"The forger as a star" was the headline in the "Zeit" newspaper recently. It was referring to the forger of the century, Wolfgang Beltracchi. This would apply even better to the former "Spiegel" journalist Claas Relotius: With more than two million Google mentions, he already has 14 times more hits than the painting forgery genius. This means that the industry is still in a state of shock two weeks after the Relotius outing. It seems as though only journalists believed in the infallibility singapore rcs data of their industry. But there have been imposters writing before. The only difference is that in the case of the fake Hitler diaries, the supposed author was already world famous before the outing.
The "Causa Relotius" is a good manual for future star journalists and award winners. Political correctness is a basic requirement. And then one more, without shame about clichés. Or, to paraphrase Rudolf Augstein: "Write what has to be." It is no longer enough to judge Trump voters as stupid or racist. Relotius found the trick: he found a small sign at the entrance to a small American town. It read: "Mexicans stay out!" The only disadvantage: unfortunately, it is made up.
What Franz Josef Strauss failed to do in the "Spiegel" affair, a 33-year-old has now managed: to shake the "monument of truthfulness".