Media creating news?

[Alkaloid]

Ok, so we know that with clever editing and perhaps a little dishonesty, almost anything can be cut to favour on side of an argument or another, but this disturbs me on a different level.

Linky

It's a news cameraman doing his job. And by doing his job, I mean deliberately provoking a muslim man (up to and including calling a man accused of nothing a terrorist) in order to get the shot that he is presumably being sent to the courthouse to get. So that it can then be cut to make it look like the scary muslim just exploded at an innocent cameraman for no reason. (other than that he's a muslim, obviously)

I know the media is meant to be self regulating and all, and I'm skeptical of anyone trying to regulate or censor the media, but surely there must be some way to make the more opportunistic and scum sucking journos (there are still some good ones) behave in a vaguely ethical manner? Because this is even more absurd than hacking phones.

[K. A. Pital]

Only public hatred towards that sort of scum can change anything. That filthy flesh bag needs to be kicked out of his fucking job.

[bobalot]

Ok, so we know that with clever editing and perhaps a little dishonesty, almost anything can be cut to favour on side of an argument or another, but this disturbs me on a different level.

Linky

It's a news cameraman doing his job. And by doing his job, I mean deliberately provoking a muslim man (up to and including calling a man accused of nothing a terrorist) in order to get the shot that he is presumably being sent to the courthouse to get. So that it can then be cut to make it look like the scary muslim just exploded at an innocent cameraman for no reason. (other than that he's a muslim, obviously)

I know the media is meant to be self regulating and all, and I'm skeptical of anyone trying to regulate or censor the media, but surely there must be some way to make the more opportunistic and scum sucking journos (there are still some good ones) behave in a vaguely ethical manner? Because this is even more absurd than hacking phones.

Why can't journalists be regulated like any other profession? If I act unethically as an engineer, I can be sent to jail years after the act. If I'm put in a position where I must alert the appropriate authorities even if it costs me my job, I'm expected to act.

Journalists lie and bullshit all the time with impunity regardless of the consequences. I would also dump economists in the same category. These douchenozzles have an enormous impact on peoples fucking lives. They should have an enforceable code of conduct.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

Journalists lie and bullshit all the time with impunity regardless of the consequences. I would also dump economists in the same category. These douchenozzles have an enormous impact on peoples fucking lives. They should have an enforceable code of conduct.

If you can find some way of reconciling freedom of the press with such a code of conduct in such a way that isn't liable to abuse of every kind, you're a fucking visionary.

[Alkaloid]

Why can't journalists be regulated like any other profession? If I act unethically as an engineer, I can be sent to jail years after the act. If I'm put in a position where I must alert the appropriate authorities even if it costs me my job, I'm expected to act.

Because it makes it far too easy for the regulating body to censor the news to their liking. If its government regulated, negative stories about the government start changing, industry regulated, negative stories about newscorp and fairfax and fox start disappearing, and self regulation clearly hasn't worked because, well, the news is full of shit. They do have a general code of conduct, (report the news without bias) and some of them follow it (I'm willing to bet that the full tape in the video was sent in anonymously from one of the other networks cameramen) but I don't know how it can be enforced without resulting in a situation where someone has the ability to influence the reporting to their liking.

But Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba said it much better.

[K. A. Pital]

Internet and civil journalism. It is a pile of hate, but it is also more free and impartial than any of the official mass media. Official mass media are shit.

And yes, I know that civil journalism and internet aren't a panacea. However, they are better than what we have now. Civil journalism is also usually poor and poverty can't allow it to make massive set-ups, cover-ups, massive corporate censorship across media space, fake videoshoots, etc.

[thejester]

Except - in Australia at least - they're demonstrably not. They don't have the time or the money to do the kind of quality journalism the 'office mass media' does, and I think you're pretty naive if you think they're not just as susceptible to forgery and lying.

[K. A. Pital]

They are susceptible to forgery and lying just the same. However, it is much harder to censor the internet than it is to censor a corporate media machine.

The scale of damage is also different, of course. Only a massive official media campaign of lies can be effective enough to provoke war. In outreach and the like, official media have much more leverage. This is why they are more dangerous.

It is like a knife and a firearm. People can kill with a knife too, but a firearm is more efficient. Same with amateur and official media.

[Stofsk]

Having something like Media Watch is about as close as I want to get to having any kind of oversight over the media. Otherwise you hit into problems like censorship or covering up stuff because the regulators (whether they're government based or industry based) won't like something.

[Iroscato]

This piece of shit should be thrown from his job, tarred, feathered, and kicked in the balls. Did he seriously think the original footage wouldn't show up? What a cunt.

[Alkaloid]

This piece of shit should be thrown from his job, tarred, feathered, and kicked in the balls. Did he seriously think the original footage wouldn't show up? What a cunt.

Keep in mind channel 9 (who the cameraman worked for) showed none of this footage, they ignored the whole thing. It was two rival networks , 10 and 7, showed the footage cut to make it look like the father just blew his top, so yes, I think they did realise that it was going to come out, and tried to limit the damage. Which sort of makes it worse, as they clearly knew it was wrong.

[tim31]

Well your internet posturing must have worked because it turns out he was.

[Siege]

Ah, good, I was wondering if Australia had a thing like that. Yeah, it's not uncommon for there to exist ethical codes that journalists are expected to abide by. We (Netherlands) certainly do have such a thing. It covers such things as unwarranted breaches of privacy and other standards of professional conduct that, yes, would include undue provocations. The union for journalists maintains an arbitrage commission that people can take their grievances to, and which tends to come down like a ton of bricks on those who break the rules and can force newspapers, tv-shows etc. to publicly rectify their mistakes and transgressions. I'll be the first to admit it's far from perfect but a modicum of self-regulation can work, even for an ego-driven business like journalism.

[Enigma]

Well your internet posturing must have worked because it turns out he was.

It isn't the first time that Channel 9 made a mess of themselves.

[mr friendly guy]

And people wonder why I roll my eyes up when someone goes well our country has Press freedomTM. Seriously having a free press means little without

a) decent code of conduct and ethics which is actually followed - as illustrated by this example, where in the end it was followed

b) competence among journalists - For example how many times has Australian media reported India doesn't have a carbon tax so why should we do it, when a google search can show that they have done something like that for coal the year before.

c) willingness to report the truth over a "balance view" (think evolution vs ID debates and you know what I mean)

d) free from their own agenda -seriously, apparently when Rupert Murdoch's Fox news displays their own agenda (as an example) its somehow less bad than when a government controlled media entity reports the governments point of view.

We were taught in high school to be aware of how the media reports things, and concepts such as media ownerships laws and why we restrict ownership media outlets so that one person can't control such power. I only hope that other people have also the benefit of such education, because the way some people wank off to free mediaTM it seems they didn't.

[mr friendly guy]

Oh, channel 9 and A Current Affair went apeshit when Gordon Ramsay liken the host of that show, whats her name to a pig (as a joke, which was in bad taste). But apparently they resort to airing footage where the camera man calls a Muslim man a terrorist (who isn't even charge yet alone convicted of terrorism), which is bloody well close to a racial epithet.

Classy guys.

I am not surprise about channel 7's actions, after all these are the guys who had was it that wanker ?Brian Seymour present a story on Today Tonight showcasing those scary Asians. Asians who aren't Australian enough because didn't realise what Pavlova was. (You mean a New Zealand dish, which we Australians claim as our own).
If I wasn't at work I would link to a chaser clip where they mock Brian Seymour.

[Simon_Jester]

They are susceptible to forgery and lying just the same. However, it is much harder to censor the internet than it is to censor a corporate media machine.

I think my fellow jester's point is that while they're less able to engineer huge lies, they're also less able to reveal huge truths. They can't afford to maintain correspondents in foreign countries or in special social circles that are hard to penetrate (finance, political leadership). They can't afford to keep up an investigation for years, which is sometimes necessary to find the dirt (Watergate). And so on.

[Lord Zentei]

The internet overall isn't more trustworthy than other media, IMHO. While it is certainly harder to censor, it's also easier to be indunated by all kinds of bullshit, and each site can independently be dishonest. Moreover, it's possible for bullshit to go viral.

In any case, here's a video on exactly this sort of selective editing:




EDIT: on another note, Jesse Ventura is a shithead.