

On Wednesday, they were vindicated. Der Spiegel announced that Relotius had “falsified his articles on a grand scale” since at least 2016 and had resigned after admitting that he had fabricated quotes and invented fictional details in more than a dozen stories, including his dispatch from Fergus Falls. The magazine’s investigation found that the 33-year-old writer had faked interviews with the parents of Colin Kaepernick and falsified material that appeared in award-winning features about children kidnapped by the Islamic State and a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay. Before it all came crashing down, he had also managed to convince editors that a co-worker who expressed suspicions was the real liar.

...

“In 7,300 words he really only got our town’s population and average annual temperature correct,” Anderson wrote, noting that the piece had contained so many outright fictions that she and Krohn had decided to highlight the 11 most absurd lies.

Among them: Relotius had claimed that the local movie theater was still playing “American Sniper” more than two years after it came out, which was quickly disproved with an email to the theater’s manager. He described traveling into town on a “narrow, sloping street, rolling towards a dark forest that looks like dragons live in it,” even though Fergus Falls is located on the prairie and there are no forests within city limits. In another passage, he wrote that local high school students on a bus trip to New York had skipped the Statue of Liberty in favor of visiting Trump Tower. But Anderson and Krohn found no evidence that the trip had taken place.
Most alarmingly, Relotius appeared to have used real people’s names and identities, then invented details about their lives. He told the story of Maria Rodriguez, the owner of a local Mexican restaurant who had become a Trump supporter after the Affordable Care Act made it more expensive to treat her kidney disease. The real Maria Rodriguez turned out to be a waitress at the restaurant. She had never had kidney disease and was never interviewed by Relotius, she said. Similarly, her son — described in the piece as a 15-year-old named Israel, but in actuality a college sophomore named Pablo — told Krohn and Anderson that the story that Relotius had weaved about his life in Fergus Falls and the prejudice he had encountered at the local high school was completely false.

Many of the made-up details reflected certain prevailing stereotypes about rural America. Bremseth, the city administrator, wore a gun to work, disparaged the idea of a female president and was the only person in the city who subscribed to national publications, Relotius wrote. But according to Krohn and Anderson’s thorough takedown, none of it was true.

http://archive.is/enbaE#selection-1477.0-1513.22


More examples showing that this guy was just part of an industry in German media of pumping out an endless stream of derogatory (at least in Germans' minds) American stereotypes. Even though this guy was full of crap and just making stuff up, half of what he claimed wouldn't have been offensive to me even if it were true. People not subscribing to national newspapers, as if that's a bad thing? I thought nationalism itself was bad according to these globalists? Maybe he should be lamenting that they aren't reading international papers? No, Americans who still read newspapers usually read local newspapers because we actually still believe in real communities, rather than fantasize about how great the New World Order will be.

[A Voice from the Mountains]

It gets even better!


It Gets Better–> CNN’s “Reporter of the Year” Claas Relotius Embezzled Donations Away from Syrian Street Children

Top German reporter at the liberal mag Der Spiegel was fired last week.
Claas Relotius at Germany’s far left Der Spiegel magazine fabricated his stories.
He got caught after he trashed Trump supporters in a recent piece. It was a completely made up story.

Claas Relotius won CNN’s journalist of the year award in 2014.

Claas Relotius is being sued by Der Speigel for embezzling donations away from Syrian street children.

France 24 reported:

Influential German news weekly Der Spiegel said Sunday it would file a criminal complaint against a disgraced reporter after it emerged he may have embezzled donations intended for Syrian street children.

Claas Relotius, 33, resigned this month after admitting to making up stories and inventing protagonists in more than a dozen articles in the magazine’s print and online editions.

Spiegel said it now had information that Relotius allegedly launched a campaign for readers to give money to help subjects of an article he wrote but that the bank details he gave directed the funds to his own account.

“Der Spiegel will give all the information it collects to public prosecutors as part of a criminal complaint,” it said on its website.

Spiegel said concerned readers had in recent days reported Relotius’s call for donations purportedly for orphaned Syrian children living on the streets of Turkey.

It said it had been unaware of the campaign and that it was not immediately clear how much money was raised from the appeal, apparently made by email to readers who contacted him about the story.

Spiegel published the article by Relotius in July 2016 but a Turkish photographer who worked with him on the piece has since noted significant inaccuracies.



https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/12/it-gets-better-cnns-reporter-of-the-year-claas-relotius-embezzled-donations-away-from-syrian-street-children/


Deep state tentacles starting to be uprooted as this press-titute is unmasked for what he truly is?

[ramus]

Here is another article on the German journalist .. not trying to step on your article Voice From The Mountains just a little more from a another source ... plus i couldn't delete it when i realized the similarity. sorry



Der Spiegel reveals journalist who faked stories sought donations
German magazine passes information to prosecutors over private appeals for money

https://www.ft.com/content/b6584e3a-0767-11e9-9fe8-acdb36967cfc

Germany’s Der Spiegel has said it would file a criminal complaint against the disgraced reporter at the centre of a journalism scandal after revealing that he had allegedly solicited donations to help the protagonists of a partially fabricated story.

Der Spiegel said it was passing on the relevant information on Claas Relotius to German prosecutors. The award-winning journalist admitted last week that he had invented people, quotes and passages — and sometimes entire stories — over seven years reporting for Der Spiegel.

The revelations about Mr Relotius, 33, constitute the biggest scandal in German journalism in decades and have sparked soul-searching and recriminations across the country’s media.

“Claas Relotius not only invented large sections of his texts, but may also have embezzled donations,” Der Spiegel said over the weekend. “As readers have told Der Spiegel, Relotius sent appeals for donations from his private email account to readers asking for help for orphans in Turkey. The money was supposed to be transferred to his private bank account.”

The magazine added: “It is not clear how many donors responded to the appeal, and how much money was raised.”

The appeal itself was made in connection with a story — largely fabricated — written by Mr Relotius in 2016 about a pair of Syrian siblings from Aleppo who had fled to Turkey after their parents were killed. Mr Relotius wrote in a subsequent book that he eventually managed to get the two children sent to Hanover, Germany, where they had been adopted by a family of doctors. “This apparently was also fiction,” Der Spiegel said.

Mr Relotius, who last week resigned from Der Spiegel’s staff and has handed back his numerous awards, had yet to respond to the latest accusations, the magazine said.

The Hamburg-based weekly described the affair last week as a “low point” in the magazine’s 70-year history and issued an apology to its readers. It said that at least 14 of about 60 articles by Mr Relotius published in Der Spiegel since 2011 contained faked material.

Among other things, Mr Relotius invented a telephone interview with the parents of US football star and political activist Colin Kaepernick, and interviews with members of a rightwing militia on the US-Mexican border.

Mr Relotius also invented the persona of “Gayle Gaddis”, a devout American woman from Missouri who had supposedly made it her life’s mission to attend executions across the country. According to Der Spiegel, the entire five-page article was fabricated.

“Claas Relotius deceived deliberately, methodically and with great criminal energy,” Der Spiegel wrote on its homepage on Wednesday.