David Simon Denounces the "Astounding Disaster" that is True-Crime Journalism

In response to my piece about Adnan Syed, no less!

https://twitter.com/AoDespair/status/1664197371490598913

For much of the last year, I’ve been working on a major piece about the case of Adnan Syed, the subject of the hit 2014 podcast “Serial”. It was finally published, in two parts, on the website Quillette. It’s a very long read, for the same reason posts on this blog tend to be long: There’s so much spin and nonsense to counter.

Yet I was rewarded for my efforts: A man I admire (revere?), praised the piece. David Simon is, of course the writer and producer and showrunner behind “The Wire”, “Homicide: Life on the Streets”, “The Corner”, “Show Me a Hero”; “The Deuce”, “We Own this City”, “Treme”, and other productions. “The Wire” routinely makes the top 5 list of the best TV series ever made, and with good reason.

My personal favorite Simon show is the miniseries “Show Me a Hero”, which, believe it or not, is about a real years-long legal and political struggle to build public housing in Yonkers, New York. It sounds as exciting as a city council meeting — and there are several of those in the series — but gradually unfolds into a story of heroism, opportunism, idealism, compassion, hatred, and prejudice (partially) overcome. Oscar Isaacs delivers one of the finest performances to grace a screen, and the ending, with its bewildering turn, is shattering.

Simon’s work addresses some of the most profound dysfunctions in American society but is never didactic. His characters live and breathe and contradict each other and contradict themselves and contradict David Simon. Just when you think one of them is about to recite a comforting platitude reflecting the views of middle-class TV scriptwriters, they drop a coarsely vivid bombshell. And just when you think they’re about to say something which will curl your toenails, they wax lyrical.

Simon’s scripts make no concessions to the tastes or preferences or experiences of his audience: characters talk the way people like that do in real life, and if you can’t follow the accent or slang, well, subtitles. Or maybe this show is just not for you. Deal with it. (He calls himself “the angriest man in television”). Characters don’t get sorted into categories like “noble” or “oppressed” based on demographics. Manichaean thinking doesn’t exist in his world, like it doesn’t in ours.

I wasn’t aware that Simon also distrusts true-crime advocacy journalism, but am not surprised. The podcasts and movies I critique in this blog, as well as all the shows about Adnan Syed’s case, consist of cherry-picking, nit-picking, and nut-picking; propagandistic editing; intrusive musical cues instructing the viewer what he or she should think; a black-and-white approach to narrative which brutally shoves people into preconceived categories (corrupt cop, justice martyr, “alternative suspect”, etc.); indiscriminate focus on details instead of the big picture, and fear of complexity, among many other faults.

OK, I’m all done boasting. Forgive me, it’s not every day that someone you admire praises your work. If you want to form your own judgment, you know where to look.