Professor Halkides Explains Why He Posted

Readers Note: For background to this post, read UNC-Wilmington professor Chris Halkides' "John in Carolina's post, 'KC Johnson Now'" and my first response to that: Professor Halkides’ Unintentional Self-Parody.

John
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I spent hours yesterday and today responding to people, including some directly involved in the Duke lacrosse case, who've asked why UNC-Wilmington professor Chris Halkides posted "John in Carolina's post, 'KC Johnson Now."

I listened sympathetically. I agreed what Halkides posted was, at best, irresponsible.

But I told everyone who asked I didn’t know why Halkides posted what he did.

Now, however, Halkides himself has answered that question.

On his "John in Carolina's post, 'KC Johnson Now'" thread Halkides says at 7/9/09 @ 11:12 PM:

… I posted something because I wanted to discuss JinC’s post without rancor but with the hope that he would retract some of the things he said.

Ah, yes! Halkides "without rancor." He begins his post:

In his post “KC Johnson Now” on 24 May 2009 (http://johninnorthcarolina.blogspot.com/2009/05/kc-johnson-now.html), John in Carolina (JinC) attacked fellow Duke Lacrosse (DL) blogger KC Johnson.

I will examine two points that JinC raised, that KC Johnson banned Joan Foster and that Professor Johnson was untruthful about his sources that confirmed a Raleigh News and Observer (N&O) story from 1 April 2006.

I will treat the second, more serious matter first. (Note: I never said Johnson was untruthful. I did express considerable skepticism about what Johnson said. The distinction between skepticism and untruthful was either lost on Halkides or he chose to ignore it. - - JinC)

Now look at what Halkides says in his Concluding Remarks:

In his post “KC Johnson Now” John has given a clinic in how not to blog.

He failed to edit obvious errors (attributing “It’s Not About the Truth” to Chuck Yeager, not Don Yaeger*).

He published a rumor as if it were fact. He failed to check with Professor Johnson about either the non-banning or the story about the bar.

He apparently did not ask Joan Foster directly about her supposed banning, either.

He questioned KC Johnson’s truthfulness twice but disclosed no evidence to support his innuendo.

Moreover, by accusing KC Johnson of making up sources,

John has cast a shadow over on any work that Professor Johnson has done that involves confidentiality, this despite the fact that both John and Joan Foster claim to admire Johnson’s contributions to the DL case.

When called on some of these matters, he either ignored them or brushed them aside.

In doing these things he has made it a little bit harder for those of us who want blogging to be held to as high a standard as traditional journalism.

(Folks, I did say “Chuck” when I should have said “Don.” I’ve corrected at the post and thanked Halkides for pointing out my error.

But everything else he says in this portion of his concluding remarks quoted here is at least wrong to a significant degree and, in some cases, outright false.

I’ll post on all of that in the coming days. - - JinC)

Folks, I'm confident most of you will know what I'm doing when I give the last words in this post to professor Halkides once again explaining the "purpose" of his post:

… I posted something because I wanted to discuss JinC’s post without rancor but with the hope that he would retract some of the things he said.