Some of the biggest purveyors of "misinformation" appear to be the same people that are constantly admonishing their readers to stop spreading misinformation. Some of the biggest purveyors of "misinformation" appear to be the same people that are constantly admonishing their readers to stop spreading misinformation.
The bs detector needs to be on full blast alright because it's not just media that must jump on everything in an attempt to first eyeball attraction, but "American officials" who cleared it all up doesn't mean much if anything. If you've been on the planet long enough, you see that the real story doesn't come out for many years, if at all.
Here's another reason it's hard (for me, at least) to confide in media personalities. They're willing to sell their credibility for exposure when they appear in movies. There they are reporting on actual fictional events created by screenwriters. It lends credence to the movie, but at the same time time shows that for many of these "reporters" they don't care whether their screen time is used for fiction or fact.
"Officials say..." is one of the laziest media tools in their arsenal. More often than not no 'official' said anything. It's far more likely two 'journalists' having a conversation then quoting one another as the other so-called 'official'. Trust me, I once worked in media. I've watched them make the unpalatable sausage.
Yes, I hear you about our newsroom celebrities. Those guys are bad enough, but when our politicians do the same, that's when you know we're in real trouble. The Canadian Liberal Party has been every bit as unhinged as the media (in many cases worse) since the start of this. And not just this issue. That doesn't do either of them any favours.
Yep, news media needs to be consumed with a critical eye, but the examples you gave are bizarre to say the least. The Gaza explosion story, to anyone who’s followed the middle-east at all, would have assumed it to be an Israeli air strike, there were even early admissions from the Israeli government (have you ever heard of a Hamas rocket causing mass casualties? Israel routinely takes out hundreds of civilians in targeted strikes, and is killing dozens-hundreds daily, striking civilian targets including that very same hospital just a day or two earlier) but the headline didn’t even conclusively blame Israel. I’m no fan of the NY Times, but in that particular case they were being as cautious and responsible as we could reasonably expect.
The story about the Catholic Church and the mass graves isn’t controversial, is it? I can’t even see the perceived bias there.
Being critical of NY Times for being biased in their reporting, while simultaneously praising Matt Taibbi as some kind of ‘honest broker’... is hilarious in my view. He’s got to be one of the most disingenuous in the business.
It’s important to note that there has been a sustained and concentrated assault on free press and journalism as Trumpism the right wing has risen throughout the west. A free and rigorous news media is one of the pillars on which Democracy can stand, so it’s only natural for the fascists to attack it. An important point missing from your piece is that distrust in the media (and science, education, and democracy) is something which is sown very intentionally by a powerful faction seeking to undermine for their own gains. I agree we need to hold journalists to a high standard, but we should also appreciate the courage it takes to do such an important job.
The Times issued an apology for that piece on Monday morning admitting that they "relied too heavily on claims by Hamas". Given that Hamas is a terrorist organization known for spreading propaganda, I would hardly consider that "cautious and responsible".
The mass graves story was very controversial because anyone who pointed out that there were no actual graves found was immediately branded a hateful, racist, denier. That story is still false and as yet there's been no retraction or correction.
The fact that there are those who would attack the freedom of the press (on both sides, I would argue) is irrelevant to the scope of this article because I'm not one of them.
Can you give a specific example of Taibbi's reporting that you find to be disingenuous?
The mass graves issue reminds me of an excellent standup bit I heard about pedophilia (Lord forgive my soul for that sentence). Basically it goes something like this… “technically, a person who’s attracted to underage teens isn’t a pedophile (pedo’s are attracted to prepubescent children), the correct term is “ephebophiles”. The reason that nobody ever points out this distinction is because when they do, they sound like a f**king pedophile.”
The point is, when you start doing “well actually..” and bringing up technical inconsistencies in a genocide of native children, people may wonder what the underlying motives are. So, they haven’t dug up those particular dead children and this is a ‘gotcha’?? Do we owe the catholic church an apology? “Sorry, Vatican, we wrongfully accused you of the genocidal abduction and abuse of 150,000 children, when it may have only been 149, 750. We had you all wrong”. It’s an odd point to be making.
Well, I suppose if that's the point one is trying to make, that would be a little sketchy. I haven't heard any actual evidence that the Catholic church purposely killed even one person so that complicates things a bit - especially when you accuse an entire country of genocide, as our PM did.
Really, my point in all of this is that if and when bodies are actually discovered, I'd like to be able to trust what they're telling me about it. So far, it's not looking good in that department.
Pine Creek First Nation in Manitoba here recently did some digging based on GPR findings and came up with nothing. It was hard to tell if people were happy or disappointed about that.
I guess you’re right. There’s just something a bit icky about that particular story and I can see how certain groups who may look favorably on the history of colonization might be particularly enthusiastic about downplaying what was done by the Catholic church.
Wikipedia gives the definition of genocide as: ‘the intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part’. This was the stated intent of the church. I’m Australian, we did something similar here, though on a smaller scale. The goal was to end the native population’s culture/traditions/language etc and to ‘civilize’ them by force, and there’s no disagreement that tens of thousands of children were abducted from their families and subjected to all manner of abuse which led to them dying at rates several times higher than other children. This is a crime of such horror and scale that’s difficult to grasp. There’s nothing wrong with facing those facts and being ashamed. Shame is healthy.
Yes, I agree. These things do need to faced. But at the very least it needs to be done honestly because when it's not, all it does is provide fuel to those opponents with less than pure motives. It was bad enough in reality, it hardly needs to be dramatized. That just discredits the whole deal.
And really, it's like Canada, or Australia, or the US is unique among countries in this regard. It's the story of humanity since the beginning.
I make no apologies for The NY Times. I’m old enough to have attended protests against W Bush's (and my country)’s 2003 Iraq invasion before it was even launched and it was the Times’ disgraceful parroting of Republican war-mongering lies at the time that many credit for giving the bastards just enough public support for what is now considered the worst foreign policy disaster in history. Worse than Vietnam. The Times can burn in hell for all I care.
I was simply saying that when an absolute blitzkrieg is being rained down on Gaza by Israeli jets, killing well over 300 innocent people each day on average and news comes in of yet another horrific explosion, it’s an understandable mistake (not like the Times broke the story or anything) and even Israeli gov. officials made the same assumption we all did before they changed their story. Let’s not forget, the Israeli and US governments will routinely fabricate reports if they believe it serves their interests. I credit the Times for running a retraction/apology, it would be good to see that more often from outlets when they get things wrong.
There are plenty of great resources which grade major news sources on their bias/accuracy/transparency in reporting etc. The Times usually fares quite well, relatively speaking.
Yes, the Times did a good job on the apology. But would they have even bothered without the national freakout? I think the "graves" story answers that question.
The whole ‘can’t trust the mainstream media’ narrative is self-fulfilling. While there are plenty of media errors we can point to, the effect is to undermine the public square press coverage and drive everyone further into their ‘trusted’ echo chambers. I don’t know the solution for this, it seems unstoppable.
My thoughts on Taibbi… Being spoon-fed a ‘story’ by the world’s richest man (who selected him specifically because he agrees with the overt political spin in his reporting), uncritically putting out exactly what the billionaire told him to put out, flies in the face of the whole ‘speaking truth to power’ thing that journalism is supposed to be about. In fact, it’s the opposite of speaking truth to power. And then, without any sense of shame or irony, to spend his days pointing fingers at journalism and the media as ‘failing in their role’ (never conservative or right-leaning journalists, strangely). This is why he’s seen as highly disingenuous.
Speaking of Matt Taibii, it turns out that he, Michael Schellenberger, and Bari Weiss won the Dao award for excellence In investigative journalism on Wednesday night. For you guessed it - the Twitter Files story.
Alright, but the Twitter files revealed exactly what Taibbi and company said they revealed. It really shouldn't matter that it was instigated by Elon Musk, should it? The Missouri v. Biden case showed that the courts agreed. Of course that case is not done yet, but Taibbi reporting on that is hardly disengenuous - this is the very definition of investigative journalism and it's also the job of the news media to keep our government accountable by letting us know what they're doing.
You must've read about that 'prize'. Doesn't that just confirm what I was saying about him? Isn't that exactly the type of people I said he's aligned himself with, and exactly the type of praise we'd expect him to be getting from the right? If he or those others had a shred of credibility left they would be embarrassed to accept something like that.
You guys are always pointing at the "right wing" boogeyman. It's like the new way to say "I'm right and you're stupid." Everyone is far right if you don't agree with them? Taibbi and Weiss are about as left as you can get. But that is completely irrelevant because what's going on right now has nothing to do with left or right. And who says they have no credibility? Other than you, I mean. I think they've both been proven to be very credible.
In terms of journalism ethics, objectivity is one of the cornerstones, and certainly one of the major considerations for the Pulitzer Prize and other prestigious awards. This Dao prize isn’t even hiding its partisan goals and affiliations. Regardless of how you feel about the terms ‘right’ or ‘left’, the benefactors of the Dao prize are unapologetically right-wing conservative interest groups, and the purpose of the prize is to recognize those whose work aligns with their interests.
The bs detector needs to be on full blast alright because it's not just media that must jump on everything in an attempt to first eyeball attraction, but "American officials" who cleared it all up doesn't mean much if anything. If you've been on the planet long enough, you see that the real story doesn't come out for many years, if at all.
Here's another reason it's hard (for me, at least) to confide in media personalities. They're willing to sell their credibility for exposure when they appear in movies. There they are reporting on actual fictional events created by screenwriters. It lends credence to the movie, but at the same time time shows that for many of these "reporters" they don't care whether their screen time is used for fiction or fact.
"Officials say..." is one of the laziest media tools in their arsenal. More often than not no 'official' said anything. It's far more likely two 'journalists' having a conversation then quoting one another as the other so-called 'official'. Trust me, I once worked in media. I've watched them make the unpalatable sausage.
Indeed. Matt Taibbi has a whole chapter on that in his book, Hate Inc: Why Today's Media Makes Us Despise One Another.
That's a great read, by the way.
and right on cue...
https://media.townhall.com/cdn/hodl/cartoons/sk102023dAPR-800x0.jpg
Ha!
Now I wonder if I should really believe that...
😊
Yes, I hear you about our newsroom celebrities. Those guys are bad enough, but when our politicians do the same, that's when you know we're in real trouble. The Canadian Liberal Party has been every bit as unhinged as the media (in many cases worse) since the start of this. And not just this issue. That doesn't do either of them any favours.
Yep, news media needs to be consumed with a critical eye, but the examples you gave are bizarre to say the least. The Gaza explosion story, to anyone who’s followed the middle-east at all, would have assumed it to be an Israeli air strike, there were even early admissions from the Israeli government (have you ever heard of a Hamas rocket causing mass casualties? Israel routinely takes out hundreds of civilians in targeted strikes, and is killing dozens-hundreds daily, striking civilian targets including that very same hospital just a day or two earlier) but the headline didn’t even conclusively blame Israel. I’m no fan of the NY Times, but in that particular case they were being as cautious and responsible as we could reasonably expect.
The story about the Catholic Church and the mass graves isn’t controversial, is it? I can’t even see the perceived bias there.
Being critical of NY Times for being biased in their reporting, while simultaneously praising Matt Taibbi as some kind of ‘honest broker’... is hilarious in my view. He’s got to be one of the most disingenuous in the business.
It’s important to note that there has been a sustained and concentrated assault on free press and journalism as Trumpism the right wing has risen throughout the west. A free and rigorous news media is one of the pillars on which Democracy can stand, so it’s only natural for the fascists to attack it. An important point missing from your piece is that distrust in the media (and science, education, and democracy) is something which is sown very intentionally by a powerful faction seeking to undermine for their own gains. I agree we need to hold journalists to a high standard, but we should also appreciate the courage it takes to do such an important job.
The Times issued an apology for that piece on Monday morning admitting that they "relied too heavily on claims by Hamas". Given that Hamas is a terrorist organization known for spreading propaganda, I would hardly consider that "cautious and responsible".
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/23/pageoneplus/editors-note-gaza-hospital-coverage.html
The mass graves story was very controversial because anyone who pointed out that there were no actual graves found was immediately branded a hateful, racist, denier. That story is still false and as yet there's been no retraction or correction.
The fact that there are those who would attack the freedom of the press (on both sides, I would argue) is irrelevant to the scope of this article because I'm not one of them.
Can you give a specific example of Taibbi's reporting that you find to be disingenuous?
The mass graves issue reminds me of an excellent standup bit I heard about pedophilia (Lord forgive my soul for that sentence). Basically it goes something like this… “technically, a person who’s attracted to underage teens isn’t a pedophile (pedo’s are attracted to prepubescent children), the correct term is “ephebophiles”. The reason that nobody ever points out this distinction is because when they do, they sound like a f**king pedophile.”
The point is, when you start doing “well actually..” and bringing up technical inconsistencies in a genocide of native children, people may wonder what the underlying motives are. So, they haven’t dug up those particular dead children and this is a ‘gotcha’?? Do we owe the catholic church an apology? “Sorry, Vatican, we wrongfully accused you of the genocidal abduction and abuse of 150,000 children, when it may have only been 149, 750. We had you all wrong”. It’s an odd point to be making.
https://youtube.com/shorts/jcXK-sPqsL0?si=06wzcpeVxDDICa4q
That is actually pretty funny. 😁
Well, I suppose if that's the point one is trying to make, that would be a little sketchy. I haven't heard any actual evidence that the Catholic church purposely killed even one person so that complicates things a bit - especially when you accuse an entire country of genocide, as our PM did.
Really, my point in all of this is that if and when bodies are actually discovered, I'd like to be able to trust what they're telling me about it. So far, it's not looking good in that department.
Pine Creek First Nation in Manitoba here recently did some digging based on GPR findings and came up with nothing. It was hard to tell if people were happy or disappointed about that.
I guess you’re right. There’s just something a bit icky about that particular story and I can see how certain groups who may look favorably on the history of colonization might be particularly enthusiastic about downplaying what was done by the Catholic church.
Wikipedia gives the definition of genocide as: ‘the intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part’. This was the stated intent of the church. I’m Australian, we did something similar here, though on a smaller scale. The goal was to end the native population’s culture/traditions/language etc and to ‘civilize’ them by force, and there’s no disagreement that tens of thousands of children were abducted from their families and subjected to all manner of abuse which led to them dying at rates several times higher than other children. This is a crime of such horror and scale that’s difficult to grasp. There’s nothing wrong with facing those facts and being ashamed. Shame is healthy.
Yes, I agree. These things do need to faced. But at the very least it needs to be done honestly because when it's not, all it does is provide fuel to those opponents with less than pure motives. It was bad enough in reality, it hardly needs to be dramatized. That just discredits the whole deal.
And really, it's like Canada, or Australia, or the US is unique among countries in this regard. It's the story of humanity since the beginning.
I make no apologies for The NY Times. I’m old enough to have attended protests against W Bush's (and my country)’s 2003 Iraq invasion before it was even launched and it was the Times’ disgraceful parroting of Republican war-mongering lies at the time that many credit for giving the bastards just enough public support for what is now considered the worst foreign policy disaster in history. Worse than Vietnam. The Times can burn in hell for all I care.
I was simply saying that when an absolute blitzkrieg is being rained down on Gaza by Israeli jets, killing well over 300 innocent people each day on average and news comes in of yet another horrific explosion, it’s an understandable mistake (not like the Times broke the story or anything) and even Israeli gov. officials made the same assumption we all did before they changed their story. Let’s not forget, the Israeli and US governments will routinely fabricate reports if they believe it serves their interests. I credit the Times for running a retraction/apology, it would be good to see that more often from outlets when they get things wrong.
There are plenty of great resources which grade major news sources on their bias/accuracy/transparency in reporting etc. The Times usually fares quite well, relatively speaking.
Yes, the Times did a good job on the apology. But would they have even bothered without the national freakout? I think the "graves" story answers that question.
The whole ‘can’t trust the mainstream media’ narrative is self-fulfilling. While there are plenty of media errors we can point to, the effect is to undermine the public square press coverage and drive everyone further into their ‘trusted’ echo chambers. I don’t know the solution for this, it seems unstoppable.
There are trusted sources of media out there, they're just not necessarily thee same ones they were 20 years ago.
My thoughts on Taibbi… Being spoon-fed a ‘story’ by the world’s richest man (who selected him specifically because he agrees with the overt political spin in his reporting), uncritically putting out exactly what the billionaire told him to put out, flies in the face of the whole ‘speaking truth to power’ thing that journalism is supposed to be about. In fact, it’s the opposite of speaking truth to power. And then, without any sense of shame or irony, to spend his days pointing fingers at journalism and the media as ‘failing in their role’ (never conservative or right-leaning journalists, strangely). This is why he’s seen as highly disingenuous.
Speaking of Matt Taibii, it turns out that he, Michael Schellenberger, and Bari Weiss won the Dao award for excellence In investigative journalism on Wednesday night. For you guessed it - the Twitter Files story.
https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2023/11/02/2772097/0/en/Twitter-Files-Awarded-Inaugural-Dao-Prize-for-Excellence-In-Investigative-Journalism.html
Alright, but the Twitter files revealed exactly what Taibbi and company said they revealed. It really shouldn't matter that it was instigated by Elon Musk, should it? The Missouri v. Biden case showed that the courts agreed. Of course that case is not done yet, but Taibbi reporting on that is hardly disengenuous - this is the very definition of investigative journalism and it's also the job of the news media to keep our government accountable by letting us know what they're doing.
You must've read about that 'prize'. Doesn't that just confirm what I was saying about him? Isn't that exactly the type of people I said he's aligned himself with, and exactly the type of praise we'd expect him to be getting from the right? If he or those others had a shred of credibility left they would be embarrassed to accept something like that.
You guys are always pointing at the "right wing" boogeyman. It's like the new way to say "I'm right and you're stupid." Everyone is far right if you don't agree with them? Taibbi and Weiss are about as left as you can get. But that is completely irrelevant because what's going on right now has nothing to do with left or right. And who says they have no credibility? Other than you, I mean. I think they've both been proven to be very credible.
In terms of journalism ethics, objectivity is one of the cornerstones, and certainly one of the major considerations for the Pulitzer Prize and other prestigious awards. This Dao prize isn’t even hiding its partisan goals and affiliations. Regardless of how you feel about the terms ‘right’ or ‘left’, the benefactors of the Dao prize are unapologetically right-wing conservative interest groups, and the purpose of the prize is to recognize those whose work aligns with their interests.