A CNN television producer fired by the broadcaster for not seeking permission to write a personal blog has claimed the network was scared of “a liberal bias” in his writing.
Chez Paziena was sacked last week from his job on the American Morning programme after he failed to follow CNN employee handbook policy. It stated that all writing done for “a non-CNN outlet” should be run through the network’s standards and practices department.
But writing on his blog, Deux Ex Malcontent, Paziena said in a meeting with his boss Ed Litvak and a HR representative, the latter said “the nature” of what he had been writing was also a factor in the decision to sack him.
Paziena said his superiors at CNN were more worried about “a liberal bias” in his blog than the potential fallout from sacking him and putting him in “the national spotlight”.
Paziena, who began to write his blog in 2006 when on leave from his job at CNN because of a brain tumour, said: “CNN fired me, and did it without even a thought to the power that I might wield as an average person with a brain, a computer, and an audience. The mainstream media doesn’t believe that new media can embarrass them, hurt them or generally hold them accountable in any way, and they’ve never been more wrong.
“I’m suddenly in a position to do all three, and I know now that this is what I’ve been working toward the last few years of my career.”
The former producer attacked the U.S. broadcaster and media in general for scaremongering in its reports, allowing celebrity to take over the news agenda and “fail to bring truth to power”, regardless of who was in government in America.
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