Conor Friedersdorf’s Article the Backlash Against Serial and Why Its Wrong

Rhetorical Analysis

Conor Friedersdorf’s article The Backlash Against Serial and Why Its Wrong is an article defending the podcast Serial, its producer Sarah Koenig and its sister program This American Life’s style of reporting.  Serial is a podcast about Hae Min Lee’s murder, which took place in 1999 and if her ex-boyfriend at the time Adnan Syned, who was sentenced to life in prison actually committed the murder.  Friedersdorf successfully defends Serial, Sarah Koenig and This American Life by addressing what the critiques have to say as well as his views on the podcast and why he agrees or disagrees.  

        In his article Friedersdorf sets the stage by asking a few rhetorical questions.  “Did Adnan Syed, her ex-boyfriend, really strangle her” (Friedersdorf).  He is trying to get the audience thinking and open their mind to the possibility of a different scenario.  Friedersdorf is talking to all the skeptics and critiques of Koenig’s, Serial’s and This American Life’s style of reporting.  As well as any person who listens to the podcast.  Friedersdorf agrees that it is possible Koenig got some of it wrong, but that doesn’t mean to not report on the story.  Friedersdorf admits he may have been bias initially, because he was a longtime fan of This American Life, Koenig’s past work and yet is also a fan of Kang’s work.  

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Kang criticized Serial saying “Sarah Koenig is white.”  The two families involved in the story behind Serial are Adnan’s family which are Muslim immigrants and the victim’s family which are Korean-American.  Kang believes the shows writing is based on Sarah Koenig’s obsession with the case.  Friedersdorf defends Koenig and Serial saying it’s up to the audience how much weight to put on Koenig’s editorial choices.  Friedersdorf uses this quote from Serial “Her diary by the way-well I’m not exactly sure what I was expectation her diary to be like, but it’s such a teenage girls diary” (Koenig).  Kang read it as “what did you expect a Korean girls diary to be like and why did she have to point out it was a Korean girls diary” (Kang).   Friedersdorf uses other sources and what they thought of this diary quote to support his claims.  Another commenter interpreted it as kids will be kids which supports Friedersdorf.  He does admit “All journalists risk getting any subculture other than their own wrong” (Friedersdorf).  As Friedersdorf points out that doesn’t mean their cultural ignorance stems from white reporter privilege.  Using other sources to support his claim, he does well in showing Koenig didn’t mean anything racist by her comment and how easy it would be to misinterpret or read more into what Koenig said.

        Kang is disturbed by Koenig stomping around in communities she doesn’t understand and criticizes This American Life style of reporting.  Friedersdorf quotes the Quartz post that says “Ethnic naïveté and cultural clumsiness are hardly unique to Serial. (Friedersdorf)” This American Life tackles many different ethnic groups and minorities, which Friedersdorf lists in his

article as well as examples.  He asks which broadcast is telling these stories better and would we be better off if This American Life told fewer stories to its huge influential audience.  

Friedersdorf is pointing out that no one else is reporting on these stories and repeating himself again, in that some reporting is better than none.   Friedersdorf believes that American journalism ignores far too many injustices against cultural minorities.  He also wishes more journalist would pay as much attention to issues of cultural minorities as they do white victims.  He is defending This American Life style of reporting.  He uses several different episodes from This American Life to support his thesis in this article and how not reporting on these stories would be far worse than making mistakes.