After all the bedbugs and ballyhoo about the #JianGhomeshi affair, and the seemingly instantaneous and simultaneous deconstruction of his celebrity brand, things have quietened down as the inevitable legal process settles in to pick at the bones. Bones is the word, because it seems that all that's left of JG and even Q this early into the crisis is a charred set of smoking embers with only the blackened bones providing any evidence of what was lost.
This past week, CBC filed a motion asking the Ontario courts to throw out Ghomeshi's $55M lawsuit on the grounds that it is simply not valid due to a collective agreement that requires the complaint to be handled by a grievance/arbitration process. Additionally, and I think we all agree they are right, they claim that there was nothing defamatory in their statement about information having come to their attention that precluded his employment, nor was there a breach of confidence if the guy showed them something that was stored on a company smartphone or device.
Much as CBC are going to come out of this mess more on top than Ghomeshi, who may well have hit rock bottom here in Canada, at least - neither does CBC come out of it looking much better than the giant prehistoric institution that it is oft accused of being. The Canadian Media Guild union that would be handling any grievance process was not delighted by Heather Conway's jumping of the gun by talking to Peter Mansbridge on "The National" (among other). Carmel Smyth (CMG President) voiced that sentiment following Conway's appearance, stating that,
“One would have thought there would be enough respect for the process that she’d have the patience to await the findings of the investigation".
“One would have thought there would be enough respect for the process that she’d have the patience to await the findings of the investigation".
It is a fact that CBC have engaged employment lawyer Janice Rubin to conduct a third party investigation into the Ghomeshi scandal, but in that case, why in God's name would Conway speak up now in advance of the findings of Rubin's investigation? As the union has implied, it reeks totally of an attempt by Conway (i.e. CBC management!) to exonerate themselves totally, even in the face of having apparently brushed complaints about Ghomeshi's "idiosyncrasies" under the warm rugs on the Q studio floor. If you believe what you read, anyone anywhere near Q knew all about Ghomeshi, and for CBC senior management to claim that they were in the dark seems highly unlikely at best and outright fallacious at worst.
It wasn't just that CBC erred in allowing EVP for English Services, Heather Conway, to speak to the media (uhmm, that would be her media, given that it was Peter Mansbridge!), but it was both the inappropriately chosen/clearly shackled Mansbridge and the cluelessness demonstrated by Conway that added fuel to the fire. Make that salt in the wounds, if you are one of the victims on the show, or elsewhere. To have had any real impact, Conway would had to have been grilled by a non-CBC TV personality who was not scripted or handed a set of questions they could ask, as Mansbridge no doubt was - and it thus came across as a scripted attempt at exoneration for upper CBC management. While they are ruminating on the subject of #QtheFuture - there is something that appears to be missing from this picture which can help significantly - it's called leadership!
Listening to Conway discussing the term "rough sex" was painful if not actually wince-inducing, because she came across not only as (perhaps understandably) misinformed but she also demonstrated the type of stuffy conservatism that typifies one's image of CBC itself. She was spectacularly inarticulate on how the story evolved and their lack of response to it, and as an employer, stating that she had "no reference" on what "rough sex" actually means, well, come on, wake up - it's 2014, not 1974. Like any other corporation with a need in a particular area in which it has no expertise, well, you hire a consultant! Or you order your HR department to get trained/informed on such issues, so that you can deal with it. Brain surgery, it ain't!! And this is the CBC, not the BBC, right?
Then again, this entire story is not a little reminiscent to this boy of the DJ scandal that rocked the BBC, involving primarily Jimmy Savile in the 70s and 80s, who like Ghomeshi had used his fame to gain access to his targets, but the difference is that Savile was allegedly an out-and-out paedophile who carried on abuse over a period of several decades. Then again, given further free reign, who knows how easily the Ghomeshi story could have become a decades-longer history of abuse? Thank God for small mercies, eh?
The CBC did do the right thing, but only when faced with a level of evidence of what "rough sex" really means that was impossible to further sanction - especially as it appears that some (all?) of that evidence was on a CBC-owned media device, and that the evidence was volunteered rather inexplicably by the perpetrator himself - Ghomeshi. In some moment of presumed arrogance over his importance to CBC, the man showed them what all the fuss was about, and somehow expected that to be enough to make it all go away? This attempt alone is proof positive that the guy's head was not in any normal state of mind, indicative of either sociopathic tendencies underlying his polished public image or that mounting pressure from the victims and Jesse Brown were taking their toll.
Opening up to the CBC was as critical an error laced in hubris as the ridiculous attempt to sway the public/media with his Facebook post a few days later. That worked for a hot minute, though there was a ship of fools who bought the fiction hook, line and sinker, before the whole ploy backfired totally inside less than a week. The guy is either nowhere near as smart as the image portrayed of him in public, and/or he really thinks that Joe Public is a total dumbass who cannot see through the papier-mâché facade of a few well-chosen and well-crafted words lining the surface of his reality.
So where are we today? Well, we come to the opening image from my last blog on this subject, which is still totally appropriate today, underlining the fact that the whole future of Q is one massive gaping question mark. The disappearance of Q executive producer Arif Noorani from CBC corridors for a week following the break of the Ghomeshi scandal, and his subsequent departure from the show itself can presumably be taken as some kind of indication that the times they-are-a-changin' - the big question is does Q have a future and if so what does it look like?
I see I have dragged on again as usual, so in the interest of brevity I will only touch on this aspect today, but will get into my direct recommendations to CBC next time. Well, CBC, ya did ask, as the banner at the top of this blog clarifies, so, we will tell you! Let's cut to the chase right away, shall we? As far as I am concerned, the Q brand is soiled, dirtied and dysfunctional, particularly and not ironically because that brand effectively was Jian Ghomeshi. He conceived it, created it, ran it, nurtured it and became synonymous with it, to a point where he did get to the level of gaining too much power in the CBC corridors.
The fact that he was synonymous with the Q brand, and that the Q brand is owned by CBC, creates an oxymoronic state of affairs, over what was an exceptionally powerful brand for the CBC, but which now is one with an exceptionally powerful degree of disdain and even hatred attached to it. There is only one thing to do, irrespective of whether a very similar but retooled show returns to the air in the near future - bury the Q! It cannot be called Q. For everyone to heal and move on, and even (especially?) for those who have worked on the show, it absolutely must be rebranded!
That rebranding has to come with separation of Ghomeshi from it (already done to an extent) and distancing of it from the term "Q" which is riddled with Ghomeshi's name, imagery and memory. "Q the future", by all means, but do so by removing the letter from the broadcasting lexicon, and returning it to where it now belongs: simply being the seventeenth letter of the alphabet, as far the CBC goes. Ghomeshi has gone, and let him take the Q with him. Why? Well because nobody else wants it or cares about it anymore. - Kevin Mc
Listening to Conway discussing the term "rough sex" was painful if not actually wince-inducing, because she came across not only as (perhaps understandably) misinformed but she also demonstrated the type of stuffy conservatism that typifies one's image of CBC itself. She was spectacularly inarticulate on how the story evolved and their lack of response to it, and as an employer, stating that she had "no reference" on what "rough sex" actually means, well, come on, wake up - it's 2014, not 1974. Like any other corporation with a need in a particular area in which it has no expertise, well, you hire a consultant! Or you order your HR department to get trained/informed on such issues, so that you can deal with it. Brain surgery, it ain't!! And this is the CBC, not the BBC, right?
Then again, this entire story is not a little reminiscent to this boy of the DJ scandal that rocked the BBC, involving primarily Jimmy Savile in the 70s and 80s, who like Ghomeshi had used his fame to gain access to his targets, but the difference is that Savile was allegedly an out-and-out paedophile who carried on abuse over a period of several decades. Then again, given further free reign, who knows how easily the Ghomeshi story could have become a decades-longer history of abuse? Thank God for small mercies, eh?
The CBC did do the right thing, but only when faced with a level of evidence of what "rough sex" really means that was impossible to further sanction - especially as it appears that some (all?) of that evidence was on a CBC-owned media device, and that the evidence was volunteered rather inexplicably by the perpetrator himself - Ghomeshi. In some moment of presumed arrogance over his importance to CBC, the man showed them what all the fuss was about, and somehow expected that to be enough to make it all go away? This attempt alone is proof positive that the guy's head was not in any normal state of mind, indicative of either sociopathic tendencies underlying his polished public image or that mounting pressure from the victims and Jesse Brown were taking their toll.
Opening up to the CBC was as critical an error laced in hubris as the ridiculous attempt to sway the public/media with his Facebook post a few days later. That worked for a hot minute, though there was a ship of fools who bought the fiction hook, line and sinker, before the whole ploy backfired totally inside less than a week. The guy is either nowhere near as smart as the image portrayed of him in public, and/or he really thinks that Joe Public is a total dumbass who cannot see through the papier-mâché facade of a few well-chosen and well-crafted words lining the surface of his reality.
So where are we today? Well, we come to the opening image from my last blog on this subject, which is still totally appropriate today, underlining the fact that the whole future of Q is one massive gaping question mark. The disappearance of Q executive producer Arif Noorani from CBC corridors for a week following the break of the Ghomeshi scandal, and his subsequent departure from the show itself can presumably be taken as some kind of indication that the times they-are-a-changin' - the big question is does Q have a future and if so what does it look like?
I see I have dragged on again as usual, so in the interest of brevity I will only touch on this aspect today, but will get into my direct recommendations to CBC next time. Well, CBC, ya did ask, as the banner at the top of this blog clarifies, so, we will tell you! Let's cut to the chase right away, shall we? As far as I am concerned, the Q brand is soiled, dirtied and dysfunctional, particularly and not ironically because that brand effectively was Jian Ghomeshi. He conceived it, created it, ran it, nurtured it and became synonymous with it, to a point where he did get to the level of gaining too much power in the CBC corridors.
The fact that he was synonymous with the Q brand, and that the Q brand is owned by CBC, creates an oxymoronic state of affairs, over what was an exceptionally powerful brand for the CBC, but which now is one with an exceptionally powerful degree of disdain and even hatred attached to it. There is only one thing to do, irrespective of whether a very similar but retooled show returns to the air in the near future - bury the Q! It cannot be called Q. For everyone to heal and move on, and even (especially?) for those who have worked on the show, it absolutely must be rebranded!
That rebranding has to come with separation of Ghomeshi from it (already done to an extent) and distancing of it from the term "Q" which is riddled with Ghomeshi's name, imagery and memory. "Q the future", by all means, but do so by removing the letter from the broadcasting lexicon, and returning it to where it now belongs: simply being the seventeenth letter of the alphabet, as far the CBC goes. Ghomeshi has gone, and let him take the Q with him. Why? Well because nobody else wants it or cares about it anymore. - Kevin Mc
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