Increasingly since the advent of rolling live TV news, news agencies face the challenge of supplying demand for popular stories in a fiercely competitive market, where Political interests often require spinning of the subject matter. In this tripartite meeting place between profit making, reporting the facts and spinning the Government cheese, the one thing you can be sure of is that the news you are seeing places the traditionally understood model of journalistic integrity guiding honest reporting of events considerably below the other two.
The Lara Logan story demonstrates how far news agencies have strayed from the path of honest reporting quite well.
Remember just a few Months ago how captivated we all were with events in Cairo's Tahrir square. The brave protesters facing down the nasty Mubarak forces. How we cheered them on. Papers ran double page spreads showing where each group had their headquarters and where the toilets were and where the Human rights activists were. All jolly good reporting which we lapped up. Thousands of miles of newsprint sold. Tahrir square - right up there with Tiananmen. The tension grew and grew and wherever you went, anywhere in the world for that matter, the talk was all perfectly clear. Mubarak bad. Protesters good. Support change in Egypt. Then, overnight, Egypt disappeared from the news. The disappearance coincided with events following Mubarak's resignation announcement, 11 February, and in the time it takes to say 'Nothing to see here' Egypt's revolution was pushed down the pecking order with just a one line mention of a journalist being assaulted in the Cairo Square.
What happened to Lara Logan, South African born reporter for CBS, is of course not the news that suits the commercial interests of the broadcasters, placing itself so firmly at odds with the product on sale. Mubarak, established regime, bad - Protesters, change for the better, good.
Twenty five minutes after Lara Logan's horrific sexual attack by around 200 men, who committed acts so violent and debased that describing them as barbaric animals whose actions demonstrate with more clarity than any gifted writer could hope to achieve with the written word, the inherent vulgarity of their belief system, Egypt was no longer suitable front-page news.
The thought that for 25 minutes whilst the good men of Tahrir square repeatedly raped, bit chunks off, urinated and ejaculated over, and generally battered this woman, no one in the crowd saw fit to intervene, although some felt it appropriate to cheer and clap, while others photographed the attack on their cell phones.
Eventually, someone did step in. Gosh and darn. One of Mubarak's soldiers, who baton charged the raping protesters and carried her body, over his shoulder, out of further harms way. Almost certainly that mans actions saved Lara Logan's life.
That soldiers story would make a good feature, wouldn't it? Brave fellow who placed his own life at risk at a time when he was very much a villain of world peace. Well. of course not. He is/was a Mubarak employee and no one is interested in that story. (I wonder if Lara Logan ever found him with thanks.)
Even her own employers, CBS News downplayed the incident. Nothing to see here.
http://www.uncoverage.net/2011/02/lara-logans-rape-in-egypt-square-much-worse-than-reported/
News is a cynical business. I find its usually safe to assume 90% of what you see is split between Government cheese and broadcasters commercial interest. Coincidentally this is about the same percentage split Ronnie Johnson's formula for identifying idiots confirms.
The Lara Logan story demonstrates how far news agencies have strayed from the path of honest reporting quite well.
Remember just a few Months ago how captivated we all were with events in Cairo's Tahrir square. The brave protesters facing down the nasty Mubarak forces. How we cheered them on. Papers ran double page spreads showing where each group had their headquarters and where the toilets were and where the Human rights activists were. All jolly good reporting which we lapped up. Thousands of miles of newsprint sold. Tahrir square - right up there with Tiananmen. The tension grew and grew and wherever you went, anywhere in the world for that matter, the talk was all perfectly clear. Mubarak bad. Protesters good. Support change in Egypt. Then, overnight, Egypt disappeared from the news. The disappearance coincided with events following Mubarak's resignation announcement, 11 February, and in the time it takes to say 'Nothing to see here' Egypt's revolution was pushed down the pecking order with just a one line mention of a journalist being assaulted in the Cairo Square.What happened to Lara Logan, South African born reporter for CBS, is of course not the news that suits the commercial interests of the broadcasters, placing itself so firmly at odds with the product on sale. Mubarak, established regime, bad - Protesters, change for the better, good.
Twenty five minutes after Lara Logan's horrific sexual attack by around 200 men, who committed acts so violent and debased that describing them as barbaric animals whose actions demonstrate with more clarity than any gifted writer could hope to achieve with the written word, the inherent vulgarity of their belief system, Egypt was no longer suitable front-page news.
The thought that for 25 minutes whilst the good men of Tahrir square repeatedly raped, bit chunks off, urinated and ejaculated over, and generally battered this woman, no one in the crowd saw fit to intervene, although some felt it appropriate to cheer and clap, while others photographed the attack on their cell phones.
Eventually, someone did step in. Gosh and darn. One of Mubarak's soldiers, who baton charged the raping protesters and carried her body, over his shoulder, out of further harms way. Almost certainly that mans actions saved Lara Logan's life.
That soldiers story would make a good feature, wouldn't it? Brave fellow who placed his own life at risk at a time when he was very much a villain of world peace. Well. of course not. He is/was a Mubarak employee and no one is interested in that story. (I wonder if Lara Logan ever found him with thanks.)
Even her own employers, CBS News downplayed the incident. Nothing to see here.
http://www.uncoverage.net/2011/02/lara-logans-rape-in-egypt-square-much-worse-than-reported/
News is a cynical business. I find its usually safe to assume 90% of what you see is split between Government cheese and broadcasters commercial interest. Coincidentally this is about the same percentage split Ronnie Johnson's formula for identifying idiots confirms.
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