Tuesday, June 01, 2004
Comments Re: NY Times' Mea Culpa
The most troubling aspect to all of this is that we live in an age where we are provided with unprecedented access to information including newspapers, online sources (including great blog sites), television and radio. We're saturated with information like never before. While that sounds reassuring, and while I like to believe that I can obtain my news from unbiased sources whose job is to report the news objectively and without slant, it just isn't true.
An avid reader of any news pertaining to snakes, crocodiles and sharks (yes, there's a little bit o' the Crocodile Hunter in all of us), I was troubled to see that there were at least three different lengths reported in three different periodicals pertaining to a recent alligator attack in Florida. If something as objective as a captured reptile's length can't be accurately reported, how could anything so subjective as, say, a known unknown, to quote that master wordsmith Donald Rumsfeld, whether there are or aren't WMDs in Iraq.
Suffice to say, while we live in an age of more information, it ain't necessarily true information. The drums of scoop journalism are ringing loudly right now, and these companies have got papers to sell. And, war sells better than peace any day of the week.
Alex
Tokyo, Japan
An avid reader of any news pertaining to snakes, crocodiles and sharks (yes, there's a little bit o' the Crocodile Hunter in all of us), I was troubled to see that there were at least three different lengths reported in three different periodicals pertaining to a recent alligator attack in Florida. If something as objective as a captured reptile's length can't be accurately reported, how could anything so subjective as, say, a known unknown, to quote that master wordsmith Donald Rumsfeld, whether there are or aren't WMDs in Iraq.
Suffice to say, while we live in an age of more information, it ain't necessarily true information. The drums of scoop journalism are ringing loudly right now, and these companies have got papers to sell. And, war sells better than peace any day of the week.
Alex
Tokyo, Japan
