A New York Times (NYT) employee is being accused of violating the publication’s ethical code for a post on LinkedIn and Instagram calling for “truly radical” climate action.
David Gelles, a New York Times climate correspondent, recently attended the World Economic Forum Summit in Davos, Switzerland. After attending the event, Gelles posted about the remarks he made in Davos on his LinkedIn account and Instagram Story.
“After the year that was the hottest in recorded history, with climate change ravaging every corner of the globe, I implored a room full of CEOs, diplomats and NGO leaders to step up their urgency and begin considering truly radical political and economic interventions,” he stated in the post.
“Rather than more of the same, it’s time to begin imagining what a society truly transformed will look like, and to start identifying the hurdles that make disruptions to the status quo appear uneconomical, impractical or politically untenable. The hour is late, and it’s incumbent on those with the capital and the clout to start deploying the whole of their resources toward the climate crisis.”
However, concerns arose among some New York Times staffers regarding the potential violation of the paper’s ethical guidelines. According to the Daily Beast, Gelles’ comments were seen as advocacy for specific policies rather than unbiased reporting.
A spokesperson for the New York Times addressed the issue, saying, “While he brought this same ethos to his role speaking at an event at the World Economic Forum, subsequent social media posts about the event may have been misunderstood to convey something other than impartiality, and as such have since been deleted.”
This incident adds to the growing trend of New York Times reporters blurring the lines between objective reporting and advocacy, despite the outlet’s claim of non-bias. Last year, the outlet gained attention when 200 NYT staffers signed an open letter accusing the paper of using “pseudoscience and euphemistic, charged language” when covering stories related to transgender children.
The outlet has also been criticized for promoting left-wing talking points on racial issues, including platforming Nichole Hannah-Jones’ ‘The 1619 Project,’ a radical rewriting of American history influenced by critical race theory.
