#SFatPauley: Deafening Silence: Daily Bruin Abdicates its Responsibility, Sells Out to Morgan Center

For the pessimistic among us, it's no surprise that the Daily Pravda Bruin has sold out to the Morgan Center.  In fact, it falls perfectly into place with Morgan Center's other Machiavellian move: co-opting student "leaders" (who gain their "leadership" positions with less than 30% of the students voting) and getting those "leaders" to sell-out not only the current student body, but future generations of UCLA students.

Now, I know UCLA doesn't have a journalism department, so one would expect aspiring journalists (especially in Los Angeles, which is devoid of anything resembling actual journalistic skill or integrity) not to really "get it" when it comes to asking the hard questions.

But the fact that Daily Pravda Bruin has failed to write one single word about the major stink being raised here at BN, on Morgan Center's Facebook page, and other Bruin communities, both on- and off-line, is a major problem.  For better or for worse, the Daily Bruin is supposed to be the students' voice on campus: a venue where young, aspiring journalists should aspire to be like Edward R. Murrow, not Bill "One-Liner" Splashme.  Instead, we're left with a group that appeared more concerned with their access and playing nice-nice with Morgan Center than exposing the frauds and liars in the Athletic Department.

More after the jump.

Now, for those of you who have been following BN for a while, you're already well-aware that the Daily Bruin has a history of, well, stupidity.  From defending Lavin to lame ad hominem attacks on Bruins who, gasp, had the courage to call for Dorrell's firing, the Daily Bruin has a history of doing the bidding of the chumps at Morgan Center. Which shouldn't be a surprise for a "newspaper" that employs folks with questionable judgment (Rodney King jokes, really?!). In fact, Nestor took, as he called it, the Daily Bootlicker to task not once, but twice.  First, in June of 2006:

Lot of these Daily Bruin writers really are just kids who are so enamored with the access they have to court side seats inside Pauley, passes to Rose Bowl sidelines, and credentials for weekly press conferences that they often forget their responsibilities as a journalist, which is to tell it like it. That is why they tend to write so many of these types knee jerk, defensive, nonsensical, idiotic columns defending the reigning coaches without having an eye/perspective on the big picture, because they are probably concerned about maintaining their access to the program. So just keep that in mind next time you see this kind of "fair and balanced" crap coming out of the Daily Bootlicker blasting alums, season ticket holders, fans for being down on head coaches who have not shown any inkling of greatness on or off the field.

Again, in 2007 (emphasis added):

Comparing fellow Bruins to a known anti-semite, fascist is beyond reprehensible. And it is deeply disappointing and embarrassing as an UCLA alum that we get to read that those kind of careless, reckless comments are being published in our own student newspaper. And you wonder why we call out these so-called sports writers as bunch of bootlicking student writers who often come across as nothing short of uninformed, clueless, ignorant, and useless "reporters".

I am all right with these guys writing like a bunch of trained monkeys who can only cut and paste press releases, and use information based on their access to the Morgan Center Sports Department. But, writing like a Bill Plascke, making assertions not based on reality and without facts, doesn't give an individual who presents himself as a UCLA student the license to compare his fellow Bruins to a known facist and anti-semite.

Is it any surprise that Nestor saw this kind of subservience to Morgan Center years before this student seating fiasco broke?

He followed up with another shot at the "journalists" in Kerckhoff Hall (emphasis added):

But, at this point, it would be prudent for Ben Azar and his editor to issue some sort of apology to DD and other Dorrell critics for making that LaRouche comparison. Otherwise, it won’t help them much to undercut the perception that they have turned our campus newspaper into nothing but a Bootlicking news source parroting the company line.

Morgan Center rolls out a short-sighted, bait-and-switch "plan" to "enhance" the student experience by banishing the student section to the baseline (despite the fact that students had a bigger sideline section when Coach Wooden was the man-in-charge) and the reaction is overwhelmingly negative.  Despite that, the Daily Bruin has been absolutely silent on this student seating fiasco.  Maybe Nestor was right years ago: the Daily Bruin has turned into nothing but a bootlicking group of chumps.

You'll see no hard questions from the Daily Bruin.  Apparently, they leave that up to upset alums to do directly at Morgan Center's Facebook page (where Morgan Center is selectively "answering" posts and ignoring the ones that pose the tough questions we've been asking at BN).

Now, peggysue69 jumped on the Daily Bruin first, calling them out for selling out their readership (the student body, err I mean, the minority of students who actually use it for more than the crossword puzzle):

The Daily Bruin reporters, Ms. Hill and Mr. Bigknife need to understand just because some dude with a title says something that doesn’t make it true.  I could get snide but I refuse to do that to students.  When I was at UCLA, I made a habit of learning  from my mistakes. I hope the  Daily Bruin reporters, Ms. Hill and Mr. Bigknife take another look at what happened and change their views and protect the students and UCLA basketball. 

And I hope the Daily Bruin staff will cover the carefully measured expressions of displeasure, viz.,outrage, from the loyal Bruins who have gone on before them.

Well, since student "leaders" at USAC and the Den were too busy selling their peers out for Dan G.'s thirty pieces of silver, we at BN hoped that the Daily Bruin's reporters and editors would have stepped up and covered the outpouring of anger and disgust at Morgan Center, not only for their idiotic decision to banish the student section to the baseline, but for the slimy, underhanded, morally reprehensible way they did it.

Fortunately, not all of the students are blind to the Daily Bruin's lack of journalistic integrity on this story:

I don't know what other students think...

but I do know if Daily Bruin does not write up another article detailing all the controversies surrounding this issue, students might be fooled into thinking that it was the students’ decision to be removed from sideline. When I was reading the article, for a second I thought being moved to behind basket could actually be a good thing. Because The Den and USAC said so, and I always thought that they are students first. But of course I used my brain a little longer and read some more articles on Bruins Nation to confirm that I’m not crazy for thinking that Daily Bruin just wrote a piece of crap and expected me to buy it.

I’m confident in our student body. I just think it’ll take some time for everyone to be properly informed before we start taking actions.

by clinx on Apr 3, 2011 2:37 PM PDT

Unfortunately, two weeks has passed since peggysue69 called out the Daily Bruin.  And thus far, it looks like they're more concerned with being the Daily Pravda instead for Morgan Center, only putting up soft coverage of sports without a single mention of the half-ass Pauley renovation or the furor surrounding the student section fiasco.

What's even more concerning is that the Daily Pravda is certainly capable of covering scandal and outrage: right now, the Daily Pravda has on its online home page coverage of UCLA law students' protest over a controversial, xenophobic comment a UCLA law professor posted on his personal blog.  In other words, the Daily Pravda has no problem giving press to the protest of a small number of students (UCLA's law students, which comprise approx. 900-1000 students out of UCLA's 38,000+ total), yet they can't say a single word about Morgan Center's underhanded scheme to rob not only current students', but future generations' (and hence, untold thousands upon thousands of UCLA students), sideline student seating, a staple of UCLA basketball since Coach's days.

In short, the Daily Pravda Bruin has completely abdicated its journalistic responsibility.

But all hope isn't lost.  There is still time for the kids at the Daily Bruin to get it right.  We know they have the potential to eventually come around to common sense, so we at BN are going to hold on to the hope that the Daily Bruin will look around and see the outrage at what Morgan Center is doing and that they'll find the courage and conviction to chase down Morgan Center, borrow a play out of the Edward R. Murrow playbook, and start asking the hacks (Dan "Fiddlin' Nero" Guerrero and Mark "I Make Jayson Blair, Bill Clinton, and Richard Nixon Look Like Lying Amateurs" Harlan)  at Morgan Center the tough questions.

Come on Daily Bruin: stop acting like Morgan Center's Pravda and get to work.

GO BRUINS