Criticism
It is argued Bild's thirst for sensationalism results in the terrorizing of prominent celebrities and stories are frequently based on the most dubious evidence. The journalistic standards of Bild, or the lack thereof, are the subject of frequent criticism by German intellectuals and media observers.
- Bild Blog, a German weblog that when founded was dedicated solely to documenting errors and fabrications in Bild articles, is among Germany's most popular blogs. In 2005, BILDblog received the Grimme Online Award for its work. Since 2009 BILDblog also reports on errors and fabrications in other newspapers from Germany and elsewhere.
- Heinrich Böll's 1974 novel The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, and the 1975 movie based on it, used a fictional stand-in for Bild to make a point about its allegedly unethical journalistic practices. Böll's public words on the Bild's coverage of the Baader-Meinhof Gang activities in the early 1970s were: " isn’t cryptofascist anymore, not fascistoid, but naked fascism, agitation, lies and dirt."
- In 1977 investigative journalist Günter Wallraff worked for four months as an editor for the Bild tabloid in Hanover, giving himself the pseudonym of "Hans Esser". In his books Der Aufmacher (Lead Story) and Zeugen der Anklage (Witnesses for the Prosecution) he portrays his experiences on the editorial staff of the paper and the journalism which he encountered there. The staff commonly displayed contempt for humanity, a lack of respect for the privacy of ordinary people and widespread conduct of unethical research and editing techniques. Wallraff’s investigations were also the basis for the 1990 film The Man Inside.
- In 2004 Bild was publicly reprimanded twelve times by the Deutscher Presserat (German Press Council). This amounts for a third of the reprimands this self-regulation council of the German press declared that year. As of 2012, it receives more reprimands from this watchdog body than any other newspaper.
- Spiegel magazine often accuses rival Bild of pushing Germany further right and questions Bild's moral standards and journalistic quality.
- Judith Holofernes, lead singer of German band Wir sind Helden, wrote a scathing open letter to Bild's advertising agency after they asked her to star in their latest campaign. "Bild is not a harmless guilty pleasure", she wrote, but a "dangerous political instrument - not only a high magnification telescope into the abyss but an evil creature".
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Famous quotes containing the word criticism:
“In criticism I will be bold, and as sternly, absolutely just with friend and foe. From this purpose nothing shall turn me.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1845)
“When you overpay small people you frighten them. They know that their merits or activities entitle them to no such sums as they are receiving. As a result their boss soars out of economic into magic significance. He becomes a source of blessings rather than wages. Criticism is sacrilege, doubt is heresy.”
—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)
“The critic lives at second hand. He writes about. The poem, the novel, or the play must be given to him; criticism exists by the grace of other men’s genius. By virtue of style, criticism can itself become literature. But usually this occurs only when the writer is acting as critic of his own work or as outrider to his own poetics, when the criticism of Coleridge is work in progress or that of T.S. Eliot propaganda.”
—George Steiner (b. 1929)