Interesting Snopes story

[southsider2k5]

http://www.snopes.com/photos/politics/muslimprotest.asp

[Controlled Chaos]

http://www.snopes.com/photos/politics/muslimprotest.asp

 

shh

[kapkomet]

I'm not surprised.

[southsider2k5]

This story to me brings up an interesting point in the bias debate. I keep hearing that the problem is news only reports what will sell. If this is the case, why wasn't this stuff plastered all over the front pages of newspapers? People would have scooped this stuff up, it would played well on all of the talkshows, great pictures, great soundbytes etc, and yet nothing. People eat up this kind of stuff, and yet it only ran in Europe.

[Texsox]

500 wackos stage a protest in London. Doesn't seem like something that would get worldwide coverage. Imagine of 500 wackos could get that kind of publicity for their cause. I don't know at what point something should receive worldwide attention, but that just doesn't seem like it.

[southsider2k5]

500 wackos stage a protest in London. Doesn't seem like something that would get worldwide coverage. Imagine of 500 wackos could get that kind of publicity for their cause. I don't know at what point something should receive worldwide attention, but that just doesn't seem like it.

 

Pat Robertson can say the samething and it becomes worldwide news, and he's only one wakko.

[Balta1701]

Pat Robertson can say the samething and it becomes worldwide news, and he's only one wakko.

He's 1 wacko with an audience of millions who controls pursestrings worth tens of millions in political donations and who has amassed a fortune through his business empire. He also ran for the 1988 Republican Presidential nomination, and has met with President Bush personally several times, both before and during his presidency.

Edited May 31, 2006 by Balta1701

[southsider2k5]

He's 1 wacko with an audience of millions who controls pursestrings worth tens of millions in political donations and who has amassed a fortune through his business empire. He also ran for the 1988 Republican Presidential nomination, and has met with President Bush personally several times, both before and during his presidency.

 

And millions of people weren't subjected to images of these protesters in Europe? There are many leaders, including the President of Iran who believe what these wackos had on their signs. Yet Robertson's words get portrayed there too, and we see nothing of protests advocating our genocide. I'd bet if the samethings were done in Iraq or Afganistan it would have been frontpage news.

[kapkomet]

And millions of people weren't subjected to images of these protesters in Europe? There are many leaders, including the President of Iran who believe what these wackos had on their signs. Yet Robertson's words get portrayed there too, and we see nothing of protests advocating our genocide. I'd bet if the samethings were done in Iraq or Afganistan it would have been frontpage news.

These images support our cause of going after nutjobs like this. That's why it wasn't news here.

[Texsox]

These images support our cause of going after nutjobs like this. That's why it wasn't news here.

 

How does the media decide this? Is there some super secret meeting, maybe a secret internet? How are all media companies represented? Do they elect leaders to decide what to cover? I wonder if they have decided who their cadidates will be in 2008. It must be so powerful that even Fox and the WSJ won't blow the cover on it. This would be our nations best kept secret.

[FlaSoxxJim]

These images support our cause of going after nutjobs like this. That's why it wasn't news here.

Far more substantive, the accompanying quotes from London's majority mainstream Muslim community condemning the protests and the ideals of the protesters in no uncertain terms should have gotten broad national coverage, along with all of those images.

 

Together, the story and the images reinforce what we know to be true – that there is a radicalized and very scary faction of Islamists that would still do the Western world harm given the chance, but also that they are a very small % of Muslim society who become increasingly isolated from the Muslim mainstream through their own radical acts.

 

How does the media decide this? Is there some super secret meeting. . . ?

 

You mean you didn't get the invitations?

Edited May 31, 2006 by FlaSoxxJim

[kapkomet]

The media moguls DO determine what's news and what isn't, every single day.

 

And yes, Flaxx, you are right that the overwhelming majority of people are NOT like this, however, when you see images like this, it does incite people to think that our "terrorist causes" are more just. And, we can't have that now, can we?

[southsider2k5]

Far more substantive, the accompanying quotes from London's majority mainstream Muslim community condemning the protests and the ideals of the protesters in no uncertain terms should have gotten broad national coverage, along with all of those images.

 

Together, the story and the images reinforce what we know to be true – that there is a radicalized and very scary faction of Islamists that would still do the Western world harm given the chance, but also that they are a very small % of Muslim society who become increasingly isolated from the Muslim mainstream through their own radical acts.

You mean you didn't get the invitations?

 

Do we get the same quotes after a Klan rally, or those bastards to protest the funerals of the war dead? The closest we get is coverage of the biker gang who tries to shield the families from the protesters. We never see a mainstream Christian leader get equal face time to say that Christ told us to love one another and what these people are doing is wrong in God's eyes.

[Balta1701]

And millions of people weren't subjected to images of these protesters in Europe? There are many leaders, including the President of Iran who believe what these wackos had on their signs. Yet Robertson's words get portrayed there too, and we see nothing of protests advocating our genocide. I'd bet if the samethings were done in Iraq or Afganistan it would have been frontpage news.

Just out of curiosity, were the riots in Kabul that hurt 100+ a few days ago front page news in Chicago? They made the A section of the LAT, but as far as I can remember they never moved past the "World news" section.

 

Do we get the same quotes after a Klan rally, or those bastards to protest the funerals of the war dead? The closest we get is coverage of the biker gang who tries to shield the families from the protesters. We never see a mainstream Christian leader get equal face time to say that Christ told us to love one another and what these people are doing is wrong in God's eyes.

How much time is given to Muslim religious figures saying the same thing about their faith?

[FlaSoxxJim]

And yes, Flaxx, you are right that the overwhelming majority of people are NOT like this, however, when you see images like this, it does incite people to think that our "terrorist causes" are more just. And, we can't have that now, can we?

 

As far as I'm concerned, why can't we?

 

I've never been against a real, honest-to-goodness war on terror, Kap. It's just been a real long time since we've actually had one. Fighting the good and just fight in Afghanistan, against the 9-11 perpetrators and those that would give them aid and comfort, for the few months that we did that, was a cause the entire country and most of the world supported. And if we didn't have to get down to business in Iraq we might have actually succeeded in our mission to bring an evil terrorist entity to justice. . .

 

The smoke-and-mirrors conflation of our invasion of Iran with the justifiable war on terror, repeating the mantra that Saddam=Osama until it takes root in the psyche of the ham-n-eggers, Hearing our president say things like he's really "not that concerned" with capturing the man who actually DID attack us – those are the sorts of things that have exposed the current version of the GWoT as the crock of s*** it truly is.

[southsider2k5]

Just out of curiosity, were the riots in Kabul that hurt 100+ a few days ago front page news in Chicago? They made the A section of the LAT, but as far as I can remember they never moved past the "World news" section.

How much time is given to Muslim religious figures saying the same thing about their faith?

 

Over the alleged hit and run? It was front page news, finished on the back page in Trib.

 

There is definately more time given to disavowing and explaining people like Ahmadinejad, than there is Pat Robertson.

[kapkomet]

As far as I'm concerned, why can't we?

 

I've never been against a real, honest-to-goodness war on terror, Kap. It's just been a real long time since we've actually had one. Fighting the good and just fight in Afghanistan, against the 9-11 perpetrators and those that would give them aid and comfort, for the few months that we did that, was a cause the entire country and most of the world supported. And if we didn't have to get down to business in Iraq we might have actually succeeded in our mission to bring an evil terrorist entity to justice. . .

 

The smoke-and-mirrors conflation of our invasion of Iran with the justifiable war on terror, repeating the mantra that Saddam=Osama until it takes root in the psyche of the ham-n-eggers, Hearing our president say things like he's really "not that concerned" with capturing the man who actually DID attack us – those are the sorts of things that have exposed the current version of the GWoT as the crock of s*** it truly is.

I still say that there is waaaaaaaaaay more to Iraq then any of us will ever know. I know that most in your camp still subscribe to the theory that GWB had a hard on to get rid of Saddam just to get rid of him. I do think that, however, it was for reasons that we still don't know about. And no, it's not oil. I think that there's a stronger influence of the world community as a whole, even though the French played the "against the War" card. If everyone was really against it, it would not have happened.

 

edit: in general, though, I agree with what you say about the "real war" leaving Iraq out of the equation. We need to focus there, but we can't, because of Iraq.

[Balta1701]

I still say that there is waaaaaaaaaay more to Iraq then any of us will ever know. I know that most in your camp still subscribe to the theory that GWB had a hard on to get rid of Saddam just to get rid of him. I do think that, however, it was for reasons that we still don't know about. And no, it's not oil. I think that there's a stronger influence of the world community as a whole, even though the French played the "against the War" card. If everyone was really against it, it would not have happened.

 

edit: in general, though, I agree with what you say about the "real war" leaving Iraq out of the equation. We need to focus there, but we can't, because of Iraq.

Ok, this is going to take this thread off in one hell of an odd direction...but man, it seems to me you're sneaking into Iggy territory there. What exactly do you expect a country like France to do that they didn't do? Threaten to use their nuclear arsenal against an ally if the invasion goes forward? France did everything that was practical at the time, short of offering actual assistance to Saddam.

[kapkomet]

Ok, this is going to take this thread off in one hell of an odd direction...but man, it seems to me you're sneaking into Iggy territory there. What exactly do you expect a country like France to do that they didn't do? Threaten to use their nuclear arsenal against an ally if the invasion goes forward? France did everything that was practical at the time, short of offering actual assistance to Saddam.

France put public posturing on the front burner of its agenda at the time. Why? Because damn near every weapon system in Iraq had a made in France or a made in Russia stamp on it. They had to play that card. Meanwhile, all the backroom meetings that took place before the invasion started... everyone knew what was coming. If there were something that should have stopped it, it would have stopped.

[Balta1701]

France put public posturing on the front burner of its agenda at the time. Why? Because damn near every weapon system in Iraq had a made in France or a made in Russia stamp on it. They had to play that card. Meanwhile, all the backroom meetings that took place before the invasion started... everyone knew what was coming. If there were something that should have stopped it, it would have stopped.

That all depends on how determined our side was to go to war. If there were people on this side who really, really wanted that war, and there certainly were many of them, then France would have had to say or do something in the back rooms strong enough to overcome that. Given how badly Bush and his associates wanted to do that war (hell, they were doing prep work for it in April of 02), the only thing I can see which could have been done by any country to stop that war would have been to threaten to come to Iraq's aid militarily.

 

Unless of course France had some real dirt on the President they could have released publically, but that's about it.

[FlaSoxxJim]

If there were something that should have stopped it, it would have stopped.

 

Like the lack of any justification for war that would actually hold up under scrutiny, for instance?

 

The administration and the PNAC cabal they kowtow to decided they needed this war (and did so many years in advance), and so it happened. They were not going to let France, the UN, the international inspectors, the facts, or their lack of any sort of strategy get in their way.

[Cknolls]

Just out of curiosity, were the riots in Kabul that hurt 100+ a few days ago front page news in Chicago? They made the A section of the LAT, but as far as I can remember they never moved past the "World news" section.

How much time is given to Muslim religious figures saying the same thing about their faith?

 

 

No. All the front pages of the newspapers were covering the heroes who we honor on Memorial Day.

[mr_genius]

This story to me brings up an interesting point in the bias debate. I keep hearing that the problem is news only reports what will sell. If this is the case, why wasn't this stuff plastered all over the front pages of newspapers? People would have scooped this stuff up, it would played well on all of the talkshows, great pictures, great soundbytes etc, and yet nothing. People eat up this kind of stuff, and yet it only ran in Europe.

 

 

it would have gone against the major newsrooms god of racial sensitivity. don't won't to offend anyone that isn't white or christian.

[Texsox]

Do we get the same quotes after a Klan rally, or those bastards to protest the funerals of the war dead? The closest we get is coverage of the biker gang who tries to shield the families from the protesters. We never see a mainstream Christian leader get equal face time to say that Christ told us to love one another and what these people are doing is wrong in God's eyes.

 

 

Should those protestors received world wide coverage? And I'm not certain that comparing a mainstream Christian leader with a fringe Muslim extremist group is the same.

 

And I receive several emails each day with exactly the same message you are talking about. Beliefnet does an excellent job with just that sort of message.