Isn't Fox Making You Sick?

I don't so much watch Fox News in the evenings as I do leave it on in the background while doing other things. If a major news story breaks, I can usually count on them to tip me off.

All night long this evening, host after host, I heard one weak rationalization after another as to why they were airing news and video of mass murderer Cho Seung-Hui. From Hannity, to Van Sustern to O'Reilly, it went something like this: "We are only doing it to halp!" Well, what a crock.

Yes, there are serious things serious people might learn from what that insane mass murderer left behind. But they are not the province of broadcast television just days after the tragic event. I think the media as a whole has terribly misread America on this one. America is intelligent enough to understand that this man was completely deranged. And attempting to learn anything about reality from such a lunatic only draws you down into his own morass of confusion and hate.

Knock it off, Fox and others. Allow me to break in with this important message from America to you: Leave America and especially those most impacted by this tragic event at least one shred of dignity and a measure of peace. We don't need to endlessly see and hear a murdering psychopath's mindlessly evil rants: enough is enough!

We know what your real objective is - ratings for your tawdry broadcasts and nothing more.

Now, stop!

Comments

[JoeBloe]

I completely disagree with you.

First off, who are you to speak for America?

Secondly, I do not want media outlets deciding what I can and cant see, what I am able to handle. You seem to have a sense of the news as being some sort of a packaged product that the authorities (albeit private sector) dole out to us, with this stuff being not well suited to the target audience.
Of course the media outlets tend to see things this way already - why on earth are you agreeing with them? Do you want to be a slave to the dictates of the program managers?

The right of the people to the free flow of information vastly outweighs the desire to not offend some people. Life can be hard sometimes, that is not a justification for treating all of us as precious little children in need of protection from reality.

[tyingtounderstand]

what drives me nuts about fox is that stupid Pavlovian bell and the switching of the camera for the same anchor and then having that anchor say: "This is breaking news" and then proceed to tell you that Greta has a hang nail on her big toe. When fox initially came on the air they saved that damn bell and that dumb phrase for those events that were truly of import. Now, they use that bell and phrase for every little dumb thing so that it loses its effectiveness so...when they really do have something of import to say,you miss the beginning of it cause you have conditioned yourself, due to self preservation, to ignore the bell!

[Dan Riehl]

Right, Joe Blow - enjoy your mass murderer porn, schmuck. You learned squat from that gibberish. Maybe it just got you off.

[tally]

there's only so much you can say about the evil crazy little bastard. enough is enough. earlier some stupid reporter was actually egging cho's suite mate with stuff like aren't you terrified knowing he could have come after you. hannity thought her interview was great. sickening.

[Retread]

The tone of last night's coverage seemed changed enough that I imagine Fox was reacting to viewer complaints. They did finally present a piece that addressed the victims as individuals with names, home towns and faces.

No, I'm not defending Fox, just pointing out that they, like the others, slide into sensationalism and seemed to finally realize it yesterday and shift focus a bit to cover the victims of the madman.

[BobInStamford]

I watch Fox to get the daily terror alert level and because it shows a waving flag in the top corner. The flag inspires our troops during their successful surge. Fox is for patriots.

[seekeronos]

Having been in Japan for the past 3 weeks... it scored big on the NHK news and Fuji News network for about 3 days. Not a peep on any of the talking head shows (the so-called "talent" shows)...

But get one minor earthquake here, and it is in the news for weeks. I guess one the scope and intensity of the "news" coverage depends upon how close to home it is.

[Legalize]

I love that Riehl's complaint against Faux News here is that it is showing material that makes him feel impotent, confused, ahd hateful. Riehl prefers to view the disturbing material that makes him feel like a riehl hero, and that which permits him to make partisan "points." That fact that there is no underlying politics to the VT event pretty much renders the killer's "manifesto" useless to Riehl.

Anyone want to bet that if the killer's rant focused squarely on the war in Iraq, Bush, etc., Riehl and the brood that populates the wingnutosphere would be screaming at the top of their lungs about "THE LEFTISTZ!!!!11one!"? I mean, every other time a a lone nut makes a left-of-Mussolini point with violence, this is the case.

[nowinger]

I'm not sure of the wingers over at LGF have given up on their hope/belief that this guy was a muslim terrorist! If I ever questioned the level of hate and insanity seeing 2000 posts about this 'asian' being an arab or one of the 'asian muslims' or part of a terrorist cell, or my personal favorite, part of the IlsamOfascits LONG TERM PLAN TO DISARM AMERICA, I question it no more. They're all stark raving mad.

That said, it seems to me that publicizing this guys rants which he purposefully sent to the media is giving him what he wanted, it reinforces the idea that if you don't have any friends and get get along in life if you make a bunch of videotapes and then kill a few dozen people the world will know of you, your 'pain' and you will be famous. The airing of his 'manifesto' will encourage other nuts to do the same thing.

[Zifnab]

"We know what your real objective is - ratings for your tawdry broadcasts and nothing more."

Whoa, whoa. Slow down a bit. Back up there. Are you suggesting that Rupert Murdoch, the bastion of such journalistic --tabloids-- masterpieces as The Star and The New York Post, started such a media empire for money? Money that is generated by ratings?!

I am shocked, Dan! Shocked and appauled! The very idea that a cable news channel would pander to the tawdry masses purely to garner eyeballs and ad-dollars is simply blasphemous!

Next you'll be claiming that Nancy Grace keeps her show because of her shock value rather than her logical, even-handed analysis of politically charged court cases. Or that Chris Mathews continues work on Hardball because of something other than his sparkling intellect. Or that the 24/7 ANS coverage, preceeded by the 24/7 coverage of the wrong guy in the ten-year old Ramsey slaying, preceeded by the 24/7 coverage of some girl gone missing in Aruba, was done with anything less than a media imperative to cover the most important news events with the most clear-headed thinkers. Damnit, Dan! Shootings! Blondies with boobies! The people have a right to know!

:-p

[Legalize]

"I'm not sure of the wingers over at LGF have given up on their hope/belief that this guy was a muslim terrorist! If I ever questioned the level of hate and insanity seeing 2000 posts about this 'asian' being an arab or one of the 'asian muslims' or part of a terrorist cell, or my personal favorite, part of the IlsamOfascits LONG TERM PLAN TO DISARM AMERICA, I question it no more. They're all stark raving mad."

They will NEVER give up their delusions over there; in fact they just become more stark-raving and loony with every passing event. If you really want to see thier deranged minds in action, check out the comments in the threads about the "scare" in Boston, or the Cory Lidle plane crash incident in NYC. EVERYTHING to them, no matter how attenuated from reality, is evidence of creeping Islamohippyhomovegancommiefascism.

"That said, it seems to me that publicizing this guys rants which he purposefully sent to the media is giving him what he wanted, it reinforces the idea that if you don't have any friends and get get along in life if you make a bunch of videotapes and then kill a few dozen people the world will know of you, your 'pain' and you will be famous. The airing of his 'manifesto' will encourage other nuts to do the same thing."

I'm still not sure about this argument; I don't think those predisposed toward such violence require the promise of being on television to motivate their rampages. I mean, if a person shoots up an office building or anything else, he's gonna make the news; this has always been the case. And the guy's "manifesto" is simply an item of "news" in any event. The fact that it is disturbing and repugnant doesn't make it less newsworthy. Personally, I hope the entirety is distributed for public examination.

[nowinger]

The difference here is the premeditation, he sent it to NBC. It wasn't found among his things or on his computer. This tells me that when he went out in a blaze of glory he was thinking: tomorrow the world will know! When this garbage that he sent himself to the media is aired we're reinforcing what he did. He's not just on TV as a mass murderer, but his own twisted thinking is out there for public consumption.

Of course if NBC had refused to make available his insane rantings that would have been concrete, ironclad evidence that the terorrist loving media was coving up the fact that he was an IslamOfascist terrorist, part of a terrorist cell, etc. etc.

Yeah, I did read the rantings about the Boston scare, that too, was another in a long line of dry runs for future terrorist attacks, making us blind to the dangers of light box cartoon characters. But they do it every time. Every time anyone who might be a muslim is detained, its a terrorist attack, dry run. Doesn't even matter what the police say. Those dumbfucks are still convinced the arab college kids with cell phones were terrorists and the pregnant Pakistani woman with the water bottle was a terrrorist mule doing a dry run.

The disappointment that this guy is your run of the mill pyschotic is palpable over there. But, I note some of them haven't given up yet. Ismail Ax doncha know.

[Zifnab]

He's dead. Whatever publicity he garners, he'll never get to appreciate. You can't avenge yourself against a dead guy, so why try? Not running the stories to "get back" at Chou doesn't actually get back at him. He totally doesn't care if you run them anymore.

However, the kid has basically spelled out a recipe for garnering attention if you're crazy enough to pull it off. Running these stories doesn't matter for Chou, but it does matter for all the future Chous of the world who are probably watching this media orgy and thinking, "I've got no friends and I'd love to appear on TV. Why not go out in a blaze of gory?" In that sense, I'd definitely second-guess running all this hype. Of course, if FOX/CNN/MSNBC don't run it, someone will. And that'll be that many extra eyeballs and ad-dollars the Cable Buddies lose out on. Who can afford that?

[nowinger]

I have to amend my previous post, LGF is still not convinced that the IslamOfascists weren't behind Cho's massacre. They want to know why someone in his family went to Saudi Arabia and want to know what 'else' was on his computer.

I also learned over there that Jose Padilla was McVeigh's partner in Oklahoma, will wonders never cease.

[Legalize]

It makes me wonder about the sanity of your average winger when they are speculating about the killer's incoherent screen name, and the use of "88" as a means of clutching like grim death, to the Islamo / Nazi angle. Remember, these are the same nitwits who see no smoking gun in the Abu Gonzales matter, which means we should therefor not even think about the story. These are also the same fuckwits who conclude that a finding a bottle of chlorine in a shed in Abar Province means that Saddam totally had WMD. I guess we shouldn't be surprised that their mental illness parallels that of the VT killer in many ways: paranoia; delusions of grandeur; an absolute unwillingness to take responsibility for their actions and positions; violent rage at the world for not seeing things as they "clearly" are to them; general blood lust; revenge fantasies; a love of violence and weapons generally; etc.

The big differnce between your average winger and the VT killer is that your average winger LOVES and WORSHIPS violence as a means of propping up authority (while rarely ever lifting a finger, mind you), while the VT killer used violence as a misguided tool of attacking those he perceived to be tools of authority - or authority itself. In any event, the "thinking" and rational faculties of the VT killer and the average winger, is confounding to say the least.

[nowinger]

Wingers are scared little cowards and always have been. They have ALWAYS had a boogeyman, the creeping evil that was going to do them in and that was the root cause of everything wrong in the world.

First it was blacks, then jews/commies, next Democrats and now, they see IslamOfacists behind every tree.

My other favorite LGF post of the day was some nut who was offended when he called the FBI to get his local New Jersey reservoir listed as a potential terrorist target and they didn't take him seriously!!!???

[tyingtounderstand]

http://www.videosift.com/video/Fox-News-parody-its-funny-cause-its-true