is that too much to ask for ?

[CyberEd]

what am I expecting from forien news channels ?
not sympathy. not much of a favorable attitude...
I ask one thing from a news company: GET YOUR FACTS STRIGHT !!!!!

why is the evacuation from gaza "marks the first removal of settlements from land Palestinians want for a state"(according to bbc) or "the largest peacetime operation in its history" (according to CNN)
false, and false...
before making such pompous assesments, shouldn't someone who is attempting to sell credability be more..... credible ?

[Aerdan]

All right, then--you tell us what's happening, then, instead of just blasting our news corps for not getting their facts straight. Please.

[CyberEd]

Israel is indeed withdrawing, and evacuating citizens from the gaza strip. however evacuation of settlements DID happen before, it was a great part of the osslo agreament. also it is indeed a large scale operation, however so were the withdrawel of sini, and south lebanon. and so was the first intifada, and second intifada (though fighting took place during both uprisings, it was still considered a time of peace since Israel did not declare war against any nation, only fought terrorist organizations...).

the disengagement is a huge thing, and I realise the attention it gets. but getting your facts wrong would be like.... on the OJ Simpson trial a media reporter claiming it was the first black celebrity being trialed for murder... or saying it was the biggest trail in the history of the USA....
claims such as these are preposterous, inacurate and annoying.

I'd expect the media to report facts, not tell one a story in a way that could be heard in the pub...

[AzraeL]

Well, I see what your getting at. But news programs have to be a little senationalist if they want to sell. Its a fact of life that they will indulge in a little hyperbole in order to get higher ratings...

[JeppZer]

Isn't BBC public service? do they really care abouut ratings?

[pc486]

You might be interested in this report CyberEd: Public More Critical of Press, But Goodwill Persists

As far as the BBC goes, I don't know about how much they care about ratings but they do care about a lot of stuff.

[Deacon]

I was going to create a whole other thread for this, but I guess it doesn't really warrant it. If anyone doubted the political leanings of the mainstream media, all one had to do was turn on ABC tonight and watch Ted Koppel and company sit there flabbergasted, going on for what was probably a full hour, apologizing that they'd somehow missed this massive news story on how "the gun lobby" had managed to do something so offensive, so unthinkingly unscrupulous, so downright dirty, dishonest, vile, and sickening as to get a bill passed that prevented law-abiding arms manufacturers and dealers from being sued for the misuse of a product by a third party (such as a criminal using a gun to hold up a store). If that firearm was manufactured legally and sold legally, you can't sue them for making it or selling it. They told one particular tale of woe about how a particular gun manufacturer's employee had stolen a gun from the factory, and eventually somewhere down the line it ended up in the hands of a guy who shot another guy in the ghetto somewhere, and how the mother then tried to sue the gun manufacturer as a result, hoping for a big pay-off like others have gotten in the past.

In the words of Sen Hutchinson, "Frivolous lawsuits have been filed against gun manufacturers not for the malfunction of a gun, but the misuse. That is not the fault of the manufacturer..." Man, you'd have thought "the gun lobby" (who, of course, is a bunch of sneaky old crusty white men in smoky back rooms, disconnected from the American public who somehow ends up "being tricked", "mistakenly" voting for people who support 2nd Amendment rights, because as we all know, nobody in America actually believes freedom is a good thing or that the 2nd Amendment shouldn't be repealed), away you'd have thought the gun lobby knocked up their sister, and they just found out about it, and they were so stunned and flabbergasted and flummoxed and felt like they'd just been punched in the stomach by someone who'd comitted such an atrocity. They actually talked about how it was "the gun lobby intimidating and coercing politicians into voting [how their constituents--who voted them into office in the first place and to whom the senators are accountable--wanted them to vote]" and managing to do a good job at being a bunch of slimey, black-hearted individuals who oppose "gun safety groups" (yes, that's how they put it, "the gun lobby versus gun safety"). Any time they showed anyone who was part of "the gun lobby" it was always some aging white guy. When they showed someone who was "for gun safety instead of the gun lobby" it was concerned soccer moms and sweet little old ladies and young, hip, urban intellectual youth, and everyone was saying, "Won't somebody think of the children?!" This travesty, this miscarriage of justice that occurred this summer, it's unbelievable! With all the loopholes in place "by the gun lobby" to allow people to exercise the Constitutionally guaranteed right to bear arms, you'd think they'd be working to make us safer, not to allow law-abiding citizens and companies to continue to do business without frivolous lawsuits being aimed at them in hopes of a big payday if someone misuses--usually illegally--their product! But no, instead they limit lawsuits to be filed only if there's an actual case, such as in the case of a defective or malfunctioning product or a sale that's not 100% legal, kosher, and above board! How ridiculous is that? I feel violated!

I swear, it was amazing to watch. You'd think someone had come in and shit on their sacred cow or maybe jacked off onto their children. The degree to which they were outraged and offended and passionately calling for action on this, it was amazing to watch, especially since they tried desperately and unsuccessfully to cling to the pretenses of neutrality and journalistic integrity. They veil wasn't just torn, it was in burned. The lengths they went to paint "the gun lobby" as bad guys and "concerned citizens for gun safety" -- the "gunn lobby's" arch nemesis in the effort to get each and every one of your children, pets, and loved ones shot to death -- as the good guys would almost be comical if it weren't so absolutely absurd and ridiculous.

[StruckingFuggle]

Wow, I think Deacon's brain exploded writing that ... it explains why it suddenly cut off ... but not how it managed to post...



Feh, I say. The media doesn't lean to the left. It leans towards the profit, and its more profitable for them to be baised as they are, rather than otherwise.

[Skuzzo]

Agreed. Money.

Most of them are just googling for facts anyway.

There seems to be this weird viewpoint, and I know we've discussed it recently, that the western media has some hidden agenda, or that they are all conspiring to achieve an end result.

Honestly, they are not that organised. I've worked in newspapers and the only checking that gets done half the time is making sure all the adverts are in place.

Money.

[Deacon]

Skuzzo, I do not believe there is a conspiracy, at least not among the regular reporters and such. However, there is a distinct trend of leftists and other like-minded individuals putting their own version of stories up as fact (not that leftists are the only ones who do that, of course, but rather that they seem to be almost exclusively leftists in the profession). In some occupations you get a cross-section of America behind the desks. In the news media and in front of classrooms (especially in universities), however, there is an undeniably disproportionate percentage of liberals. They do not necessarily all have a collective agenda, but most do have a personal agenda, just like could be expected of anyone else, really, and those individual agendas often march in lockstep with those of their peers.

Posted Fri Aug 19, 2005 1:20 am:

StruckingFuggle, actually it was my browser that exploded. I was typing in the "Quick Reply" (heh) box when I hit some sort of unholy key combination that caused the textarea input box to disappear off the screen entirely, as though it had never been coded in. On a hunch, I clicked Submit, and it went through with what I'd typed, so I hit Edit and continued, though I hadn't intended to go on that long. I could go on further, really, but I'm serious when I suggest that a type of that news show tonight should be taken and played in every journalism class that's ever taught as an example of how the profession is NOT supposed to work. You could take a full semester, probably, just on that one show, picking apart how it did things, the phraseology, the way the visuals were presented, the tone of voice used when speaking about certain things, etc. It was just...sickening and pathetic, really.

[Blinker]

i know i've talked about this before, but i think it needs to be repeated.

the media has a STUPID bias. the media reports on stories that play to people's emotions and airs the ones which are the most sensational. as cybered has showed, our media tends to twist language to make the stories more appealing. stupid. not biased.

deacon, you claim that ABC news is biased for criticizing the law that was passed (and, i think saw some of this broadcast) and it seemed to me they were more criticizing the WAY in which the law was passed. but again, them airing a story like this (which CNN and other "liberal" stations have not) is mostly to get readers interested by hyping up some law about GUNS. guns is the key word there. guns play to people's emotions. guns SCARE people.

the media will do, as Skuzzo pointed out, what will get them the best ratings and the most money. check out the movie "Broadcast News." that might give some incite on this matter.

[Deacon]

[quote="Blinker";p="534607"]i know i've talked about this before, but i think it needs to be repeated.[/quote]
Please forgive me for not having sat at your feet and absorbed your vast knowledge with rapt attention

the media has a STUPID bias. the media reports on stories that play to people's emotions and airs the ones which are the most sensational. as cybered has showed, our media tends to twist language to make the stories more appealing. stupid. not biased.

Out of curiosity, why is it that you believe the two are mutually exclusive?

it seemed to me they were more criticizing the WAY in which the law was passed.

Then you didn't watch enough of the broadcast.

but again, them airing a story like this (which CNN and other "liberal" stations have not) is mostly to get readers interested by hyping up some law about GUNS. guns is the key word there. guns play to people's emotions. guns SCARE people.

Guns in and of themselves do not make for a scary topic. The topic can be, however, manipulated to stir up hysteria and garner support for their own agenda. What Koppel and his crew were doing is exactly that, trying to convince both stupid and ignorant people to join on their political bandwagon. I personally believe that, contrary to their intentions, all this chicken little chickenshit that hasn't materialized has simply served to make them fade away into a background cacaphony that eventually becomes just more white noise. The problem is that too many people are too stupid or ignorant (or both, bless their hearts) to understand that indoctrination by repetition does not make their arguments any more correct.

the media will do, as Skuzzo pointed out, what will get them the best ratings and the most money. check out the movie "Broadcast News." that might give some incite on this matter.

Yes, because I always turn to late-80s Hollywood's dramatic comedies for accurate representations of real-life, err fictional, events. I don't know, though, maybe you're right. After all, most leftist/liberal positions and arguments are made from emotion rather than reason anyway, so perhaps they just make great bedmates.

[Arres]

Hey Deacon, lets set up an amateur stalking ring on some of these "journalists". See we can get them all upset until they go out, buy their OWN gun. Then, since were stalking them anyway, we'll get pictures, discredit them and hopefully, make them go away.....

[Skuzzo]

[quote="Deacon";p="533747"]Skuzzo, I do not believe there is a conspiracy, at least not among the regular reporters and such. However, there is a distinct trend of leftists and other like-minded individuals putting their own version of stories up as fact (not that leftists are the only ones who do that, of course, but rather that they seem to be almost exclusively leftists in the profession). In some occupations you get a cross-section of America behind the desks. In the news media and in front of classrooms (especially in universities), however, there is an undeniably disproportionate percentage of liberals. They do not necessarily all have a collective agenda, but most do have a personal agenda, just like could be expected of anyone else, really, and those individual agendas often march in lockstep with those of their peers.[/quote]

Fair comment. There's a lot of truth in that.

[Rileyrat]

The media does indeed suck, and the T.V. news, reguardless of what station you are watching, are the worst of the worst as far as I see it. Okay, the supermarket tabloids are worse, but if you hopnestly believe the crap they print then... damn I just don't know what to say. The fact is that reguardless of how anything turns out these days the media is going to paint it as the wrong way. Many people think that society in general is in decay and the media likes to prey on this idea by only showing the horrible, or painting the mundane as a horrible atrocity.

Another example is that they are now comparing the mounting death toll in Iraq with Vietnam and other wars, the fact is that fewer soldiers have died in Iraq from beginning to present than on Omaha Beach alone. The key of what I am trying to say is in the fact that the same journalists that are making these comparisons are the exact same ones that got on thier soap boxes and declared that it's about time we did something about the condition of the Iraqi state. There was literally no focus on the search for WMDs, all the focus was on the political state of Iraq. The fact is that all these guys are trying to do is make a buck, they could really care less about properly reporting the news.