War in Israel (2 Viewers)

[parasaurolophus]

One thing that stood out was how high the standards were for accuracy at the Times.

I have used this example before, and I won't get into the political details, but there was a weird story out about Bernie sanders, saying he lied about something during his campaign.

A yearbook photo emerged and WaPo sent a reporter to the school library to look at the yearbook from that year.

Now I used to use this as an example of journalistic standards.

But I have later come to realize that this is actually a perfect summation of how bias affects journalism.

That yearbook photo was verified in person, because it went against what they had originally printed. Had the yearbook photo supported their story further they would have inserted something like "according to a photo presented to the post by xyz"

This allows them to deny any wrongdoing if it turned out to be fake documentation.

This provides cover. It is a way to selectively report news that could very well be incorrect, but maintain the facade that they are truth seekers.

And this is not where that story ends(which I didn't learn until very recently). The journalist was so upset that the photo went against his story that he took to arguing with the school photo archives and got them to change the caption of the photo!!! Eventually the photographer caught wind of all of this and still had several photos from that day proving the original caption was correct and it has now been changed back.

 

[dickey moe]

The news media have a huge responsibility when it comes to accuracy of reporting. They have an equal responsibility to quickly own up to mistakes and retract, with explanation, when necessary. There is not nearly enough of that IMO, and it's a large part of the problem as to why the news media are largely distrusted these days.

 

[Boston]

The news media have a huge responsibility when it comes to accuracy of reporting. They have an equal responsibility to quickly own up to mistakes and retract, with explanation, when necessary. There is not nearly enough of that IMO, and it's a large part of the problem as to why the news media are largely distrusted these days.

Also, an error from a front-page story should not have a page 20 correction...too often/most often there is not equal weight given to the correction.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

 

[FreeBaGeL]

The NYT used a picture of a leveled building from somewhere else. Hope this helps

I literally just saw this.

Here's an explainer for those who are interested. @tommyGunZ in particular will find this interesting. NGL, I saw this NYT story myself on Twitter, on my phone, and on my desktop, and I never once thought to question whether that building was part of the hospital that was hit. I guess I sort of fell for this even if I was mad at the NYT for some other piece of misinformation.

Thanks for sharing. I think the NYT could have been better here. We agree in the micro - it's the macro where we diverge. Over the long run, you'll unquestionably be more accurately informed by reading the NYT, WaPost, etc. daily than following randoms on Twitter. There is far more misinformation and no editorial standards for the vast majority of armchair analysts on Twitter. None of them ever get any of the scrutiny the NYT is getting today.

I don't question your honesty IK, I'm sure there were lots of contrarians last night on twitter doubting Israel's responsibility. What I doubt is their accuracy over the long run vs. larger organizations with stricter standards and more seasoned editorial decision makers.

I’m not going to pretend to speak for IK here, but based on his comments in this thread, he isn’t “following randoms on Twitter.” He is following a specific subset of Twitter users who are drawn to facts, logic and critical analysis. People who have demonstrated what he concerns a rational approach to uncertain topics or events.

It wouldn’t surprise me in the least to see that type of subset of people “outperform” random media members, particularly when it comes to unusual events like this one.

(Side note: good to see you in here TGunz. I still credit you with saving me a ton of money during the mid/late 2000s real estate bubble)

Of course the question is how would they hold up if they were under the same kind of scrutiny as NYT etc, with people and entire websites dedicated to tracking their every move and finding and calling out even the smallest errors, even if those errors are immediately redacted or the limitations in the first place completely put up front.

How many times have they posted incorrect information and then deleted their tweet and IK was never the wiser because there isn't a website dedicated to screenshotting everything they ever post and then cross referencing it later to see if it was deleted or changed 5 minutes later or when more information became available?

In this case we aren't even given the sources. We just have to take it on faith that there are this collection of people out there that report only completely accurate info all the time, in realtime, even though no one is checking them on it and we don't even know who they are. And our source on this is a guy who, while generally a good rational dude, is clearly approaching this topic with an extremely heavy bias (see: insane post about how if Elon hadn't bought twitter the whole world would still think Israel bombed the hospital).

The 'realtime' is another issue, where the larger media outlets just can't win. If they post "Hospital bombed by Israel, Palestinian authorities claim" they get lambasted for reporting on the allegations coming out of the region in realtime, even though they very clearly qualify it as allegations being passed on 2nd hand that they haven't been able to verify yet. Likewise if they wait, they get equally lambasted as they did in the Prigozhin news where they waited an hour to TRY and confirm some of the reports coming from Russian sources, and people here on this forum went absolutely nuts over them not reporting on it sooner even though it was all over twitter already. So they really can't win in that respect. Meanwhile if the Twitter guys pass on "according to Russian news sources" they get heralded for being fast.

 

[The Commish]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

 

[Caveman33]

One thing that stood out was how high the standards were for accuracy at the Times.

I have used this example before, and I won't get into the political details, but there was a weird story out about Bernie sanders, saying he lied about something during his campaign.

A yearbook photo emerged and WaPo sent a reporter to the school library to look at the yearbook from that year.

Now I used to use this as an example of journalistic standards.

But I have later come to realize that this is actually a perfect summation of how bias affects journalism.

That yearbook photo was verified in person, because it went against what they had originally printed. Had the yearbook photo supported their story further they would have inserted something like "according to a photo presented to the post by xyz"

This allows them to deny any wrongdoing if it turned out to be fake documentation.

This provides cover. It is a way to selectively report news that could very well be incorrect, but maintain the facade that they are truth seekers.

And this is not where that story ends(which I didn't learn until very recently). The journalist was so upset that the photo went against his story that he took to arguing with the school photo archives and got them to change the caption of the photo!!! Eventually the photographer caught wind of all of this and still had several photos from that day proving the original caption was correct and it has now been changed back.

Exclusive: College Alumni Raise Doubts About Bernie Sanders Campaign Photo

The best image of the candidate's civil rights activism under spotlight

time.com

Being unfamiliar with this story, I googled and came across this article. Is this the incident you're referring to? It appears that the college photographer concluded, based on other photos that he took that day, that it is Sanders in the disputed photo. Some classmates disagree. They think it is Rappaport. Sanders and Rappaport were similar looking and both acted as leaders in the civil rights movement at their college. Whether it is Sanders or Rappaport in that photo, I don't think this is a good example of journalistic integrity.

 

[Battersbox]

A great Twitter follow is Drew Holden. He will often summarize the reporting of news outlets around major events such as this current bombing, which in theory would help hold accountable parties who were inaccurate in their reporting. In this case, not only were major U.S. media hasty with their headlines but international outlets acted similarly (Reuters, A.P.) Full disclosure, his perspective is of someone who leans to the right. With that said, if anyone had a strong follow for someone who might come from the other end of the ideological spectrum who does something similar please point me their way.

https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

 

[Joe Bryant]

A great Twitter follow is Drew Holden. He will often summarize the reporting of news outlets around major events such as this current bombing, which in theory would help hold accountable parties who were inaccurate in their reporting. In this case, not only were major U.S. media hasty with their headlines but international outlets acted similarly (Reuters, A.P.) Full disclosure, his perspective is of someone who leans to the right. With that said, if anyone had a strong follow for someone who might come from the other end of the ideological spectrum who does something similar please point me their way.

https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

Thank you @Battersbox I was not aware of that thread. This thread you linked does a good job of covering how the story was covered. Including from AP, Reuters and BBC https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

 

[Stoneworker]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Clearly you don't follow the BBC too closely...

Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza

'Hospital horror and 'bring my baby home'

DIGIONLY

www.bbc.com

 

[Joe Bryant]

A great Twitter follow is Drew Holden. He will often summarize the reporting of news outlets around major events such as this current bombing, which in theory would help hold accountable parties who were inaccurate in their reporting. In this case, not only were major U.S. media hasty with their headlines but international outlets acted similarly (Reuters, A.P.) Full disclosure, his perspective is of someone who leans to the right. With that said, if anyone had a strong follow for someone who might come from the other end of the ideological spectrum who does something similar please point me their way.

https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

Thank you @Battersbox I was not aware of that thread. This thread you linked does a good job of covering how the story was covered. Including from AP, Reuters and BBC https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

I also want to assume the best. I’m not how much is “carrying water” and how much is “fog of war” stuff. Coupled with an insane race to be first or at least soon after the first report.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

The NYT used a picture of a leveled building from somewhere else. Hope this helps

I literally just saw this.

Here's an explainer for those who are interested. @tommyGunZ in particular will find this interesting. NGL, I saw this NYT story myself on Twitter, on my phone, and on my desktop, and I never once thought to question whether that building was part of the hospital that was hit. I guess I sort of fell for this even if I was mad at the NYT for some other piece of misinformation.

Thanks for sharing. I think the NYT could have been better here. We agree in the micro - it's the macro where we diverge. Over the long run, you'll unquestionably be more accurately informed by reading the NYT, WaPost, etc. daily than following randoms on Twitter. There is far more misinformation and no editorial standards for the vast majority of armchair analysts on Twitter. None of them ever get any of the scrutiny the NYT is getting today.

I don't question your honesty IK, I'm sure there were lots of contrarians last night on twitter doubting Israel's responsibility. What I doubt is their accuracy over the long run vs. larger organizations with stricter standards and more seasoned editorial decision makers.

I’m not going to pretend to speak for IK here, but based on his comments in this thread, he isn’t “following randoms on Twitter.” He is following a specific subset of Twitter users who are drawn to facts, logic and critical analysis. People who have demonstrated what he concerns a rational approach to uncertain topics or events.

It wouldn’t surprise me in the least to see that type of subset of people “outperform” random media members, particularly when it comes to unusual events like this one.

(Side note: good to see you in here TGunz. I still credit you with saving me a ton of money during the mid/late 2000s real estate bubble)

Of course the question is how would they hold up if they were under the same kind of scrutiny as NYT etc, with people and entire websites dedicated to tracking their every move and finding and calling out even the smallest errors, even if those errors are immediately redacted or the limitations in the first place completely put up front.

How many times have they posted incorrect information and then deleted their tweet and IK was never the wiser because there isn't a website dedicated to screenshotting everything they ever post and then cross referencing it later to see if it was deleted or changed 5 minutes later or when more information became available?

In this case we aren't even given the sources. We just have to take it on faith that there are this collection of people out there that report only completely accurate info all the time, in realtime, even though no one is checking them on it and we don't even know who they are. And our source on this is a guy who, while generally a good rational dude, is clearly approaching this topic with an extremely heavy bias (see: insane post about how if Elon hadn't bought twitter the whole world would still think Israel bombed the hospital).

The 'realtime' is another issue, where the larger media outlets just can't win. If they post "Hospital bombed by Israel, Palestinian authorities claim" they get lambasted for reporting on the allegations coming out of the region in realtime, even though they very clearly qualify it as allegations being passed on 2nd hand that they haven't been able to verify yet. Likewise if they wait, they get equally lambasted as they did in the Prigozhin news where they waited an hour to TRY and confirm some of the reports coming from Russian sources, and people here on this forum went absolutely nuts over them not reporting on it sooner even though it was all over twitter already. So they really can't win in that respect. Meanwhile if the Twitter guys pass on "according to Russian news sources" they get heralded for being fast.

The media outlet you are defending ran a photo of a different bombed-out building in a different part of Gaza to make its readers think that the hospital they were writing about had been bombed. I unfollow people who do stuff like this, and block them if they show up in the algorithm. That's how you clean up a feed.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Clearly you don't follow the BBC too closely...

Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza

'Hospital horror and 'bring my baby home'

DIGIONLY

www.bbc.com

And it's small things, right?

"Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza"
sounds different from:
"Hamas says up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza"

When it's the same thing.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

It just seems like an impossible standard. Do we actually know Prigozhin was on that plane? Wasn't that entire story "according to Russian state sources"? Would it be better if we just had no idea that even happened right now, rather than "according to Russian state sources, Prigohzin was killed in a plane crash"?

Why is there no uproar on news sources reporting the Hamas invasion in the first place, rather than waiting until 3 days later when we had actual video footage of it?

Just seems like how these things have always worked. When there is some big event reported by a state, it gets reported on with the qualification that it is according to that state and has not yet been verified, and then updated as more information comes to light.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

For those praising AP for their reporting, I have some bad news for you.

Here's is a story from AP that just came out today. Give it a read. I want to focus on something in particular here, but it's worth reading the story first.

Read it? Okay, let's move on. Here's the part I want to draw your attention to. They're discussing the hospital strike:

I linked that same story - seems unbiased to me. People see what they want though.

A story can be "unbiased" but be factually incorrect. That is IK's point.

I understand - I don't think they generally get much wrong since they take a measured approach (and I didn't find that case he pointed out particularly egregious).

I find it a nice unaffiliated and unbiased news source that other news sources draw from. Some like Twitter, which is fine. To each their own.

I do think people seek sources that confirm their particular biases. I don't think that's a shocking statement and I don't claim to be immune to it - but since I hate both political parties equally (what they've become at least), I don't think I'm biased in that regard so enjoy my news to take a moderate approach as well.

I get that, but what I'm talking about here isn't bias. It's a lie. The AP reporters state as a matter of fact that a video shows the mangled corpses of people who were killed in the hospital strike. That simply isn't true. There is no such video. It's straight-up disinformation, not bias.

Everybody wants to go on and on about disinformation in social media, and yeah obviously there's lots of disinformation out there. So they go to "neutral" sources like AP and get openly lied to.

If anybody can find the video that the AP is referencing, I would appreciate a PM. Not that I particularly want to see that, but I do want to know if a large number of civilians were actually killed in this strike. That doesn't seem to have been the case, but it would be good to know.

 

[parasaurolophus]

One thing that stood out was how high the standards were for accuracy at the Times.

I have used this example before, and I won't get into the political details, but there was a weird story out about Bernie sanders, saying he lied about something during his campaign.

A yearbook photo emerged and WaPo sent a reporter to the school library to look at the yearbook from that year.

Now I used to use this as an example of journalistic standards.

But I have later come to realize that this is actually a perfect summation of how bias affects journalism.

That yearbook photo was verified in person, because it went against what they had originally printed. Had the yearbook photo supported their story further they would have inserted something like "according to a photo presented to the post by xyz"

This allows them to deny any wrongdoing if it turned out to be fake documentation.

This provides cover. It is a way to selectively report news that could very well be incorrect, but maintain the facade that they are truth seekers.

And this is not where that story ends(which I didn't learn until very recently). The journalist was so upset that the photo went against his story that he took to arguing with the school photo archives and got them to change the caption of the photo!!! Eventually the photographer caught wind of all of this and still had several photos from that day proving the original caption was correct and it has now been changed back.

Exclusive: College Alumni Raise Doubts About Bernie Sanders Campaign Photo

The best image of the candidate's civil rights activism under spotlight

time.com

Being unfamiliar with this story, I googled and came across this article. Is this the incident you're referring to? It appears that the college photographer concluded, based on other photos that he took that day, that it is Sanders in the disputed photo. Some classmates disagree. They think it is Rappaport. Sanders and Rappaport were similar looking and both acted as leaders in the civil rights movement at their college. Whether it is Sanders or Rappaport in that photo, I don't think this is a good example of journalistic integrity.

Time is a different publication than WaPo.

 

[Stoneworker]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Clearly you don't follow the BBC too closely...

Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza

'Hospital horror and 'bring my baby home'

DIGIONLY

www.bbc.com

And it's small things, right?

"Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza"
sounds different from:
"Hamas says up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza"

When it's the same thing.

My point is the poster claimed he had never heard the number 500 except in FFA, which is ludicrous. That number was being reported by a large number of major news sources, reputable and not so much. Including his own.

As to your point, this was lifted from the WSJ and is as good as it gets in terms of objectivity and listing sources.

Hamas and Palestinian officials blamed Israel and said at least 500 people were killed. Israel’s Prime Minister’s Office said there were “clear indications” that the blast was a misfire by the militant Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which the group denied. The source of the explosion couldn’t be immediately verified.

 

[Battersbox]

A great Twitter follow is Drew Holden. He will often summarize the reporting of news outlets around major events such as this current bombing, which in theory would help hold accountable parties who were inaccurate in their reporting. In this case, not only were major U.S. media hasty with their headlines but international outlets acted similarly (Reuters, A.P.) Full disclosure, his perspective is of someone who leans to the right. With that said, if anyone had a strong follow for someone who might come from the other end of the ideological spectrum who does something similar please point me their way.

https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

Thank you @Battersbox I was not aware of that thread. This thread you linked does a good job of covering how the story was covered. Including from AP, Reuters and BBC https://twitter.com/DrewHolden360/status/1714778669481124341

I also want to assume the best. I’m not how much is “carrying water” and how much is “fog of war” stuff. Coupled with an insane race to be first or at least soon after the first report.

I attribute the majority of these incidents of faulty reporting to the race to be first, certainly.

I've always felt Twitter is an invaluable, yet flawed, tool for staying informed. Accounts like Drew Holden's are one of the primary reasons why. Misinformation is rampant on the platform, but the truth is out there if you keep yourself honest and are willing to investigate multiple points of view. To me the extra effort is worth it if it means I get more unfiltered perspectives on any given topic.

 

[Joe Bryant]

I've always felt Twitter is an invaluable, yet flawed, tool for staying informed. Accounts like Drew Holden's are one of the primary reasons why. Misinformation is rampant on the platform, but the truth is out there if you keep yourself honest and are willing to investigate multiple points of view. To me the extra effort is worth it if it means I get more unfiltered perspectives on any given topic.

Agreed. It's a tool and like any tool, it has to be used correctly. When used correctly, I'm with you 100% it's invaluable.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Why is there no uproar on news sources reporting the Hamas invasion in the first place, rather than waiting until 3 days later when we had actual video footage of it?

Just seems like how these things have always worked. When there is some big event reported by a state, it gets reported on with the qualification that it is according to that state and has not yet been verified, and then updated as more information comes to light.

Because the Hamas invasion and the hospital strike aren't the same thing.

To use one example, consider the music festival. A bunch of people are enjoying themselves with cell phones at the ready. A group of gunmen show up and start killing everybody. This results in a bunch of texts, calls, videos, etc. all going out at the same time from people at the festival. There was never any dispute about the festival being attacked. Hamas openly took credit for it. I'm not sure what anybody was supposed to wait around for. None of the actual facts of what happened were being disputed by anybody, and they're still not.

By way of contrast, the hospital explosion occurred in a densely-packed urban environment in a war zone. When the explosion occurred, the cause was disputed immediately. Any reasonable observer could have identified at least three plausible explanations for why that explosion occurred: (1) Israel intentionally bombed the hospital, perhaps because they thought it was being used as a military staging area or perhaps because they are just jerks, (2) Israel accidentally bombed the hospital while trying to hit something else, an event that happens regularly in wars, and (3) Hamas blew it up themselves. And of course when dawn broke we learned that the hospital wasn't blown up after all and it was really just some burned out cars and broken windows. Admittedly, the media maybe couldn't have known that last part at the time, but they could have shown a little restraint because of the whole "fog of war" thing. None of these qualifiers applied to the Hamas attack on the music festival kids.

That's why there was no uproar about the reporting about the Hamas invasion and a big uproar about the reporting about the hospital explosion.

 

[SoBeDad]

People do this all the time. I make it a habit to click through these source-links from time to time, and I'd say it's about 50-50 as to whether the source actually backs the author up or not. This is an excellent habit to get into.

In academic articles, misatribution happens usually because authors are too lazy to read the articles they site. Peer-review by experts in the field reduces that. When I've peer-reviewed articles, I often have recommended that authors site new articles, or other articles that may be more relevant. Peer review is a slow process, not like the news about the war in Israel. But there is a push to get more cutting edge science research in journals like bioRxiv, which are open source but not peer-review. That expedites science and is a way to not get scooped. But they clearly state that it's not peer-review.

This thread is like a peer-review of the War. I hope it doesn't get shut down.

 

[Dr. Octopus]

For those praising AP for their reporting, I have some bad news for you.

Here's is a story from AP that just came out today. Give it a read. I want to focus on something in particular here, but it's worth reading the story first.

Read it? Okay, let's move on. Here's the part I want to draw your attention to. They're discussing the hospital strike:

I linked that same story - seems unbiased to me. People see what they want though.

A story can be "unbiased" but be factually incorrect. That is IK's point.

I understand - I don't think they generally get much wrong since they take a measured approach (and I didn't find that case he pointed out particularly egregious).

I find it a nice unaffiliated and unbiased news source that other news sources draw from. Some like Twitter, which is fine. To each their own.

I do think people seek sources that confirm their particular biases. I don't think that's a shocking statement and I don't claim to be immune to it - but since I hate both political parties equally (what they've become at least), I don't think I'm biased in that regard so enjoy my news to take a moderate approach as well.

I get that, but what I'm talking about here isn't bias. It's a lie. The AP reporters state as a matter of fact that a video shows the mangled corpses of people who were killed in the hospital strike. That simply isn't true. There is no such video. It's straight-up disinformation, not bias.

Everybody wants to go on and on about disinformation in social media, and yeah obviously there's lots of disinformation out there. So they go to "neutral" sources like AP and get openly lied to.

If anybody can find the video that the AP is referencing, I would appreciate a PM. Not that I particularly want to see that, but I do want to know if a large number of civilians were actually killed in this strike. That doesn't seem to have been the case, but it would be good to know.

The original post I replied to was talking about political bias in the media.

I don’t agree on your framing on this issue (“lie” is a pretty strong word) and not going to bog down the thread on it.

In the end we are all relying on others for this information and we’re more likely to believe those that confirm our biases.

 

[parasaurolophus]

It just seems like an impossible standard. Do we actually know Prigozhin was on that plane? Wasn't that entire story "according to Russian state sources"? Would it be better if we just had no idea that even happened right now, rather than "according to Russian state sources, Prigohzin was killed in a plane crash"?

Why is there no uproar on news sources reporting the Hamas invasion in the first place, rather than waiting until 3 days later when we had actual video footage of it?

Just seems like how these things have always worked. When there is some big event reported by a state, it gets reported on with the qualification that it is according to that state and has not yet been verified, and then updated as more information comes to light.

You act like everybody is demanding every detail be correct(of the cited source).They aren't. You are bringing up an example that isn't related, but if we are going to compare apples to apples here, the minimum level of qualification would be things like verifying there was actually a plane crash. Verifying there isn't evidence that perhaps he was halfway across the globe. The basics.

Also not using pictures of other plane crashes at the front of the article or maybe not using random Russians mourning a death of somebody else. And not using inflammatory headlines.

You know really hard stuff.

 

[The Commish]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Clearly you don't follow the BBC too closely...

Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza

'Hospital horror and 'bring my baby home'

DIGIONLY

www.bbc.com

You're correct. The last time I checked in on this fiasco was a couple of days ago. Regardless of the sources I typically follow, I also know that a lot of the details in these things (regardless of who's reporting them) are going to be wrong because of that rush to be "first". I certainly don't think that's all unique to US media (though they are BY FAR the most egregious in this area)....all of them can be susceptible and I take a lot of those things with a grain of salt. Trust but verify is my typical approach, only I have a hard time applying that state side with all the incidents they've provided us over the years.

To this example, I'd likely gloss over the "palestinian officials say" headlines because, well, I don't really trust what they or the Israelis throw out there at the moment, so had I been on following yesterday, I'd have likely gone with "consider the source" and not allowed it as part of my calculus.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Thank you. For US political stuff, what sources do you like?

 

[Desert_Power]

Probably time to update the thread title.

 

[The Commish]

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Thank you. For US political stuff, what sources do you like?

If I can't get to the legislation itself, I use those same ones. I'll throw reuters in there too. So there are a lot of times where the first time I hear about some "issue" is here (or at least that was true when the PSF was up and running). Then I'll go to those outside the US sources to see what they're saying. Reuters and BBC aren't in the habit of covering every single little comment made and they aren't in the habit of taking things out of context on purpose. Does it happen occasionally? Yep. But going to those places cut out 95% of the noise (my estimation based on discussions here and elsewhere) that our media outlets are built on.

For example, right now the show being put on in the House with speaker elections etc, if it's not on CSPAN, I don't see it until one of those outlets covers it or until someone brings it up in the Garbage Pail discord server.

 

[unckeyherb]

For those praising AP for their reporting, I have some bad news for you.

Here's is a story from AP that just came out today. Give it a read. I want to focus on something in particular here, but it's worth reading the story first.

Read it? Okay, let's move on. Here's the part I want to draw your attention to. They're discussing the hospital strike:

U.S. President Joe Biden, who visited Israel on Wednesday, said data from his Defense Department showed the explosion was not likely caused by an Israeli airstrike. The White House later said an analysis of “overhead imagery, intercepts and open-source information” showed Israel was not behind the attack. But the U.S. continues to collect evidence.

Video from the scene showed the hospital grounds strewn with torn bodies, many of them young children. Hundreds of wounded were rushed to Gaza City’s main hospital, where doctors already facing critical supply shortages were sometimes forced to perform surgery on the floors, without anesthesia.

Look at the first sentence of the second paragraph. "Video from the scene showed the hospital grounds strewn with torn bodies, many of them young children." Yikes! That sounds really bad. And there's a link there and everything, so they've got receipts backing this up. How terrible that all those people died.

Except . . . click the link. You'll go to this story, which was published on 10/17. See if you can find a video from the scene of al-Ahli hospital showing any torn bodies. Hit ctrl-F and see if that story even mentions the hospital in question. (Spoiler: The video does not exist and the story does not mention the hospital). The link in the first story absolutely does not in any way support the claim that is being made. They are making up a "source" and hoping that you won't click through the link to check whether their source says what they say it says. The authors are lying to you.

People do this all the time. I make it a habit to click through these source-links from time to time, and I'd say it's about 50-50 as to whether the source actually backs the author up or not. This is an excellent habit to get into.

Not for nothing but this is something I have been noticing for quite a while now and its mostly in political hit pieces.

The author will make some claim about a pol, say RFK believes that covid vaccines killed a million people, and then that claim is a clickable link. So you, quickly reading on your cell phone as you wait for the uber guy or whatever, assume that he is linking to a story that expands on the million-dead story, but since your uber driver is 2 mins away you carry on with the original story, assured now that RFK really believes the initial claim and any further sliming being done should carry equal weight.

Except if you do click on the link (at least in my experience) you get one of two things. Either you get some story about some Q anon people that believe this crazy thing and somewhere buried in the 8th paragraph RFK is referenced tangentially but not directly in any relation to the crazy thing. The mere inclusion of him in the story smears him with the same slime as the crazy Qanon folks. Or it links to a sloppily written opinion piece by a first year Poly-Sci student on Salon.com where the title is some thing like, "69 Ways RFK is more like Stalin than Trump". Completely fact free fiction that gets clicks by a sub-set of #resistance folks.

Its crazy. Sorry, I've been wanting to point that out for a long time and your post reflected precisely my experience as well.

 

[Psychopav]

On the unbiased sources topic, I have been using aggregators ever since I discovered Drudge way back when. Drudge is not an unbiased source but I still head over there quite a bit to see what's going on. At least they don't appear to care about just toeing the party line.

I get most of my news from 1440, a daily e-mail aggregator which was founded with the goal of being objective and balanced. They do a good job in my opinion.

Before I landed on them, I went through several aggregators. BBC and Reuters were blatantly biased. I got a daily e-mail from Reuters for about a year and am convinced that despite their Standards and Values, the stories they choose to push are selected and worded with a slant.

I also used the Daily Skimm for several years. Like 1440, they were originally supposedly created because the goal was an unbiased and balanced daily news aggregator. It was by and for women but at the outset I found it to be pretty good. Over time though that changed, and I ended up dropping them once they became pretty overt.

Same thing for a Catholic news aggregator. I was hoping it would be unbiased (other than obviously Catholic positions like abortion or birth control of course, which I expected would be in line with the church's teachings), but unfortunately it turned out to be pretty slanted as well so I dropped that one too after a couple years (I don't recall which service that one was).

For televised news, I can't stand Fox, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc. NPR used to be pretty slanted but I've actually found them to be better when I've listened to them on occasion in the past few years. I tend to just watch local news tbh.

In short, I recommend 1440 if you haven't checked them out. And literally nothing else if you're just hoping for unbiased news. It's probably easier to go the opposite direction with complete bias, know that going in, and use a combination of sources from both sides. If you can stomach it (I can't).

 

[The Z Machine]

They have been bombing the southern region so maybe there was some concern.

I was listening to the BBC and there was a UN Aid worker from Gaza that reported IDF bombing of the area near the Raffa crossing. They didn't want to bring trucks through if there was risk of bombing the aid workers.

 

[Joe Bryant]

For those praising AP for their reporting, I have some bad news for you.

Here's is a story from AP that just came out today. Give it a read. I want to focus on something in particular here, but it's worth reading the story first.

Read it? Okay, let's move on. Here's the part I want to draw your attention to. They're discussing the hospital strike:

U.S. President Joe Biden, who visited Israel on Wednesday, said data from his Defense Department showed the explosion was not likely caused by an Israeli airstrike. The White House later said an analysis of “overhead imagery, intercepts and open-source information” showed Israel was not behind the attack. But the U.S. continues to collect evidence.

Video from the scene showed the hospital grounds strewn with torn bodies, many of them young children. Hundreds of wounded were rushed to Gaza City’s main hospital, where doctors already facing critical supply shortages were sometimes forced to perform surgery on the floors, without anesthesia.

Look at the first sentence of the second paragraph. "Video from the scene showed the hospital grounds strewn with torn bodies, many of them young children." Yikes! That sounds really bad. And there's a link there and everything, so they've got receipts backing this up. How terrible that all those people died.

Except . . . click the link. You'll go to this story, which was published on 10/17. See if you can find a video from the scene of al-Ahli hospital showing any torn bodies. Hit ctrl-F and see if that story even mentions the hospital in question. (Spoiler: The video does not exist and the story does not mention the hospital). The link in the first story absolutely does not in any way support the claim that is being made. They are making up a "source" and hoping that you won't click through the link to check whether their source says what they say it says. The authors are lying to you.

People do this all the time. I make it a habit to click through these source-links from time to time, and I'd say it's about 50-50 as to whether the source actually backs the author up or not. This is an excellent habit to get into.

Not for nothing but this is something I have been noticing for quite a while now and its mostly in political hit pieces.

The author will make some claim about a pol, say RFK believes that covid vaccines killed a million people, and then that claim is a clickable link. So you, quickly reading on your cell phone as you wait for the uber guy or whatever, assume that he is linking to a story that expands on the million-dead story, but since your uber driver is 2 mins away you carry on with the original story, assured now that RFK really believes the initial claim and any further sliming being done should carry equal weight.

Except if you do click on the link (at least in my experience) you get one of two things. Either you get some story about some Q anon people that believe this crazy thing and somewhere buried in the 8th paragraph RFK is referenced tangentially but not directly in any relation to the crazy thing. The mere inclusion of him in the story smears him with the same slime as the crazy Qanon folks. Or it links to a sloppily written opinion piece by a first year Poly-Sci student on Salon.com where the title is some thing like, "69 Ways RFK is more like Stalin than Trump". Completely fact free fiction that gets clicks by a sub-set of #resistance folks.

Its crazy. Sorry, I've been wanting to point that out for a long time and your post reflected precisely my experience as well.

I've noticed this too. It seems now my expectation when I click on a link is that where it sends me is not nearly as conclusive or firm as I thought it might be.

I think this especially sticks out to me as linking is so basic and I do it a lot when I'm writing things. Now granted, mine is for dumb meaningless stuff. But when I wrote in Random Shots that Saquan Barkley had a long run and I link "long run", when you click on it you get exactly what you were expecting - video of exactly the long run I'm talking about.

I see way too many sites not doing this. But adding links makes the article look more official and trustworthy as it gives the impression you're supporting what you're saying.

 

[Joe Bryant]

On the unbiased sources topic, I have been using aggregators ever since I discovered Drudge way back when. Drudge is not an unbiased source but I still head over there quite a bit to see what's going on. At least they don't appear to care about just toeing the party line.

I get most of my news from 1440, a daily e-mail aggregator which was founded with the goal of being objective and balanced. They do a good job in my opinion.

Before I landed on them, I went through several aggregators. BBC and Reuters were blatantly biased. I got a daily e-mail from Reuters for about a year and am convinced that despite their Standards and Values, the stories they choose to push are selected and worded with a slant.

I also used the Daily Skimm for several years. Like 1440, they were originally supposedly created because the goal was an unbiased and balanced daily news aggregator. It was by and for women but at the outset I found it to be pretty good. Over time though that changed, and I ended up dropping them once they became pretty overt.

Same thing for a Catholic news aggregator. I was hoping it would be unbiased (other than obviously Catholic positions like abortion or birth control of course, which I expected would be in line with the church's teachings), but unfortunately it turned out to be pretty slanted as well so I dropped that one too after a couple years (I don't recall which service that one was).

For televised news, I can't stand Fox, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc. NPR used to be pretty slanted but I've actually found them to be better when I've listened to them on occasion in the past few years. I tend to just watch local news tbh.

In short, I recommend 1440 if you haven't checked them out. And literally nothing else if you're just hoping for unbiased news. It's probably easier to go the opposite direction with complete bias, know that going in, and use a combination of sources from both sides. If you can stomach it (I can't).

I've glanced at 1440 a bit and for the quick look I did, they seemed good. That's not an endorsement as I haven't looked closely.

But clearly, there seems to be a need for better news.

 

[Gr00vus]

We're way off topic now, but I thought I'd read over the course of the last couple of decades that the editor / editing departments at most news outlets have been getting significantly reduced, and in some cases there are no editors at all. I'm nowhere near a journalist, but I thought a lot of the practice of institutional journalistic integrity involved editors as another check / gateway to filter out the issues we're encountering here. I think we see the effect of that, not only in terms of the veracity of articles, but their overall quality as well - things like word usage, spelling, grammar all seem to be worse than they were when all we had were physical print and fewer televised news sources. There aren't enough good editors to go around with the proliferation of sources and outlets, and current economics / market forces are reducing or eliminating the budget for such positions.

I'm not saying that's the sole reason reporting quality doesn't seem to be as high as it used to be, market forces also seem to select for targeted narratives over plain facts for example, but it would explain a decent amount of the drop off.

 

[parasaurolophus]

I've noticed this too. It seems now my expectation when I click on a link is that where it sends me is not nearly as conclusive or firm as I thought it might be.

I think this especially sticks out to me as linking is so basic and I do it a lot when I'm writing things. Now granted, mine is for dumb meaningless stuff. But when I wrote in Random Shots that Saquan Barkley had a long run and I link "long run", when you click on it you get exactly what you were expecting - video of exactly the long run I'm talking about.

I see way too many sites not doing this. But adding links makes the article look more official and trustworthy as it gives the impression you're supporting what you're saying.

I laugh at how often the links take me to the exact article I am reading.

I try to decipher if this was a mistake or intentional. So for the Barkley example, if it is pretty easy to find footage on my own of a long Barkley run or the box score shows a big gain, I would cut slack and brush off as a mistake. If there was no such other proof I would view it as intentional. If you intentionally mislead, you are not reputable.

 

[dickey moe]

Probably time to update the thread title.

What would you suggest? War between Israel and Hamas?

 

[Ministry of Pain]

The NYT used a picture of a leveled building from somewhere else. Hope this helps

I literally just saw this.

Here's an explainer for those who are interested. @tommyGunZ in particular will find this interesting. NGL, I saw this NYT story myself on Twitter, on my phone, and on my desktop, and I never once thought to question whether that building was part of the hospital that was hit. I guess I sort of fell for this even if I was mad at the NYT for some other piece of misinformation.

Thanks for sharing. I think the NYT could have been better here. We agree in the micro - it's the macro where we diverge. Over the long run, you'll unquestionably be more accurately informed by reading the NYT, WaPost, etc. daily than following randoms on Twitter. There is far more misinformation and no editorial standards for the vast majority of armchair analysts on Twitter. None of them ever get any of the scrutiny the NYT is getting today.

I don't question your honesty IK, I'm sure there were lots of contrarians last night on twitter doubting Israel's responsibility. What I doubt is their accuracy over the long run vs. larger organizations with stricter standards and more seasoned editorial decision makers.

I’m not going to pretend to speak for IK here, but based on his comments in this thread, he isn’t “following randoms on Twitter.” He is following a specific subset of Twitter users who are drawn to facts, logic and critical analysis. People who have demonstrated what he concerns a rational approach to uncertain topics or events.

It wouldn’t surprise me in the least to see that type of subset of people “outperform” random media members, particularly when it comes to unusual events like this one.

(Side note: good to see you in here TGunz. I still credit you with saving me a ton of money during the mid/late 2000s real estate bubble)

Of course the question is how would they hold up if they were under the same kind of scrutiny as NYT etc, with people and entire websites dedicated to tracking their every move and finding and calling out even the smallest errors, even if those errors are immediately redacted or the limitations in the first place completely put up front.

How many times have they posted incorrect information and then deleted their tweet and IK was never the wiser because there isn't a website dedicated to screenshotting everything they ever post and then cross referencing it later to see if it was deleted or changed 5 minutes later or when more information became available?

In this case we aren't even given the sources. We just have to take it on faith that there are this collection of people out there that report only completely accurate info all the time, in realtime, even though no one is checking them on it and we don't even know who they are. And our source on this is a guy who, while generally a good rational dude, is clearly approaching this topic with an extremely heavy bias (see: insane post about how if Elon hadn't bought twitter the whole world would still think Israel bombed the hospital).

The 'realtime' is another issue, where the larger media outlets just can't win. If they post "Hospital bombed by Israel, Palestinian authorities claim" they get lambasted for reporting on the allegations coming out of the region in realtime, even though they very clearly qualify it as allegations being passed on 2nd hand that they haven't been able to verify yet. Likewise if they wait, they get equally lambasted as they did in the Prigozhin news where they waited an hour to TRY and confirm some of the reports coming from Russian sources, and people here on this forum went absolutely nuts over them not reporting on it sooner even though it was all over twitter already. So they really can't win in that respect. Meanwhile if the Twitter guys pass on "according to Russian news sources" they get heralded for being fast.

Because people are apt to question the NYTimes, you discount what IK looks at on social media?
That's the gist of all this, yes/no?
I find that fascinating
One doesn't seem to be tied to the other but I appreciate you sharing why you feel the way you do.

 

[Ministry of Pain]

Why is there no uproar on news sources reporting the Hamas invasion in the first place, rather than waiting until 3 days later when we had actual video footage of it?

Just seems like how these things have always worked. When there is some big event reported by a state, it gets reported on with the qualification that it is according to that state and has not yet been verified, and then updated as more information comes to light.

Because the Hamas invasion and the hospital strike aren't the same thing.

To use one example, consider the music festival. A bunch of people are enjoying themselves with cell phones at the ready. A group of gunmen show up and start killing everybody. This results in a bunch of texts, calls, videos, etc. all going out at the same time from people at the festival. There was never any dispute about the festival being attacked. Hamas openly took credit for it. I'm not sure what anybody was supposed to wait around for. None of the actual facts of what happened were being disputed by anybody, and they're still not.

By way of contrast, the hospital explosion occurred in a densely-packed urban environment in a war zone. When the explosion occurred, the cause was disputed immediately. Any reasonable observer could have identified at least three plausible explanations for why that explosion occurred: (1) Israel intentionally bombed the hospital, perhaps because they thought it was being used as a military staging area or perhaps because they are just jerks, (2) Israel accidentally bombed the hospital while trying to hit something else, an event that happens regularly in wars, and (3) Hamas blew it up themselves. And of course when dawn broke we learned that the hospital wasn't blown up after all and it was really just some burned out cars and broken windows. Admittedly, the media maybe couldn't have known that last part at the time, but they could have shown a little restraint because of the whole "fog of war" thing. None of these qualifiers applied to the Hamas attack on the music festival kids.

That's why there was no uproar about the reporting about the Hamas invasion and a big uproar about the reporting about the hospital explosion.

Every time I think I need to come in and try to rescue you...
I cannot verbalize how much I appreciate your POV, you're doing it right and you're doing it in a very classy and gentleman way.

-Thanks IK!

 

[beef]

On the unbiased sources topic, I have been using aggregators ever since I discovered Drudge way back when. Drudge is not an unbiased source but I still head over there quite a bit to see what's going on. At least they don't appear to care about just toeing the party line.

I get most of my news from 1440, a daily e-mail aggregator which was founded with the goal of being objective and balanced. They do a good job in my opinion.

Before I landed on them, I went through several aggregators. BBC and Reuters were blatantly biased. I got a daily e-mail from Reuters for about a year and am convinced that despite their Standards and Values, the stories they choose to push are selected and worded with a slant.

I also used the Daily Skimm for several years. Like 1440, they were originally supposedly created because the goal was an unbiased and balanced daily news aggregator. It was by and for women but at the outset I found it to be pretty good. Over time though that changed, and I ended up dropping them once they became pretty overt.

Same thing for a Catholic news aggregator. I was hoping it would be unbiased (other than obviously Catholic positions like abortion or birth control of course, which I expected would be in line with the church's teachings), but unfortunately it turned out to be pretty slanted as well so I dropped that one too after a couple years (I don't recall which service that one was).

For televised news, I can't stand Fox, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc. NPR used to be pretty slanted but I've actually found them to be better when I've listened to them on occasion in the past few years. I tend to just watch local news tbh.

In short, I recommend 1440 if you haven't checked them out. And literally nothing else if you're just hoping for unbiased news. It's probably easier to go the opposite direction with complete bias, know that going in, and use a combination of sources from both sides. If you can stomach it (I can't).

I've glanced at 1440 a bit and for the quick look I did, they seemed good. That's not an endorsement as I haven't looked closely.

But clearly, there seems to be a need for better news.

Would better news matter? Seems to me most people will tune-in to the places that tell them what they want to hear anyway.

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

They are making up a "source" and hoping that you won't click through the link to check whether their source says what they say it says. The authors are lying to you.

So your position is that The Associated Press is trying to intentionally deceiving its readers? Knowing full well that they'll be caught in that deception?

 

[Ministry of Pain]

On the unbiased sources topic, I have been using aggregators ever since I discovered Drudge way back when. Drudge is not an unbiased source but I still head over there quite a bit to see what's going on. At least they don't appear to care about just toeing the party line.

I get most of my news from 1440, a daily e-mail aggregator which was founded with the goal of being objective and balanced. They do a good job in my opinion.

Before I landed on them, I went through several aggregators. BBC and Reuters were blatantly biased. I got a daily e-mail from Reuters for about a year and am convinced that despite their Standards and Values, the stories they choose to push are selected and worded with a slant.

I also used the Daily Skimm for several years. Like 1440, they were originally supposedly created because the goal was an unbiased and balanced daily news aggregator. It was by and for women but at the outset I found it to be pretty good. Over time though that changed, and I ended up dropping them once they became pretty overt.

Same thing for a Catholic news aggregator. I was hoping it would be unbiased (other than obviously Catholic positions like abortion or birth control of course, which I expected would be in line with the church's teachings), but unfortunately it turned out to be pretty slanted as well so I dropped that one too after a couple years (I don't recall which service that one was).

For televised news, I can't stand Fox, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc. NPR used to be pretty slanted but I've actually found them to be better when I've listened to them on occasion in the past few years. I tend to just watch local news tbh.

In short, I recommend 1440 if you haven't checked them out. And literally nothing else if you're just hoping for unbiased news. It's probably easier to go the opposite direction with complete bias, know that going in, and use a combination of sources from both sides. If you can stomach it (I can't).

I use the DrudgeReport quite often, mostly because I can pan n scan quickly.
Things of interest I might click or even Google to get a wider range POV if it's interesting
I'm glad I'm not the only one

 

[Ministry of Pain]

They are making up a "source" and hoping that you won't click through the link to check whether their source says what they say it says. The authors are lying to you.

So your position is that The Associated Press is trying to intentionally deceiving its readers? Knowing full well that they'll be caught in that deception?

Let's insert anything we want into someone's mouth...please refrain
These are the types of posts that shut folks down and get threads deleted.
He didn't say any of those things to my knowledge

"So your position"
we can't have those here because now we are taking aim at 1 Poster...Ivan K does not speak for just 1 person, let's not make it personal Ejotuz, please!

What has you riled up about?
That is what I would like to hear more of, feel free to unleash on MoP, I can take it, what's bugging you?
You trust mainstream American Media or by trusting it and professing faith to it, it makes you feel more secure, what's that about? I'm interested how the pecking order works
Why is the AP so much better vs Social Media streams many find comfort in?
Thanks!

 

[Desert_Power]

Probably time to update the thread title.

What would you suggest? War between Israel and Hamas?

Just joking about how off topic this has gotten.

 

[Sand]

By way of contrast, the hospital explosion occurred in a densely-packed urban environment in a war zone. When the explosion occurred, the cause was disputed immediately. Any reasonable observer could have identified at least three plausible explanations for why that explosion occurred: (1) Israel intentionally bombed the hospital, perhaps because they thought it was being used as a military staging area or perhaps because they are just jerks, (2) Israel accidentally bombed the hospital while trying to hit something else, an event that happens regularly in wars, and (3) Hamas blew it up themselves. And of course when dawn broke we learned that the hospital wasn't blown up after all and it was really just some burned out cars and broken windows. Admittedly, the media maybe couldn't have known that last part at the time, but they could have shown a little restraint because of the whole "fog of war" thing. None of these qualifiers applied to the Hamas attack on the music festival kids.

That's why there was no uproar about the reporting about the Hamas invasion and a big uproar about the reporting about the hospital explosion.

It's estimated that about 15% of casualties in WWII were friendly fire. Hamas is about at that level of sophistication. Really, this shouldn't be a surprise to anyone.

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

Let's insert anything we want into someone's mouth...please refrain

I literally quoted him.

ETA: but your other point stands. Happy to let it go to keep the thread on track.

 

[parasaurolophus]

Let's insert anything we want into someone's mouth...please refrain

I literally quoted him.

ETA: but your other point stands. Happy to let it go to keep the thread on track.

One of the solid benefits of the new posts, view them feature.

Was typing a reply, but read the above and obviously not going to beat a dead horse as everybody is moving on.

 

[jamny]

I meant, none of my media sources were talking about the 500 number. I saw ONE source mention the "hundreds" (which given the circumstances, isn't out of the realm of possibilities). I can't tell you what our US mainstream media was reporting, but I did see it being reported here and those reports were referencing our mainstream media. The FFA (FBG in general really) is my only meaningful insight into what the US media machine is saying these days....been that way for about 7ish years now.

What media sources do you use?

Mostly outside the US. BBC has been where I've been following Israel. I've also gone to Al Jazeera for a few things, but not a big fan of them.

Clearly you don't follow the BBC too closely...

Palestinian officials say up to 500 people have been killed in a hospital air strike in Gaza

'Hospital horror and 'bring my baby home'

DIGIONLY

www.bbc.com

Or Al Jazeera

Israeli air raid on al-Ahli Arab Hospital kills 500, Gaza officials say​

 

[Sand]

From the Jerusalem Post - Foreign intelligence sources put the number of dead at 10-50. Hamas put it at 471.

Death toll in Gaza hospital blast greatly exaggerated - foreign intel

Local Hamas-run Gazan sources allege that 471 people were killed at the hospital; foreign independent intelligence sources claimed instead that the number was closer to 10-50.

www.jpost.com

 

[Psychopav]

On the unbiased sources topic, I have been using aggregators ever since I discovered Drudge way back when. Drudge is not an unbiased source but I still head over there quite a bit to see what's going on. At least they don't appear to care about just toeing the party line.

I get most of my news from 1440, a daily e-mail aggregator which was founded with the goal of being objective and balanced. They do a good job in my opinion.

Before I landed on them, I went through several aggregators. BBC and Reuters were blatantly biased. I got a daily e-mail from Reuters for about a year and am convinced that despite their Standards and Values, the stories they choose to push are selected and worded with a slant.

I also used the Daily Skimm for several years. Like 1440, they were originally supposedly created because the goal was an unbiased and balanced daily news aggregator. It was by and for women but at the outset I found it to be pretty good. Over time though that changed, and I ended up dropping them once they became pretty overt.

Same thing for a Catholic news aggregator. I was hoping it would be unbiased (other than obviously Catholic positions like abortion or birth control of course, which I expected would be in line with the church's teachings), but unfortunately it turned out to be pretty slanted as well so I dropped that one too after a couple years (I don't recall which service that one was).

For televised news, I can't stand Fox, MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc. NPR used to be pretty slanted but I've actually found them to be better when I've listened to them on occasion in the past few years. I tend to just watch local news tbh.

In short, I recommend 1440 if you haven't checked them out. And literally nothing else if you're just hoping for unbiased news. It's probably easier to go the opposite direction with complete bias, know that going in, and use a combination of sources from both sides. If you can stomach it (I can't).

I use the DrudgeReport quite often, mostly because I can pan n scan quickly.
Things of interest I might click or even Google to get a wider range POV if it's interesting
I'm glad I'm not the only one

There was a time in the distant past (probably 10-12 years gone now) when Drudge would have many things a day or even two in advance of the story becoming widely reported. That doesn't really happen anymore, for sure.

 

[FreeBaGeL]

Why is there no uproar on news sources reporting the Hamas invasion in the first place, rather than waiting until 3 days later when we had actual video footage of it?

Just seems like how these things have always worked. When there is some big event reported by a state, it gets reported on with the qualification that it is according to that state and has not yet been verified, and then updated as more information comes to light.

Because the Hamas invasion and the hospital strike aren't the same thing.

To use one example, consider the music festival. A bunch of people are enjoying themselves with cell phones at the ready. A group of gunmen show up and start killing everybody. This results in a bunch of texts, calls, videos, etc. all going out at the same time from people at the festival. There was never any dispute about the festival being attacked. Hamas openly took credit for it. I'm not sure what anybody was supposed to wait around for. None of the actual facts of what happened were being disputed by anybody, and they're still not.

By way of contrast, the hospital explosion occurred in a densely-packed urban environment in a war zone. When the explosion occurred, the cause was disputed immediately. Any reasonable observer could have identified at least three plausible explanations for why that explosion occurred: (1) Israel intentionally bombed the hospital, perhaps because they thought it was being used as a military staging area or perhaps because they are just jerks, (2) Israel accidentally bombed the hospital while trying to hit something else, an event that happens regularly in wars, and (3) Hamas blew it up themselves. And of course when dawn broke we learned that the hospital wasn't blown up after all and it was really just some burned out cars and broken windows. Admittedly, the media maybe couldn't have known that last part at the time, but they could have shown a little restraint because of the whole "fog of war" thing. None of these qualifiers applied to the Hamas attack on the music festival kids.

That's why there was no uproar about the reporting about the Hamas invasion and a big uproar about the reporting about the hospital explosion.

That's fair in regards to the Hamas attack, but what about Prigozhin? Wasn't it DAYS before we really had anything concrete beyond "according to Russian authorities" on that? And people were happy to discuss it and dying to see it covered. Had it turned out a week later (or even now, as I believe we still don't really have concrete proof) that he wasn't on that plane and it was all a ruse would we need to go back and call the news outlets "disgraceful" for reporting on it? Why weren't we doing it at the time?

When a state government claims something major, the outlets pretty much have to pass the info along. They make it clear that it is according to that government (and usually call it a "developing story" or something like that) and then update as more info becomes available. Which is what happened here, and they were out front on some of that too. I can't speak to the print media but I've had CNN on in the background the last few days just so I can get updates while I work, and while I know they're everyone's favorite whipping boy they were interviewing Israeli officials who claimed the IDF was not responsible for the incident before I ever saw it mentioned here. They presented the notion that the IDF had audio recordings where Hamas was aware that the IDF wasn't responsible for it before anyone here, etc.

And again, I don't know your particular twitter sources but the ones I've seen it's not like they approach it any differently. It's not like (at least the ones I've seen) came out and said "the IDF didn't have anything to do with this incident, and here's all the evidence that proves it". They usually start with an idea/suggestion that maybe they weren't as culpable as was originally claimed, and then the idea builds and develops from there over time, in the same way.

 

[Ministry of Pain]

Let's insert anything we want into someone's mouth...please refrain

I literally quoted him.

ETA: but your other point stands. Happy to let it go to keep the thread on track.

All good
Thanks for the clarification