Playing Into Their Hands -- Part II
Enough already. The news networks need to stop promoting everything Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has to say. They can't cast stones at Al-Jazeera and then do the exact same thing. So stop telling us about the threats he's making against everyone and their mother, every great building out there -- a big fat "DUH" to them all! We get it. But what they fail to realize is that the object of terrorism is to terrorize people. If you stop helping him do that by announcing every little thing he wants out there, he is neutralized to a large degree. Thoughts?
posted by Esther @ 8:49 AM
6 comments
6 Comments:
Agreed -- to a point. Don't give a megaphone to those who would use it as a machinegun. I think this is a comment on the pathetic state of American journalism more than anything else. The mentality seems to be, "If it bleeds, it leads." But here's where you and I may part company. I say, don't let ABCNBCCNNCBSFNCNYT get away with showing a Western hostage bound and pleading for his or her life, only to cut away with a sanctimonious message that they "can't show the horrors that ensue." Look, either show the horrors or don't -- but halfway measures just feed into the terrorists' goal of spreading terror (which, as you point out, is the goal of terrorism). America needs to see what is happening over there. We cannot afford to have Iraq sanitized for our protection and be expected to speak intelligently on how the nature and extent of our involvement. I would err on the side of giving Americans access to all available information, at their own discretion -- but not on the nightly news.
"It's going to take another cataclysmic megaterror attack to steel the West's resolve."
Hopefully it's going to be in Europe if it must happen.
Another terror event in the US would only shut the left up. The rest of us seem to know what needs to be done. Perhaps that is the same as steeling ones resolve though.
jonathan... "I think this is a comment on the pathetic state of American journalism more than anything else." I TOTALLY AGREE! As to your not wanting to cut away...i see your point. I'm not sure showing us the attrocities would help things. While you say Americans should know what's happening, I think it would probably undermine things. Govt is supposed to protect -- that's one of the things they're supposed to do. To that end, there are many things most Americans can't stomach (understandably); doesn't mean they shouldn't happen in the name of keeping us safe.
patrick, absolutely. I don't think many of us get it. And that's why we shouldn't be making the decisions -- and why we have representatives in govt who do.
felis.... ;)
ts: you really think anything can shut any of us up for long? ;)
Good point. You don't strike me as being of a leftward bent really though. I should ammend that to say, the crazy US/Israel hating left.
Oh TS, I meant any of us as the "global" us...not a specific party. :) Politically, I consider myself a centrist.
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