How does Fox get away with it?

The Saint

I know I shouldnt open a thread for one article but when I read this on the Fox news site I nearly choked on my tongue. We all know how the Americans feel about the French but I think this is going way too far.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,92768,00.html

Can this stuff actually be printed in the press. Is there no laws against racism in the American media?:eek:

(fixed that link - Gandalf)

BKtje

file not found unfortunately.

Try http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,92768,00.html

Sparks

Not Found
The requested object does not exist on this server. The link you followed is either outdated, inaccurate, or the server has been instructed not to let you have it. Please inform the site administrator of the referring page.

Mind you, Fox can legally get away with pretty much anything, following this case.
So as far as I'm concerned, US media is now all as suspect as the NY times or Fox.

gandalf

That looks fairly typical of Fox News.

Ignorant News for Ignorant People.

Gandalf.

The Saint

Its working for me folks.

The Saint

I was looking for a press complaint orginisation (like the Press Complaints Commission in the UK) in the US on Google and I cant seem to find any official orginisation where racism or inaccuracies of reporting can be reported. If anyone knows of such an orginisation in the states please post a link.

Sparks

Yes, it's working now.
More's the pity :

Let's Not Pardon the French
Thursday, July 24, 2003
By Julia Gorin
As many sound and revealing theories as have been proposed over the past year to explain France's confounding geopolitical behavior, they've all missed something fundamental.

The country's less than Western, less than ally-like stances would have seemed less baffling if we hadn't started from a wrong premise: Namely, that France is a member of the civilized world.
Savages naturally gravitate toward savages. And they facilitate savagery everywhere while impeding nations that seek to minimize it.

How else to explain_France's (search)_defiant feting and support_of brutal_leadership, as in_Zimbabwe (search)_and_Iraq (search) -- even_helping Iraqi officials escape to_Cuba_(search), according to a_Geostrategy-Direct (search)_intelligence brief? Whatever economic benefits there may have been to France in its oil, arms and nuclear dealings with the Hussein_government, they were secondary to the kinship France apparently felt for its bloodthirsty system.

Why else would an old couple get beat up for protesting the_Saddam Hussein (search)_posters and Iraqi flags that were_a staple of_French anti-war rallies (search), where young Jews were_clobbered with iron bars? How else to explain French sympathy for the more barbaric of the two Semitic cousins, not to mention for_Islamic rebels (search)_everywhere, most recently in the Ivory Coast? Sympathy that has been enabling acts of violence against the civilly more constructive cousin -- so numerous as to leave the rest of Europe struggling to keep pace. Fittingly, France_-- where it is unsafe for a Jew to wear a skullcap -- has been the European nation of choice for_Muslim immigration (search), now six million strong there, and for_Jewish emigration.

Indeed, there should be no mystery surrounding France's inability to forgive America for rescuing it from the_Gestapo (search)_more than half a century ago. Today France is gleeful about its friendship with Germany, recently celebrating 40 years of German-French postwar reconciliation. Franco-German reunification has taken the form of standing together on everything from the Iraq war to forcing economy-crippling policies on_current and future_EU members.

France has a natural affinity for any and all of the globe's uncivilized elements. The more primitive, the better to define one's own deviancy down -- a deviancy that once prompted Mark Twain to observe, "In certain public indecencies the difference between a dog & a Frenchman is not perceptible." Which would explain_why dogs are allowed in restaurants_in France.

But then how does one account for all the charming, elegant French culture -- the art, the wine, the cheese, the language, the pastries -- those qualities that have made France what to the world appears to be a bulwark of civilization? My uncle, an Israeli_composer, answered that question when he invited my husband and me to the_Metropolitan Museum of Art (search), and I answered: "We're low-class. We don't go to museums."

He replied: "We're also low-class. That's why we go to museums."
Connoisseurship is indeed a brilliant cloak for depravity:_Don_a lofty external disguise to mask a degraded internal character. Let's recall that the most dehumanizing event in modern history, the_Holocaust (search) -- with its massacres and incinerations -- was set to classical music and fine dining. Similarly, anything the French do is considered artful, including inventing the_guillotine (search), which turned "beheading into an art form," as an ad for a guillotine-style cigar cutter read in a Sky Mall catalogue.
The guillotine inventors, meanwhile, perpetually pride themselves in having abolished the "barbaric" death penalty. Kill their killers they won't, but handing over 10,000 citizens for the gas chambers was never an issue.

The French even managed to innovate in animal cruelty. The popular dish_Foie Grois (search)_is liver from a goose that has been mechanically force-fed to make its liver work overtime and_become_soft and fatty._Last_April, a top Paris restaurant_celebrated_its one-millionth_8-week-old duckling to be_strangled and_cooked in cognac and_its own blood, then served with a souvenir numbered tag._Its owner reportedly remarked, "If for the chef each dish is a work of art, for me, it's ... the return of a happy moment. ... There is nothing more serious than pleasure."
Of all the contemporary diplomats, dignitaries and official ministers of the world, it was dashing_French Foreign Affairs Minister Dominique de Villepin (search)_who_refused to answer the question of whom he would rather see win the war -- America or Iraq -- but who published an 800-page book of poetry. This poet calls Hamas a vital player in any Middle East peace process.
Always on the opposing side of civilization and on the cutting edge of degenerateness, the French are pioneers in decadence. What was the first place child rapist_Roman Polanski (search)_thought to go where he could thrive in exile? France, of course, where art redeems all. And who better to land the gig promoting France and French products than Polanski's kindred spirit here,_Woody Allen (search)? Such men have called America "puritanical." Which must be the French understanding of the word "moral."

Consider the book that was a 2001 bestseller in France,_The Sexual Life of Catherine M (search), (Grove Press), the_true-life memoir of_Parisian editor and art critic Catherine Millet who "loves penises," as_the June 2002 review in_Elle Magazine reads.
In one scene, writes reviewer Will Blythe, an entire caravan of cars gets lost on its way to an outdoor orgy at a sports stadium._At another point in the book,_Millet writes: "In the bigger orgies ... there could be up to about 150 people ... and I would take on the organs of around a quarter or a fifth of them in all the available ways."

Whenever the_American conscience wrestles with the introduction into our society of some risqué new practice, procedure or product -- such as lowering the legal age of consent, installing condom machines in schools, approving_RU-486 (search)_and dispensing it in schools -- proponents always reason, "The French have been doing it for years!"

Yet in Paris, where they speak in soft tones and posture demurely, they bristle when the gregarious, high-decibel American approaches with a question, and pretend_they don't understand English.

During his stay in Paris,_journalist Andrew Baker (search)_witnessed a_cyclist stop to beat an octogenarian pedestrian unconscious after the latter threw a baguette at his head for cutting him off._According to Baker's 2000_New York Press (search)_article about his experience,_the event was_typical of a Paris day.
Now we know why in America, when someone accidentally uses a four-letter word in the presence of a child, he or she hastily adds, "Pardon my French."

Julia Gorin is the author of the newly released_The Buddy Chronicles, available through bruiserbooks.com

Havelock

The Link worked for me

I am brissling, I am half French and for this American, of all people, to so blanetly sterotype the entire French nation as barbarians and savages. Its un speakable that this can be printed on a news service (not that FOX is much of one) but still, theere are people who would read it and take it all to be true.

I actually feel sick, if this is what the American public thinks of France, how long can it be until America makes up some reason to start a war in France?

dahamsta

Write to the ignorant bitch, her email address is at the bottom of the article; although the CC to Fox is broken:

jegorin@erols.com
views@foxnews.com

adam

The Saint

I already have. I was just about to post the same addresses.

Here it is.

Dear Sir/Madame,

I am writing to you in relation the article on your "news" site on the 24/07/03 regarding the French. May I just begin by saying that it is the most slanderous piece of racist tripe I have ever had the misfortune to read in the mainstream press. I have no idea how such an inflammatory article is actually allowed to publish national and racial bigotry. This goes way beyond freedom of speech into incitement. I will go through this article point by point stating how bigoted this piece of rubbish is.

Quote:
"Savages naturally gravitate toward savages. And they facilitate savagery everywhere while impeding nations that seek to minimize it. "
Do you not think that this implies that the French are savages and promote savagery?

Quote:
"How else to explain France's (search) defiant feting and support of brutal leadership, as in Zimbabwe (search) and Iraq (search) -- even helping Iraqi officials escape to Cuba (search), according to a Geostrategy-Direct (search) intelligence brief? "

All of the "search" links do not even lead to relevant links about these accusations. They give no source for this info and as far as I can see is utter rubbish as it has not been in any of the mainstream press.

Quote:
Whatever economic benefits there may have been to France in its oil, arms and nuclear dealings with the Hussein government, they were secondary to the kinship France apparently felt for its bloodthirsty system.

Here they are implying a kinship between Saddam and France and speak of the help he got from the French in developing weapons. I don't think America can throw any stones on this point having supplied him with chemical and biological programs and continued to do so during his worst atrocities with full knowledge of it occouring.

Quote:
"where young Jews were clobbered with iron bars? "
I think this speaks for itself. Look at the rate of anti-semitism and other forms of racism in the US and you will see that it is on a par if not worse than in France.

Quote:
"How else to explain French sympathy for the more barbaric of the two Semitic cousins, not to mention for Islamic rebels (search) everywhere, most recently in the Ivory Coast? Sympathy that has been enabling acts of violence against the civilly more constructive cousin -- so numerous as to leave the rest of Europe struggling to keep pace"

This is not only racist to the French but to Arabs in the statements "How else to explain French sympathy for the more barbaric of the two Semitic cousins" and "Sympathy that has been enabling acts of violence against the civilly more constructive cousin "

Quote:
"France -- where it is unsafe for a Jew to wear a skullcap -- has been the European nation of choice for Muslim immigration (search), now six million strong there, and for Jewish emigration."

Anti-semitism is not only a French problem but an American problem and a problem in many other countries. And what does it matter what the Muslim population of France have to do with it. Does it make it less of a civilised country?

Quote:
"Today France is gleeful about its friendship with Germany, recently celebrating 40 years of German-French postwar reconciliation. Franco-German reunification has taken the form of standing together on everything from the Iraq war to forcing economy-crippling policies on current and future EU members."

So France having normalised relations with Germany 60 years after WWII is a bad thing? So what if they stand together if they share the same opinion. Also the countries that are coming into the EU decided themselves to do so. No one forced them and it is in their economic interest to do so.

Quote:
"France has a natural affinity for any and all of the globe's uncivilized elements. The more primitive, the better to define one's own deviancy down -- a deviancy that once prompted Mark Twain to observe, "In certain public indecencies the difference between a dog & a Frenchman is not perceptible." Which would explain why dogs are allowed in restaurants in France."

I think this speaks for itself. Comparing the French to dogs sounds reminiscent of the sign outside swimming pools in the US in the not too distant past, "No Dogs, No Jews, No Irish" As for it's affinity for "the globes uncivilised elements", it is not like most of Americas "allies are great bastions of civilisation, eg. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait but to name a few.

Quote:
"My uncle, an Israeli composer, answered that question when he invited my husband and me to the Metropolitan Museum of Art "

I think you may need to get your writer some grammar lessons.

Quote:
Similarly, anything the French do is considered artful, including inventing the guillotine (search), which turned "beheading into an art form," as an ad for a guillotine-style cigar cutter read in a Sky Mall catalogue.

Didn't the Americans invent the electric chair and lethal injection and use the gas chamber as a form of execution? And isn't the death penalty still in use in the US and not in France?

Quote:
"Kill their killers they won't, but handing over 10,000 citizens for the gas chambers was never an issue. "

Is it not desperate pulling events from a country that was under occupation of the Nazi's under very different circumstances from 60 years ago?

Quote:
"The French even managed to innovate in animal cruelty. The popular dish Foie Grois (search) is liver from a goose that has been mechanically force-fed to make its liver work overtime and become soft and fatty."

The EU actually has
some of the strictest rules on animal rights and keeping livestock to which the US would not fare favourably at all.

Quote:
"Last April, a top Paris restaurant celebrated its one-millionth 8-week-old duckling to be strangled and cooked in cognac and its own blood, then served with a souvenir numbered tag "

This is called "food". Go to a US slaughter house where cattle are fed bits of other livestock and steroids and see how it compares. Have you ever eaten lamb of a rare steak?

Quote:
"This poet calls Hamas a vital player in any Middle East peace process."

They are. If there is going to be peace Hamas is going to have to be involved as they are a part of the situation in the Palestinian/Israeli conflict.

Quote:
"Always on the opposing side of civilization and on the cutting edge of degenerateness, the French are pioneers in decadence."

Speaks for itself.

Quote:
"And who better to land the gig promoting France and French products than Polanski's kindred spirit here, Woody Allen (search)"

Hmm, isn't Woody Allen from New York?

Quote:
"In one scene, writes reviewer Will Blythe, an entire caravan of cars gets lost on its way to an outdoor orgy at a sports stadium. At another point in the book, Millet writes: "In the bigger orgies ... there could be up to about 150 people ... and I would take on the organs of around a quarter or a fifth of them in all the available"

Does one woman's sexual escapades bear any relevance to anything. There should be no criticism of what consenting adults do together. Does this not smack of severe generalisation? I have also heard that the world "gang bang record" where a lady had intercourse with numerous men, one after the other, is held by an American set on American soil

Quote:
"Whenever the American conscience wrestles with the introduction into our society of some risqué new practice, procedure or product -- such as lowering the legal age of consent, installing condom machines in schools, approving RU-486 (search) and dispensing it in schools -- proponents always reason, "The French have been doing it for years!"

Is there anything wrong with any of this?

Quote:
"During his stay in Paris, journalist Andrew Baker (search) witnessed a cyclist stop to beat an octogenarian pedestrian unconscious after the latter threw a baguette at his head for cutting him off. According to Baker's 2000 New York Press (search) article about his experience, the event was typical of a Paris day. "

I think you'd find the level of violent crime in France a fraction of what it is in the US.


This article was written to inflame anti-French feeling amongst Americans which should not be allowed in the media. I also don't think an American can presume to be morally superior to anyone judging by her country's past and present, eg, death penalty, human rights, children's rights, flouting international law, gun culture, corporate governance, biased media, etc, etc.......

Yours Sincerely,

Hairy Homer

Originally posted by dahamsta
Write to the ignorant bitch, her email address is at the bottom of the article; although the CC to Fox is broken:

jegorin@erols.com
views@foxnews.com

adam

And if you have any doubts as to the general thrust of her opinions, have a look at some of her other articles

Looks like she's just another card-carrying neocon.

How dull.

Cork

I think many people like Fox. It gives a differant prospective on events. Even, as we are discussing Fox is a victory for it's news service. It is getting people talking about world events & watching the news. It is far better that people are becoming interested in current affairs. People buy "The Mirror" , "star" & "Sun". Its all about personal choice.

Of course, I don't agree with 100& of the content on Fox. It is far from balanced. But our own RTE is often far from balanced at times.

Eoughan Harris pointed this out recently about the way it covers news storys.

Lemming

Originally posted by Cork
I think many people like Fox. It gives a differant prospective on events. Even, as we are discussing Fox is a victory for it's news service. It is getting people talking about world events & watching the news. It is far better that people are becoming interested in current affairs.

The problem with Fox, Cork, is, Cork, that they, Cork, are taken as scripture, Cork, by many Americans, Cork.

Saying they give a different perspective is flattering to them. They don't give ANY pespective. They just spout absolutely irresponsible tripe a great deal of the time.

/me snorts

yes, you're right in saying that it's good that people are becoming interested in current affairs. BUT ...

NOT ...
LIKE ...
THIS

Of course, I don't agree with 100& of the content on Fox. It is far from balanced. But our own RTE is often far from balanced at times.

Geeh? You think?:rolleyes: And as faulted as RTE can be at times, they are NOT a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g like Fox.

TBH, I'd expecting nothing less (or more depending which way you look at it) from Fox.

fisty

never mind

parasite

gotta love o'reilly though

fisty

i did, until i checked into it,
I take it back:D

Tha Gopher

You must give credit where it is due. Fox is a decent enough channel when it doesnt get on its right wing high horse. When it comes to breaking news it usually leaves CNN trailing by perhaps 10 minutes, even when it is an extremely important news development.
But some of the content is a disgrace alright. For examples you should watch Hannity and Colmes, a show on in the rarly hours over here where the basic play is that one presenter is conservative and the other liberal. The conservative guy is just sickening. He shouts down any guest who tries to make a valid point which might be ever so slightly anti Bush. Bill Clinton is some sort of antichrist who is responsible for todays woes. And so forth
I think the worst thing I ever heard on fox was some of the journalists and guests claiming that Hollywood actors had no right to criticise or oppose the war. Apparently doing so is abusing free speech laws.

Victor

It's an entertainment company, not a news company ....

Sparks

When it comes to breaking news it usually leaves CNN trailing by perhaps 10 minutes, even when it is an extremely important news development.

Gopher, unless it's an imminent physical disaster like a tidal wave or nuclear bomb or whatever, I don't care about the ten minutes. Getting things right are far more important.
Mind you, I'm still not even sure if I want to know about a nuclear bomb unless I can actually get clear in time

Biffa Bacon

It's no worse than the hate-filled anti-American anti-Israeli garbage we've had to suffer from lefties ever since 9-11. And yet people start getting sniffy about FOX being biased. Don't make me laugh. Have none of you ever read Robert Fisk, the Guardian, watched the BBC, listened to RTE? All of it just as biased as FOX, just in the opposite direction.

swiss

I think Victor summed up my opinion of Fox news quite accurately. Like the sensationalist headlines in the Sun, Fox is not so much about delivering accurate and unbiased news and analysis, it seeks to ingratiate itself unto it's target audience, and generally feed into the anti-french sentiment felt over parts of America because of the French position on the Iraqi war.

However, unlike the Sun, Fox news keeps a veneer of respectability which not only obscures it's naked ambition and hides it's subjective manner of reporting but also dangerously leads to a general bias amongst Americans (amongst others) who simply don't know any better. Actually, I find a delicious irony in one of the sentiments echoed by the author

Connoisseurship is indeed a brilliant cloak for depravity

Indeed, it can be. Like the propaganda disseminated by various totalitarian regimes by smiling, polished faces, so too does Fox news and some other sources of mainstream media in the US manage to sow ignorance about world affairs into the mindset of many Americans.

What I objected to the most in this article was not the poorly disguised cultural slur against the French that implied they were no better than dogs. It was not the attack on their culture of supposed animal cruelty. It was the archaic reference to the guillotine that somehow 'proved' the barbarity of the French, that one would deign to describe such a malicious weapon of execution a work of art. I felt like invoking the famous pot : kettle reference. If you judge a culture by the crimes of it's ancestors, then none of us would escape judgement.

It is a pity that US patriotism has blinded many to this fact, or as Samuel Johnson put it "Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel".

magick

kinda.....
well when I watch FOx anytime they end a peice before they go to the ads,they say "stay with fox for balanced trusted views". Which is crap, yes their news is quiet biased, but not all of America blindly thinks that Fox is completely respectable, its known in other American Media circules as an extention of the White House,which also Fox is Sky news parent company, and Sky News is almost as bad. But even some people (non news ) kinda s****** when the words "fox/fair coverage" topic comes up. Another example is that hac of a reporter "little john" if his show is still on, really takes it to a whole new low level, being so Pro British its almost like watching the "national front" channel. But yes Fox (for the usa ) and Sky News (for Europe) have to be the worst news channels that are out there at the moment.

DriftingRain

HEHE...The girl is just crazy and so is the one that put her story up..come on guys... LOL

Hairy Homer

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon
It's no worse than the hate-filled anti-American anti-Israeli garbage we've had to suffer from lefties ever since 9-11. And yet people start getting sniffy about FOX being biased. Don't make me laugh. Have none of you ever read Robert Fisk, the Guardian, watched the BBC, listened to RTE? All of it just as biased as FOX, just in the opposite direction.

Bollox!!!!

Show me one example of Fisk denigrating an entire nation in that fashion.

Or RTE doing the same. If they said something like that about anyone, heads would roll.

As would be the case at the BBC for that matter.

Get real.

The Saint

This is the response I got from my letter of complaint:


"Dear Frenchie,
The only point worth addressing in your email is the following:

> Quote:
> "My uncle, an Israeli composer, answered that question when
> he invited my husband and me to the Metropolitan Museum of Art "
>
> I think you may need to get your writer some grammar lessons.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT SENTENCE? And please don't embarrass yourself
further by advising that "me" should be "I." So what's wrong with it? Looks
like you're the one who needs the grammar lesson. Good luck."


Nice to see juvinile retaliation is not dead. People like that shouldnt be allowed to write.

Cork

Show me one example of Fisk denigrating an entire nation in that fashion.

Or RTE doing the same. If they said something like that about anyone, heads would roll.

As would be the case at the BBC for that matter.

Get real.

I would agree. If RTE is interviewing Robert Fisk - they should tell us the other side of the story as well. What we get usually is Robert Fisk's openion. These openion pieces are all over the news.

On RTE we get people stateng the health system should et more resources. But RTE never asks union bosses should unions abandon benchmarking for this??

You will never hear this type of questioning on RTE. This is a service we pay a licence fee for. Fox News is a commecial TV news station - They are not a public service broadcaster. Yet why should we expect higher standards from them than our own RTE.

Or is it that if Fox news were more "leftie" - they'd be fine??

gandalf

No Cork with regard to Fox News if they didn't publish racist bigots like Ms. Gorin then they would be more balanced. Maybe they should rename themselves to a Newstainment channel like the WWF had to do withits "Sports Entertainment" label.

With regard to RTE I really do not see your problem with them they are so pro your beloved FF it is unreal. You hardly ever see them rip into one of the FF/PD Junta like they do any of the opposition parties. RTE imho are biased but they are biased in favour of the current regime in Ireland.

Gandalf.

Lemming

Originally posted by The Saint
This is the response I got from my letter of complaint:


"Dear Frenchie,
The only point worth addressing in your email is the following:

> Quote:
> "My uncle, an Israeli composer, answered that question when
> he invited my husband and me to the Metropolitan Museum of Art "
>
> I think you may need to get your writer some grammar lessons.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT SENTENCE? And please don't embarrass yourself
further by advising that "me" should be "I." So what's wrong with it? Looks
like you're the one who needs the grammar lesson. Good luck."


Nice to see juvinile retaliation is not dead. People like that shouldnt be allowed to write.

I didn't know Fox were hiring 11 year olds from hicks-ville as writers these days

the times they-must-be-bad ... :rolleyes:

Words that spring to mind:

",....
In the right light, study becomes insight
But the system that dissed us
Teaches us to read and write
So called facts are fraud
They want us to allege and pledge
And bow down to their God
Lost the culture, the culture lost
Spun our minds and through time Ignorance has taken over
..... "
- "Take the Power Back, RATM

Hairy Homer

Originally posted by Cork

On RTE we get people stateng the health system should et more resources. But RTE never asks union bosses should unions abandon benchmarking for this??

You will never hear this type of questioning on RTE. This is a service we pay a licence fee for. Fox News is a commecial TV news station - They are not a public service broadcaster. Yet why should we expect higher standards from them than our own RTE.

Or is it that if Fox news were more "leftie" - they'd be fine??

Show me an RTE reporter using language such as the following to describe another country or nation.

It’s a ‘wrong premise’ that ‘France is a member of the civilized world.’

France ‘facilitates savagery everywhere while impeding nations that seek to minimize it.’

France feels sympathy for ‘the more barbaric of the two Semitic cousins,’ (which seems to be a subtle assertion that Israel, the other Semitic cousin is only a little bit barbaric but there you go)

In France it is ‘unsafe for a Jew to wear a skullcap’. (As the recent horrific attack up north just showed it’s unsafe in parts of this country to wear a Celtic jersey on a municipal golf course)

France has ‘a natural affinity for any and all of the globe's uncivilized elements.’

The French ‘Don a lofty external disguise to mask a degraded internal character.’

‘Always on the opposing side of civilization and on the cutting edge of degenerateness, the French are pioneers in decadence.’


Come off it. This is infantile, bilious crap, the like of which would not be permitted in this country. By all means have a point of view and express it, but when writers descend to attempts such as this to dehumanise an entire nation, don’t dare say that it equates to the reasonable expression of a contrary position that would be permitted on more reputable news channels such as BBC or RTE.

And I don't work for either of those organisations, just in case you hear the sound of an axe grinding.

sceptre

Originally posted by The Saint
And please don't embarrass yourself
further by advising that "me" should be "I."

Well, she's right there - at least she knows the difference between subject and object.

She's no idea of the difference between subjectivity and objectivity of course but that's what this thread is about.

Sand

Ah its just some harmless fun and games, save the outrage for the next time the US is dismissed as a nation of fat assed, loudmouth, gun nut, uncaring, nation invading monsters - oh wait!

In other news have you heard that the French kulturkamf continues? The term E - mail is no longer considered suitable for use by the French people. Freedom fries and all that:|

Sparks

In other news have you heard that the French kulturkamf continues? The term E - mail is no longer considered suitable for use by the French people. Freedom fries and all that:|

Got it wrong there Sand. It was deemed that curriel would be used in offical french government documents, not that ordinary people couldn't say "email". Besides, many french-speaking people were already using "curriel" instead of email...

Capt'n Midnight

RE: People buy "The Mirror" , "star" & "Sun". Its all about personal choice.

so it has nothing to do with the price or the freebies or the pictures or cartoons or TV listing .. I doubt many people buy it for IT'S coverage of news stories (all the main stories are in all newspapers - kinda like agruing about brands of lager really)

RTE / EuroNews - say what you want about them but it's nice to hear other stories - all the UK TV news is fairly similar.

Anway during the last UK general election - SKY claimed to have reporters in every count centre - RTE were way ahead of them in the reported results...

At this stage it's Channel 4 at 7 or newsnight - if you want decent news from the UK - anyone know where you can get real impartial news from the USA ?

(Am starting to think news-portal sites can kill the media corporations.. actually I hope it will be so..)

Freedom fries - ha - they can't call them potato chips (slices) - 'cos they aren't ...

I really resent the US media for missreporting Greneda. When they were showing satelite photos of the "airbase" in military breefings, the reporter from the Beeb was standing on the tarmac.

It all harks back to whatsisname (real one does not deserve to be remembered) - citizen Kane - you said - "you supply the stories , I'll provide the war" ....

The US electrol / Legal / media systems - the best money can buy..

Xhen

How does Fox get away with it? Well, the US has a little something called the First Amendment which protects freedom of speech. You may have heard of it?

I'll admit that article is a little over the top but nothing more than the anti-American idiocy disseminated through Europe on a regular basis by people whose opinion of America comes from movies, television, or whatever conspiracy theory they happen to be indulging in this week. The proliferation of this nonsense has dispelled any notions that Europe is a continent populated by political savants. Hell, a recent poll revealed that one out of every three Germans under the age of 30 believes that the American government may have sponsored the 9/11 attacks. Apparently stupidity is reaching epic proportions in Europe as the moonbats become the mainstream.

And you wonder why America is tuning you out?

Victor

Originally posted by Xhen
How does Fox get away with it? Well, the US has a little something called the First Amendment which protects freedom of speech. You may have heard of it?

Doesn't freedom of speech also require a genuine diversity of media? As opposed to Disney, Time Warner AOL and Fox owning virtually everything?

Sparks

Hell, a recent poll revealed that one out of every three Germans under the age of 30 believes that the American government may have sponsored the 9/11 attacks.

Except that they're correct.
OBL gets his money from business with america, then sponsors the 9/11 attack.

Plus, there's the fact that the Congressional investigation shows that 9/11 could have been prevented at several points.

So frankly, I don't see what you're ridiculing.

How does Fox get away with it? Well, the US has a little something called the First Amendment which protects freedom of speech. You may have heard of it?

Yup. We have the whole free speech thing here too. In fact the philosopical movement that spawned the idea was a european one.
But we don't make it legal to knowingly present a lie as news.
Which isn't the case in the states.

edited to say "I don't believe I wasted my thousandth post on responding to Xhen..."

shotamoose

Originally posted by Xhen
a recent poll revealed that one out of every three Germans under the age of 30 believes that the American government may have sponsored the 9/11 attacks. Apparently stupidity is reaching epic proportions in Europe as the moonbats become the mainstream.

Another recent poll revealed that 19% of American's believed that they were in the top 1% of earners in the country. A further 20% expected that they would someday be in the top 1%.

So Europeans don't have a monopoly on stupidity.

We could all do with more balanced media, and just because 'the other side' has its own prejudices does not excuse the biggest news corporation in the world filling its American broadcast time with lies and hateful propaganda.

Zombrex

To quote the Simpsons -

"Welcome to FOX News. Your voice for evil"

FOX is a joke, a laughing stock, even in America .. I wouldn't worry about it anyone who actually takes FOX seriously is probably already a right wing loony and not watching FOX probably would make much difference

Originally posted by Sparks
edited to say "I don't believe I wasted my thousandth post on responding to Xhen..."

My god it was nearly two years before I reached that total;)

SkepticOne

Originally posted by Sparks
Except that they're correct.
OBL gets his money from business with america, then sponsors the 9/11 attack.

Plus, there's the fact that the Congressional investigation shows that 9/11 could have been prevented at several points.

So frankly, I don't see what you're ridiculing.
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I think 'sponsoring' something implies some intention on the part of the sponsor. If I hire and pay a plumber to do a pluming job and he subsequently buys a gun and shoots you with that money, I have not 'sponsored' your death.

Similarly, your failure to wear a bullet proof vest, which may have prevented your death, does not mean that you have 'sponsored' your own death.

Victor

Originally posted by SkepticOne
I think 'sponsoring' something implies some intention on the part of the sponsor. If I hire and pay a plumber to do a pluming job and he subsequently buys a gun and shoots you with that money, I have not 'sponsored' your death.

However, if you pay a mercenary to kill people and the mercenary then uses those skills to go on and kill other people .... oh, that sounds very like September 11th.

SkepticOne

Originally posted by Victor
However, if you pay a mercenary to kill people and the mercenary then uses those skills to go on and kill other people .... oh, that sounds very like September 11th.

OK, so do you, like Sparks, also believe that the US therefore sponsored September 11th?

To me this is the same sort of stupidity that is illustrated by the poll that revealed that 40% of Americans believed that Saddam is directly responsible for 911.

Victor

Originally posted by SkepticOne
OK, so do you, like Sparks, also believe that the US therefore sponsored September 11th?

I haven't gone though Spark's beliefs, but my point is by slightly varying the language, you can understand the other side of the argument (while not necessarily agreing to it).

Did the USA government finance September 11th?
No, but finance and equipment supplied by the US government was used interchangly by Al-Qaeda.

Did the USA government sponsor September 11th?
No, but they did sponsor Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

Did the USA government encourage September 11th?
Yes, by being morally and politically ambivalent in their foreign policies in the Middle East and Central Asia.

Who is responsible for September 11th?
Al-Qaeda.

SkepticOne

I realise that there is a line of reasoning through which the US can be shown to have some invovment in the events of 911. In an interconnected world many such lines of reasoning are possible. However, saying that they sponsored the attack is stretching things to the extent that the word has lost it's meaning.

Al Queda planned and executed the attacks using whatever money was to hand. Some of this may have been left over from the US sponsored campaign against the Soviets in Afghanistan. Other money may have come from the Bin Laden construction businesses in Saudi. Some of those profits from the construction business may have come from American firms. Whatever. None of this amounts to an argument that the US sponsored the attacks on the World Trade Centre.

Those Germans that were simply wrong.

Zombrex

Have to agree with Skeptic here, the US government did not sponsored the 9-11 attacks any more than the US government sponsored the 1st Gulf War.

What they did to in both cases was heavily invest in training, weapons and financial support for a group that then turned against its original patrons.

The US government (notice I don't say the US in general) has a lot of responsibility for both events, but that does not mean they sponsored them.

If you sell a gun to a mad man who then shoots you in the head, you are stupid but it doesn't mean you wanted him to.

Zombrex

Originally posted by Cork
Eoughan Harris pointed this out recently about the way it covers news storys.

And you actually listen to Eoghan Harris (you actually read the Sunday Independent)????

Eoghan Harris hates RTE, everything he says stems from that. Maybe FOX should give him a job .. though then again he does work for the Sunday Independent so he is already at a joke of a paper anyway.

Sparks

Originally posted by SkepticOne
OK, so do you, like Sparks, also believe that the US therefore sponsored September 11th?

For someone calling himself a skeptic, you do a lot of jumping to conclusions.
I was pointing out that their belief isn't an indication of stupidity. Not that I thought that Bush sat down one day and said "Ya'know boys, I reckon we need a big kabloie so we can start a war so I won't miss muh secund term like my pappy did".

Mind you, it is interesting to note that the germans aren't the only ones to think that is a likely scenario - the first people to think so were americans...

Originally posted by Sparks
Mind you, it is interesting to note that the germans aren't the only ones to think that is a likely scenario - the first people to think so were americans...

No matter what people, you examine in the world, you are going to get a certain proportion who believe in conspiracy theories eg, the ones being mentioned here.
I don't believe them and to be honest, I haven't spoken to a single American yet, who does.

Like the opening words on an episode of Battlestar Galactica... "There are those that believe..." but that doesn't make it true.
I wouldn't subscribe to UFO theories either, but there are many in America and here in europe that do:rolleyes:
mm

SkepticOne

Sloppy reasoning can lead you to any conclusion you want. For example, if Saddam hadn't invaded Kuwait, the Soudi government wouldn't have allowed US troops on Soudi soil. One of the gripes of Osama Bin Laden, it is said, is that he objected to the presence of US troops on holy Soudi ground and that this motivated him to the various attacks on the US including the one on the WTC as a protest. The 911 attack on the WTC created the political conditions within the US for them to persue their oil interests in Iraq by military force.

By this tortuous line of reasoning, Saddam, it could be argued, brought the war upon himself. This is no worse, in my view than the idea that the US brought upon themselves the 911 attack through morally and politically ambivalent foreign policies in the middle east and central asia.

A more direct reason for the recent invasion of Iraq is because Saddam stood in the way of US interests in the region and had to be eliminated. The positive aspect was that a brutal dictator was removed (and sons). The negative aspect is that thousands of innocent Iraqi's died in the process and the economy and social structures of the country are still in tatters.

The reason for the 911 attacks is simply because Osama Bin Laden is a mad mother****** who believed it was the correct thing to do and managed to convince a number of other idiots
to fly planes into buildings.

Silent Bob

I'm fairly sure that the 'invaded Kuwait' issue is a lot more complex than it is thought to be by the major populace.

This article explains things, and the US involvement in the middle-east (some of which is quite shocking)

Biffa Bacon

Mark Steyn has a funny article on all the media bull**** surrounding the war: BBC World News - now with all content guaranteed sexed down

By the way, isn't it great that he now has a column in the Irish Times?