CA
How do you know it's crap if you've never watched it? I've never watched it and understood it (obviously as I don't speak Arabic), but I'm personally not willing to make a value judgement on something before I've seen it. That sounds a bit Fox News to me.
Al Jazeera aims to have the same relationship with its Government pretty much as the BBC has with ours. Of course, neither is truly independent (financially) and I would agree that the power to censor Al Jazeera would probably be quite a bit stronger.
However, Al Jazeera's reporting has caused many ripples in Arabic governments, and led it to being banned in Algeria, Bahrain and temporarily in Iraq. So it can't be that much of a mouthpiece propping up these regimes, can it?
However, on one issue, I have provided an example of where one undemocratic government told the truth and democratic governments told lies, ie Iraq's WMDs, links to terrorism etc. As much as I dislike those regimes, an independent observer would draw the conclusion that undemocratic governments may not lie all the time, and democratic governments may not tell the truth all the time.
As is 'natural', the BBC et al here and the American media tended to place more faith in the evidence of their home governments than of Iraq. Al Jazeera, of course, did not, and their constant reporting on the lack of WMDs, lack of links to 9/11 were per se more accurate than our own media, it has been shown in hindsight.
Thus, any reasonable observer would think that it is best to get more than one side of an argument, no matter what the source, as democratic governments are not always truthful and undemocratic governments don't always tell porkie pies.
And that is connected to the media how? Are we talking about political systems here, or are we talking about accuracy in reporting?
I was not disputing your comments about al-Jazeera, and if you look at my original post you'll see that. I am not going to judge the channel when a) it's not launched and b) I don't speak the language of its big sister, so don't have a clue what they talk about. The only pre-concieved impression I have of the thing is that it's probably as sceptical about what's happening in Iraq as Fox News is cheering it on. Neither one of those positions is good journalism, but like I said, that's just from what I've heard of it, not from what I know.
I was taking up the point that unelected Arab governments having a voice (whomever provides it) certainly is not a ''nice counterbalance'' to the regular stuff - that's sort of like saying war is a ''nice counterbalance to peace''.
All New Johnnyboy posted:
cat posted:
Like I said, Johnnyboy, if you want to watch undemocratic Arab governments putting out crap, that's fine.
How do you know it's crap if you've never watched it? I've never watched it and understood it (obviously as I don't speak Arabic), but I'm personally not willing to make a value judgement on something before I've seen it. That sounds a bit Fox News to me.
Al Jazeera aims to have the same relationship with its Government pretty much as the BBC has with ours. Of course, neither is truly independent (financially) and I would agree that the power to censor Al Jazeera would probably be quite a bit stronger.
However, Al Jazeera's reporting has caused many ripples in Arabic governments, and led it to being banned in Algeria, Bahrain and temporarily in Iraq. So it can't be that much of a mouthpiece propping up these regimes, can it?
However, on one issue, I have provided an example of where one undemocratic government told the truth and democratic governments told lies, ie Iraq's WMDs, links to terrorism etc. As much as I dislike those regimes, an independent observer would draw the conclusion that undemocratic governments may not lie all the time, and democratic governments may not tell the truth all the time.
As is 'natural', the BBC et al here and the American media tended to place more faith in the evidence of their home governments than of Iraq. Al Jazeera, of course, did not, and their constant reporting on the lack of WMDs, lack of links to 9/11 were per se more accurate than our own media, it has been shown in hindsight.
Thus, any reasonable observer would think that it is best to get more than one side of an argument, no matter what the source, as democratic governments are not always truthful and undemocratic governments don't always tell porkie pies.
cat posted:
I agree, no government is honest all of the time.
But at least ours lets us kick it out when it gets rumbled. There's not one government in the Arab world that gives its citizens that right. (Turkey is an exception, for obvious reasons).
But at least ours lets us kick it out when it gets rumbled. There's not one government in the Arab world that gives its citizens that right. (Turkey is an exception, for obvious reasons).
And that is connected to the media how? Are we talking about political systems here, or are we talking about accuracy in reporting?
I was not disputing your comments about al-Jazeera, and if you look at my original post you'll see that. I am not going to judge the channel when a) it's not launched and b) I don't speak the language of its big sister, so don't have a clue what they talk about. The only pre-concieved impression I have of the thing is that it's probably as sceptical about what's happening in Iraq as Fox News is cheering it on. Neither one of those positions is good journalism, but like I said, that's just from what I've heard of it, not from what I know.
I was taking up the point that unelected Arab governments having a voice (whomever provides it) certainly is not a ''nice counterbalance'' to the regular stuff - that's sort of like saying war is a ''nice counterbalance to peace''.