“There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance, and indifference,” Edward R. Murrow said back in 1958. “This weapon of television could be useful.” The words apply equally to today’s networked and instant-news world.
At the height of the Cairo riots last week, the US Embassy controversially tweeted: “Sorry, but neither breaches of our compound or angry messages will dissuade us from defending freedom of speech AND criticizing bigotry.”
Bravo. Just because bigots have the right to publish offensive material doesn’t mean I must defend them any more than I would defend the news organizations that recently published the name of the Navy Seal who shot bin Laden.
Charlie Hebdo has the right to publish the cartoons (just as Newsweek has the right to its inflammatory cover). But, as Laurent Wauquiez, the former French minister once asked, “Is it necessary to do this week? I do not think so.”
Back when I was a young reporter, I owned a belt buckle with a Superman-style logo that read: “Newsman: Truth, Justice, and the American way.” None of those ideals are served by throwing journalistic firebombs in the name of freedom of the press.
Related stories:
Western, Arab Journalists Miles Apart in Cartoon Rift
Breathing Room: Toward a new Arab media
It’s likely the same reason most Western news organizations haven’t republished the topless Kate Middleton pix. Or why most US newspapers do not show dead soldiers.
The western press and punditry ROUTINELY publishes some of the most vile, slanderous, and contemptible article/cartoons about Catholics/Evangelicals/Jews/Mormons/etcetera without a second thought because as a largely civilized group the reactions aren’t 1,000,000’s of lunatics rampaging through the streets killing, pillaging, and swarming foreign embassies.
As a regular reader, I have certainly come across some ridiculous ideas so vapid and tortured in their twisted logic at CJR, but I think this might actually take the cake. I don’t know if this article is written out of pure cowardice, White Western paternalistic liberal guilt, left wing tribalism taken to its logical conlcusion or what .. but it’s really a heaping pile of manure.
In any conflict between barbarians and civilized men, take the side of the civilized.
#1 Posted by Mike H, CJR on Thu 27 Sep 2012 at 06:15 PM
Clearly, the author of this article knows next to nothing about the dynamics ruling the political debate and the mighty notion of freedom of expression and press in France. Better ask Frenchmen at Columbia or read op-eds on the topic in French outlets before writing analyses of the like next time... If you wanna talk about it, shoot me an email.
#2 Posted by Mikå Mered, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 12:32 PM
Dean Pintak is correct when he says that journalists often exclude information from stories for moral or legal reasons. Self-censorship is an omnipresent force in journalism as well as in all interpersonal communication.
But, as a journalism professor in the Murrow College, I am dismayed that the head of my program would write that "journalism is not supposed to be a firebomb."
Although, like Pintak, I personally rebuke communicators who deliberately seek to inflame or create journalistic "firebombs," I steadfastly defend their right to express themselves, regardless of their motives.
The kind of journalism advocated by Pintak is dangerous because it encourages state-imposed censorship for the greater good (sometimes referred to as the communitarian pespective).
A better prescription for bad speech, as the U.S. Supreme Court has suggested, is counter-speech (the libertarian perspective).
-Dave Demers, associate professor of communication, Washington State University (the comments expressed here do not represent those of the university or its officials)
#3 Posted by David Demers, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 12:58 PM
"Clearly, the author of this article knows next to nothing about the dynamics ruling the political debate and the mighty notion of freedom of expression and press in France."
On that topic:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/proud-to-be-american-by-davidoatkins.html
#4 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 01:32 PM
"In any conflict between barbarians and civilized men, take the side of the civilized."
Beware:
http://www.logosjournal.com/issue_4.3/twain.htm
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkatimetobreaksilence.htm
That way lies madness.
#5 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 01:38 PM
Reason why traditional press is failing not just America, but the world, No. 243,873.
Yes, journalists routinely exclude material for good taste or community standards. Media outlets didn't exclude the Kate Middleton photos out of intimidation. The National Enquirer wasn't afraid that a British SAS squad would come and kill them. They did it because they felt the market fallout would not be worth the publicity.
But self censoring because a bunch of fascist Islamist loons will murder people is bowing to the heckler's veto. You can never satisfy those who will murder over their concept of speech unless you ban all speech.
Instead of this situation being a crowning moment for the media and a revival of American support for a free press, the PC American news orgs are running scared of offended Muslims. Yet no free press exists in those nations controlled by Muslims.
#6 Posted by Dan Gainor, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 04:42 PM
"But self censoring because a bunch of fascist Islamist loons will murder people is bowing to the heckler's veto. You can never satisfy those who will murder over their concept of speech unless you ban all speech."
I guess the same goes for blacklisting.
http://www.cjr.org/the_kicker/cnns_gutless_firing.php
But then where would newsbusters be?
#7 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 05:35 PM
All off this shows that Ron Paul and the non-interventionists have always been correct about military aggression and blow-back. Best defense? Don't be there.
#8 Posted by Dan A., CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 07:39 PM
Thimbles, the CNN reporter was fired because her statements belied her claim to be an objective reporter. There is no connection whatsoever between that and Pintak's risible call to self-censorship in the face of murderous thugs.
Pintak and CJR should be ashamed of the contents of this article.
#9 Posted by JLD, CJR on Fri 28 Sep 2012 at 08:12 PM
"Thimbles, the CNN reporter was fired because her statements belied her claim to be an objective reporter."
Yeah, usually I would look at the work in question to ascertain whether she satisfied the demand for an objective reporter, but hey, if you prefer a tweet what can I say?
Well, I can say this. The way the right defines objective is "something which does not offend my sensitive sensibilities". Juan Williams fear of Muslims did not offend nor 'affect his objectivity' which was why the right freaked out and tried to defund NPR over their dismissal of the guy for the numerous times he made questionable statements on fox.
Dana Loesch did not offend or 'affect her objectivity' when she said she would have liked to 'drop trou' and join in on the urinate on corpses party. She's got her job on CNN.
To the right, this is not about freedom of speech, as in the freedom to say things like 'I'm ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas'. It's about the freedom to say things you want to say about other people. If people talk back to you, your networks will go after their jobs, after their social life, after their clinics, after their books and cd's. It's about the freedom of your expression.
When it comes to the expression of people you disagree with, you guys are all in for the blacklisting and the "righteous rage" protests which, if we're lucky, won't end up in rocks being thrown or churches being bombed or crazy gunmen being unleashed or death threats being sent etc...
And editors know this, which is why they avoid calling out the batshit insane party without a 'liberals do it too' or some other equivocation. Nobody needs the headache of a right wing intimidation campaign.
If the Muslim intimidation bs pisses you off, guess what. That's in Pakistan and Libya. Pakistanis and Libyans have to solve that problem - not you. The intimidation tactics in America are something you can do something about. If you want everybody else to start examining themselves in their mirrors, you might want to try fixing yourself up in yours first.
Just sayin.
#10 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sat 29 Sep 2012 at 02:57 PM
Ps. David Frum makes a similar point to Pintak about the media:
http://www.frumforum.com/burn-the-media-for-the-koran-burning-fiasco/
About the guy who's, for some reason, tied into the Libya story today.
I think that Pintak's point is more to do with the mission of journalism: are you trying to tell a story or are you trying to be the story? "God hates Fags" makes good and outrageous print, but it doesn't improve anyone's greater understanding of the world. Is your job to spike paper sales or to make a meaningful paper? Because Pastors Jones and Phelps don't bring anything to the table informative wise, but they sure get print out of proportion to their weight compared to, say, the Iraq war protests of 2003 or, for that matter the Aniversary of Katrina which Rolling Stone saw fit to remember.
The media likes heat, simple stories, good guys and bad guys. As Taibbi said, September 11th and 9-11 mosques we're primed for, but real stories?
"September 11th, the first great paradigm-shifting event of our century, was a disaster that the American psyche was prepared for. As horrible as it was, it spoke directly to our most deliciously satisfying persecution fantasies: It was Independence Day, Deep Impact, War of the Worlds. Stinky Klingons attack Manhattan; America straps it on and kicks ass. We knew the playbook for that one.
But no one was ready for Katrina. He was ridiculed for saying it, but George Bush was absolutely right – painfully if unintentionally honest – when he said that "I don't think anyone anticipated" this disaster. New Orleans falls into the sea; whose ass do we kick now? When that isn't an option, we're just left staring at each other. And that's what really hurts."
There are things we don't want to examine. We'll look at the backwards ways of Benghazi but we won't look at our own backwards lives even and they destroy the climate and oceans around us. We'll defend 'our freedom' even at the cost of everybody's existence.
Challenge those values and we'll see who's acting wild and crazy in the streets. (Oh wait, we saw that in the run up to the Affordable Health Care Act. Come to think of it, we saw it when the anti-segration laws were coming down.)
It's one thing to demand tolerance from other people when their fundamental values are challenged, it's another to expect it from ourselves.
#11 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sat 29 Sep 2012 at 03:49 PM
"Oh wait, we saw that in the run up to the Affordable Health Care Act. Come to think of it, we saw it when the anti-segration laws were coming down."
And here's a fine read by the erudite, Ta-Nehisi Coates:
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/09/fear-of-a-black-president/309064/?single_page=true
#12 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Sat 29 Sep 2012 at 04:54 PM
The criticisms of "bigotry", however, ended up misinforming with respect to what happened in Benghazi. People were led to believe that a Youtube video triggered the death of the US Ambassador to Libya. The problem is not a failure to defend "Sam Bacile" or whatever the real name is. The problem is using up one's soapbox to attack the video again and again when that soapbox could be used to raise awareness of other issues.
#13 Posted by Brian Dell, CJR on Sun 30 Sep 2012 at 02:55 PM
the Wikipedia article "Contemporary imprints of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" (the Egypt section, in particular) shows just how much respect some Muslim journalists give other beliefs and the truth. Charlie Hebdo is a left-wing satirical magazine. They can and probably have satirized everything within range, and their Mohammed coverage was nothing particularly new. Asking them to avoid Islam is treating Islam with kid gloves.
(For what it's worth, "civilized men" have abused, enslaved, and slaughtered many harmless "barbarians" because the barbarians were in their way. We must never fall into the trap of calling ourselves "more civilized" and then believing that makes all our actions morally right.)
#14 Posted by David S., CJR on Sun 7 Oct 2012 at 09:28 PM