graeme
sources a good idea?
Posted on: 03/28/2012 19:23
It may sound strange to hear this from an academic historian - but Ii think sources are much overvalued in most areas of thought - especially in understanding the news.
When Staff Sgt. Major Bales killed 27 people, all the news reports carried the story that he had acted alone, left his camp in the middle of the night with his rifle and a few gallons of gasoline, walked a coujple of mlies to a village, killed 17 people, set fire to the bodies, walked back to the base, and surrendered and convessed.
Wihtin hours, we also got the story he had PTSD going back to an accident in Iraq two or three years ago.
That's what all the news sources set. that's what the amry command said. That's is the story that Obama publicly vouched for.
Those are pretty strong sources.
But anybody should have realized from the first press release it was mostly lies.
He walked out of a base in the middle of the night in a combat zone? Really? You need permission for that. There are guards, too..
He had severe PTSD? The army knew it? and it sent him to a combat zone?
So he walked two miles to a village with a rifle and some gallons gas, shot seventeen people, burned the bodies - all alone - and walked back - all in one hour.
That's obviously a pack of lies. But that's what many, respectable news sources are still saying -a nd that is the only version most people are likely ever to hear.
In fact, there were two villages - some considerable distance from each other. He returned to the base after one village, ate, and went out again. Gee. Where are those guards?
People at the site say there were twenty soldiers - and a helicopter.
So say this was a regular night raid, somehing that had been reported hundreds of times- a terror raid, on orders of a senior officer. Maybe.
My own guess is that we could be watching the breakdown of morale that also happend in Vietnam when soldiers were killing their own officers.
Whatever the truth may be, it cannot be the story that appeared originally and is still appearing.
Want a prediction? The government will go heavy on the PTSD story - delay the trial as long as possible, then go for a slap on the wrist.
Sources are useful. But they should never be used as a substitute for common sense.
.
Search
Recently Active...
Comments
Pilgrims Progress
Posted on: 03/29/2012 01:36
You make a lot of valid points.........
I've also noticed that quoting sources often gives an opinion more credibility than perhaps it should.
It's distorting - we're lead to think what's quoted is what actually happened.
Allowing for a point of view and bias, it seldom -if never- is..........
My personal bugbear is reporters interviewing reporters...........
InannaWhimsey
Posted on: 03/29/2012 07:24
good QED, graeme :3 i see sources as an aid to check on the article's bona fides (and as a kind of hyperlink where i can do further research myself, like wikipedia is good for; it provides lots of hyperlinks) as with everything else, they aren't an excuse to stop thinking
whenever i read a news article i try to keep it in the "maybe" category and if i am interested in it i check out at least 2 other news outlets that aren't of the same bias to see their take on it
it is thanks to Scott Atran that i first found out that all news follows a power law distribution, which i've come to understand as all of the news is courtesy of just a few sources...
i'm a bit troubled by when i read news items where the sources are twitter or other social networking sites...
and i'm glad that i picked up an idea from somewhere (i can't remember whom) that news by definition isn't news...it takes something very complex and with connections to a whole bunch of other aspects of reality and then cuts it into bits, creates reality, controversy and then tries to sell itself as an Authority...
in related news, i found an old Discover magazine article that says one of my things that i've been riffing on and complaing aboot
graeme
Posted on: 03/29/2012 17:46
It's hard to know who's respectable. Reuter's is long established as a news source. But much of their foreign news is pretty dreadful stuff. For example, I've noticed it draws heavily for information on the war in Syria on something called The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. It certainly has an impressive ring to it.
In fact, The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights is one man - who isn't even in Syria. He lives in England where he runs a clothing store. He is also very pro-rebel. And it certainly shows in the tone of Reuters reports.
But these reports are highly regarded in the journalism world - so that much of our news on Syria si coming from a man who runs a clothing story in England and who hates the Syrian government.
And I'm afraid a great deal of our news is like that.
InannaWhimsey
Posted on: 03/29/2012 18:39
graeme,
LOL! That's wonderful :3 Such power. "News" being the BS of a particular person; how very much like other areas of life i've experienced, like religion and laws in some respect, social norms...
InannaWhimsey
Posted on: 05/13/2012 04:46
I just read an article from The Canadian Press aboot that Montreal subway smoke bomb incident and it actually quotes someone on the Internet who talked on a certain site.
w
o
w
We're living in the future
graeme
Posted on: 05/13/2012 16:18
Oh, there's a 2 or 3 billion dollar complex going up in the US. It wil make it possible to save and record every computer, phone, etc. us in the whole USA, possibly in Canada, too. The future has arrived.
InannaWhimsey
Posted on: 05/14/2012 19:31
Oh, there's a 2 or 3 billion dollar complex going up in the US. It wil make it possible to save and record every computer, phone, etc. us in the whole USA, possibly in Canada, too. The future has arrived.
I thought G_d already had one of those? Yanno, when one gets beyond a certain age, one needs all the help they can get...is G_d outsourcing?
graeme
Posted on: 05/14/2012 20:41
yes. it's the step after globalization.
graeme
Posted on: 05/18/2012 20:46
Oh - another problem with sources.....they can be----twisted.
NATO has claimed a very small number of civilians killed in the bombing of Libya. the UN, though has released figures which show NATO as understimating its killing of cilivians. But there's more. Much more.
The UN figures are of civilians killed by BOMBS. But -
by intervening in Libya, NATO made it possible for the rebels to win on the ground, killing thousands of civilians in the process - not to mention rape, imprisonment, torture, and robbery. The killing still goes on today. Special targets have been African blacks in Libya. Nobody has any count of the thousands who have died and those who are going to die.
It's not just our bombs that killed people. It was our intervention, itself. you know, our mercy mission.
Our side is now playing the same game in Syria. the rebels are bankrolled, supplemented by mercenaries, and supplied by our side. The rebellion - and the killing it has caused - is continuing because we are making ti possible for it to continue.
Alex
Posted on: 05/19/2012 02:09
It is good that you point this out. Rember the death of Pat Tillman. He was a pro-football playe who after 9/11 quit playing to join the army. He had bought into the whole American freedom was under attack. He became a poster boy for the Arny to encourage new enlistment. Thus he had a very high profile.
This became a problem when he was killed by other enlisted men in the US army. The army said he was killed by the enemy. Howevr several inconistencies in the story caused his mother to dig deeper. She and her family faced immediate hostility, even when asking simple questions about what happened. This hostility made her even more suspicious.
She uncovered documents that show the whole line of command up to the top knew immediately that he had been killed by his own men, and choose to cover it up and invented the story about him being killed by the enemy.
The military than changed the story and admitted he was killed by his men, but that it was a friendly fire accident. This is the current offical story
Further investgations incluidng interviews with those he fought with and other documents lead his mother to believ he was murdered on purpose, with sevral men involved. (similar to a firing squad, except he was shot in the back)
While friends of his believed he was killed because his strong work ethic was resented, a lot of documentaion shows that he was hated for being an atheist. He was blamed for not fitting in,(based not on behaviour but on his atheism) and the army started a counter information campaign when his mother started asking questions. Documents uncovered showed they were trying to discredit him and his family for being dishonest and strange, because why would anyone be good and honest if they were atheists. Thus they could justify lieing about what really happened.