Fox News has consistently shown that it has only a passing interest in the truth of a story. I mean, thank god we’re elevating a major news organization to the level of not actually fabricating a complete event. What praise shall we lavish on them next?
If a poster were to accuse Fox News of deliberately infecting people with Ebola, and I pointed out that the accusation was untrue, I assume you would not believe it was relevant to say, “I mean, thank god we’re elevating a major news organization to the level of not actually not infecting people with Ebola. What praise shall we lavish on them next?”
The reason this observation is irrelevant is the logical fallacy of equivocation. “Dishonesty,” when applied to a news organization, can mean a lack of journalistic integrity, or it can mean a willingness to fabricate events, such as the Weekly World News’ breathless report that extraterrestrial aliens met with George H.W. Bush to help guide his policies.
To conflate the two is an example of fallacious equivocation.
So, too, is your rejoinder. Without specifically rebutting my point, you sarcastically suggest that Fox News’ journalistic flaws are the same as a willingness to fabricate an event out of whole cloth – which, so far as I am aware, is not a supportable allegation.
Do you wish to offer a specific rebuttal?
While I’d disagree that it describes the ‘whole’ thought process, it certainly ends up being how it plays out practically.
My personal perspective is that we are deathly afraid of any culture being ‘dominant’ and thus exerting its will/influence on another (and either feel guilty or oppressed, depending on which side of the coin we are on), and the only solution we can come up with is a Prime Directive-esque self-imposed cultural segregation. It’s ridiculous, because these American cultures developed and continue to develop in relationship with each other, and because the definition of, say, ‘black’ culture and ‘white’ culture are so blurry and fuzzy as to be almost meaningless in most (but not all) contexts.
Though, on the other hand, I want to be really conscious of the fact that as a white cis male I move easily through a culture that is generally shaped by the economic power of people who are like me, and surely there are times when I/we do things that take power from others who struggle to have their voices heard/represented.
On the other other hand, ‘culture’ by definition is a shared legacy. American culture may be fractured, but don’t we all have a stake in it? Plus, what about people who don’t fit easily into the cultural/racial/gendered ‘boxes’ that we’ve defined somewhat arbitrarily.
It’s intersectionality to the n’th degree, is insanely complicated, and so I think the best thing to do is to be open, aware, and cautious of people who shout too loudly one way or another. Anyone who thinks they have the answer or understand it completely is delusional.
You don’t have to completely fabricate an event to rip it of any and all context and meaning, as FOX so commonly does, to the point where what you are describing is so fundamentally different from reality as to convey entirely the wrong information. “You didn’t build that” happened, but that doesn’t mean that FOX’s reporting on it was anything but a batch of disgusting, vile lies.
Well there was that time they took out a full page add declaring all other news organization were ignoring a mass rally in Washington. Shall we mark that as incompetence, dishonesty, or fabrication?
Are you saying that you see that misunderstanding here in this thread, or among the college students that are protesting for safe spaces?
Both, I think, at least to some degree.
I don’t understand what you hope to accomplish by complaining about the source, unless you don’t believe the events in the video actually happened, and are trying to prove that by complaining about the source.
People getting “traumatized” over seeing a slogan they disagree with? Holy Cow! That’s ridiculous!
He’s trying to create a safe space on the messageboard.
Perhaps all cites from FoxNews should come with a Trigger Warning.
Regards,
Shodan
Caution: may contain peanuts.
That’s certainly journalistic dishonesty – a journalistically fair report would have acknowledged there was some press coverage while also presenting the claim that the coverage was insufficient for an event of that magnitude.
But it’s not fabrication: to “miss” a story is not necessarily to ignore it completely, but to miss its significance or fail to properly cover it consonant with its importance.
So Fox’s ad was guilty of equivocation: it uses the word “miss” to suggest that other news organizations completely ignored the event, while defensibly claiming the second meaning of the word.
But it’s certainly not an outright fabrication of an event on Fox’s part.
Here is the article about the protesters at Berkeley from the student newspaper:
Sather gate is a bit of a choke point when coming onto campus, and blocking it is pretty much a tradition for dumbass students who want to protest something. These protests accomplish two things (IHMO): get some press for your issue, and convince others students just how annoying you are.
Anecdotally - I have talked to people who might have been sympathetics to some issues shift after going through one of these.
Ah, to “miss” an event isn’t to fail to notice it, it’s actually to minimize the significance of the event.
I suppose discount, on a cost per letter, exceeded Fox’s purse. Tragic.
I date my shift away from radical politics to reading about a Berkeley protest in the mid-nineties. It was a long account of student actions from a participant, and I kept expecting the participation to have an epiphany: “I slowly realized that we weren’t actually making anything better,” the writer would say, “but instead were just alienating potential supporters so that we could feel good about ourselves. I left the group and joined a different group that wrote well-researched reports to give to legislators.”
But the writer never came close to realizing what a near-parody of activists they were writing, and I realized that’s how a lot of student activists thought, and I toned my own activism down sharply, and now I teach public school :).
No, I disagree, at least to the extent you’re claiming that in debate you can simply dismiss any story from Fox as a failure to constitute the requisite burden of proof from a rhetor.
If an event happened and Fox’s reporting provides a different “context and meaning,” then the burden still shifts to those who disagree with that context and meaning to provide their own, differing offer of context and meaning. You cannot simply dismiss a report of an event by assuming that perhaps the context and meaning are deceptive. That would be an example of the fallacy of argumentum ad ignoratium – we don’t know that this ISN’T the case, so let’s assume it is.
Here is an opinion piece arguing for the need of racialized safe spaces (link to Huffington Post):
Ethnic Minorities Deserve Safe Spaces Without White People
Whatever you think of it, it seems that comparing it to old style “segregation” is not a good perspective. Isn’t it rather trying to recover from the (historical and continuing) evils of segregation and racism?
Again, you substitute sarcasm for actual rebuttal.
As an intransitive verb, miss can certainly have that meaning: one is said to “miss the boat” when failing to correctly or completely take advantage of an opportunity, for instance.
Do you have a non-sarcastic, actual argument to advance?
I can certainly understand that!
You think universities should be places where people can be harrassed, intimidated, victimized or assaulted and that only certain small places within the university should be free of that?
That makes no sense.
The motive and end goal may be different, but the practical effect is the same: “Coloreds only.” The segregation may be intended for the benefit of minorities rather than discrimination against them, but it’s still the same thing, practically speaking.