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US Slips Again In Freedom of the Press Ranking
npwa writes to tell us Reporters Without Borders has released their annual worldwide press freedom index. While developing nations like Haiti and Mauritania continue to gain ground developed nations like France, Japan, and the US continue their downward spiral. From the article: "The United States (53rd) has fallen nine places since last year, after being in 17th position in the first year of the Index, in 2002. Relations between the media and the Bush administration sharply deteriorated after the president used the pretext of 'national security' to regard as suspicious any journalist who questioned his 'war on terrorism.' The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media's right not to reveal its sources, even threatens journalists whose investigations have no connection at all with terrorism."
Simply read the following page, here they explain their methodology.
Nice troll. RSF simply assumes journalists should be granted the following rights:
As a side note: your comments clearly reveals your lack of understanding of even the most basic universal human rights.
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
Since Slashdot is a web-based news site and forum, and not a newsgroup, I have to ask: which newsgroup did you copy this post from, and who was the original author?
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
"So if some islamist group threatens, say, danish journalists/cartoonists, the ranking of Danemark [sic] will go down."
That's a good point, but if that group's power or ability to levy punishment is significant, I think it makes sense to include. The reason censorship is wrong is that it's a violence-based denial of free speech. Whether it's a government, para-government, mafia, or militant group is largely irrelevant to the overall problem: lack of freedom. Presumably, the ranking takes into account the severity of the threat involved.
He who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.
from bias are the most enslaved to bias.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
The theory is that the press should have the right to hide sources (be they human or otherwise) no matter what so that people needn't be afraid to expose major scandals which the press can then inform the world about. Potentially there are situations where they could be exposing say, a scandal that involves the courts, the goverments and so forth so it's arguable in this case that they should be able to expose the truth without fear of those they are exposing coming down on them using the very system the reporter is exposing flaws in.
;)
I do mostly agree with you though, frankly I think there are more reporters that would abuse that protection than there are scandals serious enough to warrant it's existence. Certainly here in the UK a large amount of the press seem like bottom feeding low life scum anyway and that alone is enough to give me the feeling these kind of people don't deserve any special treatment to boost their already over-inflated egos, I'd guess it's the same elsewhere.
It is of course not suprising though that a press organisation would disagree with you and I and suggest that they deserve more freedoms however as that's the nature of humans, hell I work in IT and feel us IT workers should have the right to shoot dead users guilty of idiocy and incompetence but unfortunately that's another right we'll never be granted. That said it is somewhat ironic and amusing that an organisation that stands for freedom and objective reporting be guilty of writing a bias article though
Currently at least, the BBC is funded by a "TV Tax" called the license fee, about £120 per year per household with a colour TV or computer capable or receiving broadcast TV. There are discounts for old black and white televisions, partially sighted people. The issue of how to deal with on demand TV over the net is still not settled.
The BBC is fairly independant of the UK Government, and frequently annoys ministers with its news reporting.
However, every few year's the BBC has to have its Charter renewed, and at that point the government can make significant changes...
Let me demonstrate the difference in what I know about.
10 Hungary 3,00
What does it tell you? It would be wrong to assume that the press is great in Hungary. It only means that the press is not physically threatened. That is freedom of journalism.
Freedom of press also means that there is no outstanding bias in either way, which is simply not the case in ex-communist Hungary. Most of the press has been privatized into the hands of ex-communist businessman, so currently the press shows around 80%-20% bias towards the socialist side.
The hungarian "public" tv is called state tv for a reason, even by European media experts, in contrast for example the BBC which does a good job at maintaining balance and trying not to be too biased to either side. That is freedom of the press.
So yeah, you're free to write about what you want in Hungary, but informed opinion is hard to be established for the common people, because most of the domestic media is so biased. It is not even free market, when the government while doesn't jail journalists they don't like, but they do fund news sources they like (by advertising only in those papers for example) and boycott the ones they don't.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Have these things been happening to US journalists? If they have not, and neither have journalists in the other high-ranking nations, then how is this ranking conducted? Isn't that like ranking all the students who made 100% on their tests?
"The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media's right not to reveal its sources"
There is no such right, even though journalists love to pretend it is etched in the First Ammendment or something. And even if there were such a right, any responsible journalist wouldn't rely on anonymous sources anyways. They are notoriously unreliable (at least with a named source you can go back and verify what they said, and investigate how they know what they said they know). If I wrote "an anonymous official deep within the WhiteHouse said the other day that the Bush Administration only went to war in Iraq to get oil", that statement has no credibility. Yes, my "anonymous official" may have been Karl Rove himself, but it is just as likely (if not much more likely) that it was a janitor. I have essentially told you nothing while still making an attention grabbing headline.
Many like to point to Watergate as an example where anonymous sources (Deepthroat) broke open a case, but that is just not true. Neither Woodward nor Bernstein wrote about something simply because Deepthroat told it to them, instead they used his information as a guide as they sought independent confirmation. Had they written about some anonymous source named after a porno flick who told them the president had broken the law, they would have been laughed out of Washington. Though I'm not sure if that would have happened today now that the public's expectations in terms of evidence seems to have been lowered to the point where any scandal becomes instant credible news.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
Well, I'm European and I spent some time working in a project in the US. I watched Fox News every evening because it made me laugh a lot. It's completely ridiculous.
We have some pretty bad journalists, and our media are very biased, you can tell right away most things are manipulated. But we couldn't get to the level of Fox News, it's too brazen, people just wouldn't take it seriously.
Of course, if some Americans take the Fox crap seriously, it ceases to be funny, it becomes very, very dangerous.
Your comments are legitimate. But you also need to consider that one of the US' greatest exports is its media -- music, books, magazines, movies. The US State Department is VERY aggressive at making sure all of its trading partners have open markets to US product. Unfortunately most of the rest of the world doesn't consider culture = product. When there's a KFC 100' from the base of the pyramids, I think the world has just become a slightly less interesting place.
In canada we have an anachronistic, painful, paternalistic system called CANCON (canadian content) which mandates various %s of broadcast media/sales must be Canadian originating. Its an ugly system, but living so close the the US (and being so similar) its necessary to give some market niches breathing room. In music, alot of groups get a good starting base in Canada and then go onto larger fame, unlike 30-40 years ago when Joni Mitchell and Neil Young HAD to go to the US if they wanted to pursue music.
I think the bigger issue is that with the US national media being so insular, that when (many) americans travel abroad they're not appreciative of the differences between themselves and others. Its not that US is better or France is better, its that France does things differently and that's okay too.
And for the record, I've seen Canadians act like drunken idiots abroad and make me cringe, and German tourists are a species unto themselves.
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
Wow. Where's Bin Ladens head on a pike displayed on the White House lawn ? I don't see it. I did see him featured in a campaign ad, however. Wonder why this is so ?
"I heard this story about an American who visited once
I have travelled to 25 countries round the world, to USA many times, spanning four continents. I many many cases I have seen people treat Americans obsequiously, in a transparently patronising manner, because of their wealth, and yet the moment the American is gone the hatred is clear. In one country, I was with a group of tourists, with an American party, and only once I said I was English not American did the non-Americans even acknowledge my existence. I have noticed Canadians explain the same and seen an instant change of attitude.
If you're American, and offended, don't be - just remind yourself that yours is NOT the only way of life, and that the people who represent you both formally and informally on the world's stage do NOT give a very good impression, and that maybe it's about time you made your gov't accountable to the people, and put a stop to the corruption and crap dished out. Even Condy Rice admitted that the USA's stance on Iraq has been a disaster.
It is however either way besides the point. Most societies place different restrictions on their individuals. This index measures journalists ability to write whatever they want. Just because you deem them having to expose individiuals who have commited crimes just and how it should be doesn't make it less restricting.
"" How about taking the safety labels off everything, and let the stupidity-problem solve itself? """
SWIFT was not legal in EU *and* US jurisdictions. Over here, we take our privacy rights more seriously, and this is why, for example, for example the Belgian Data Privacy Commission and the Swiss Federal Data Protection Commissioner have denounced the scheme. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/17/swiss_swif t_transfers_illegal/ Oh, and by the way, the July 2005 bombings were carried out with only £3000. And Muslim terrorists use the hawala system to move money around without alerting banks, so its effectiveness is moot. Please tell me of a case where this data helped to catch a terrorist. Oh no! Wait, you can't tell me, because it's not just the detainees and the charges but the evidence that's secret. The scheme certainly was secret, though, even from those government departments whose remit is cross-border data transfer. Tom
It's not because it ruffles some feathers that it isn't true that the US knowingly trampled on EU laws. And it won't be soon forgiven.
Uhm I posted my previous comment in a moment of bitterness (bad day and all) so I suppose I should apologize for insulting you. Even if I do disagree with you. Still it's not a good reason to snap at you like that. Sorry!
Global warming is a cube.
For me, the right not to reveal sources is not fundamental to the freedom of press.
snip
I consider the ability to speak one's opinion, no matter how nasty it is, as a necessary prerequisite for freedom of speech.
Well, I consider it an item of freedom of speech to not say something. Especially if it happens to be who my sources are. I also think that advocating violence against one a group of people for their race, ethnicity, religion, sexual preference, or whatever constitutes a responsibility for those actions. If I teach my child that lesbians are sinners and deserve death, am I not responsible when my child kills one?
You have a very interesting twist on freedom of speech.
.
Why should they pay war criminals for self inflicted losses? The largest "loss" was, when at the time of the founding, the allied Arab powers decided to launch a "final solution" to push Israel into the sea.
The largest loss within the official borders of Israel result from the founding of Israel. Sure, the war directly following on that helped quite a bit as well, but the problem was that when Israel was founded, they effectively controlled about 50% of their territory at best. The remainder was in Palestinian hands, and that needed a 'fix'.
Large numbers of Palestinians left their homes to clear the battlefield: thus participating in attempted genocide.
Yes, they should have stayed where they were and get killed, sounds like a better solution indeed.
Lets just try a bit of a thought experiment...
A couple hundred years ago, New York was actually Dutch territory. How about the Dutch buying half of the property there, and then declaring it independent from the USA, meanwhile confiscating th eother half of the property there? The rest of the USA would not accept this? Why the hell do people in the USA expect the palestinians to accept something similar?
Thats true, i reside in a country which is not america, and i am pledging my help to you americans stuck in your represive country, if you would like to take me up on my offer see how you can make a difference for your own people on Anonet.
Have you read the news today? The BBC has acknowledged it is institutionally biased, based on a report it commissioned itself.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
And here is a good time to mention that Fox gets about twice the viewers of all other cable news shows combined. Consider that.
One of the problems is that the US's news has been slanted for so long that Fox hardly stands out as biased. The CIA's Operation Mockingbird literally subverted and took loose control of the three major broadcast networks and most large newspapers starting in the 1950s by appealing to the proprietors' and key journalists' sense of nationalism and by bribing them with stories. The goal of opposing Soviet expansion became conflated with stopping left-wing political activism since native support for the Soviet Union was excluded to segments of the left wing, and so the media was pulled to the ideological right. Some were already there; according to the book Age of Anxiety, the New York Times was instrumental in promoting Joe McCarthy because his fearmongering was approved of by the Sulzberger family.
Now a marvelous trick is being played: with the media already dominated by conservative (ABC, CBS, NBC), very conservative (NY Times, Washington Post), and extreme right-wing rah-rah go-US (CNN) voices, along come the Bircher-style Fox News and Rush Limbaugh and the like accusing them all of being left-wing liberals! They do this by reporting things you don't hear on the mainstream (already conservative, pro-Republican) news: a combination of completely made up lies or direct handouts from ideologically like-minded sources inside government that they complain "why isn't the mainstream media reporting this?" when they just got the fax in after breakfast that morning. The goal is to move the bounds of national discussion from moderate Democrat vs. conservative Republican where it had been towards being between the mildly managed, conservative and Republican-biased mainstream media and the extreme right wing, totally Republican Party controlled new media. The mainstream media is obligingly shifting to the right to try to appease them.
Launching constant attacks on the credibility of the mainstream media is part of how the new media make themselves look credible by comparison. Look at the current jihad aganst CNN, where Bush and the Republicans in Congress are condemning CNN as anti-US and trying to remove their access to stories in Iraq because CNN -- gasp! -- practiced journalism by playing a terrorist-produced tape that had journalistic value. And they are doing this to an organization that is so biased in favour of the US that it was caught running its programming through US Army Psychological Operations approvers during the Clinton administration. This is too recent an event to be considered by RSF's ranking, so to take it into account we should consider the US's position dropped down from 53's 4-way tie to 57 or 58.
Apparently being jailed for questioning the Holocaust is not considered an issue for press freedom.
The theory behind it being a crime to deny the Holocaust is that by doing so, you are in effect calling all Holocaust survivors liars (as it never happened, so they must be lying about what they saw/did). That would be libel or slander, a civil crime, *except* that in this case it is felt that the survivors have already been through enough, and should not have to defend themselves in court, hence it is a criminal matter, so the state can do it for them.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
You left off an important part of my statement. I was comparing it to most of the debate shows on the air today. I just want to be clear that I'm not comparing Jon Stewart to Brian Wiliams or any of the people who read the five minute broadcasts at the "top of the hour" on 24 hour news networks (those are probably the only part of their broadcast that can be classified as news). Jon Stweart is biased, and they _DO_ hit republicans harder than democrats. Some of it may be because Republicans are in power and there are only so many "democrats are too wordy" jokes to be made, but some of it is bias. With that having been said, I'm comparing this show to what you typically see on news networks, which usually either begins or ends with a preachy monologue about why you should think the way the host does (and the host clearly has a bias in most cases).
The only exception being Hannity and Colmes, but their bias is that Allan Colmes argues like a battered housewife who is afraid that if he really defends a liberal philosophy (by saying something other than "isn't it true that theoretically a liberal might not be as bad as you say"), that he will get punched in the mouth again. There's also the bias in the debate subjects, since they mostly seem to be accusations levied at democrats.
As for me sharing Stewart's bias, you are correct. But, his bias is not purely liberal. Part of his bias is that he knows that the ability to set the debate is a powerful one. It convinces people that there are only two options in every situation, and he tries to convince people that, if they look around, there is usually a smarter answer that is being completely overlooked.