From: hal@finney.org
Date: Thu Jun 28 2001 - 11:17:01 MDT
Harvey writes,
> No offense, but I would almost be tempted to raise my hand. I know that
> this is politically incorrect sentiment on this group, but most scientists
> do believe in the dangers of global warming. Although scientists are never
> "unanimous" on any issue, this one is clearly divided between the majority
> and minority. Although there is a very vocal minority of scientists that
> discount global warming, most of these are funded by business to fight
> global warming. In any case, there is not enough evidence to claim global
> warming is such a fraud that it is brainwashing to teach it to children.
I agree, although at this point we have only a one-sided account of what
the Stossel report would have shown (the segment with the children that
the parents complained about has been pulled).
> This method of pulling children into the debate is a blatant attempt to tug
> on our heart strings and evoke pity. This is poor journalism whether it is
> on "our" side or "their" side.
Absolutely. In fact I think that much journalism is poor in quality,
it's just that Stossel is being held to a higher standard than some
others because of his public visibility.
I read a comment once, which noted that if you have ever been involved
personally with some event or situation which made the newspapers, you
probably noticed that the reporting was highly inaccurate. People's names
are wrong, their roles are mixed up, their justification and goals are
not explained properly. Maybe you just assumed that the reporter got
it wrong this time. But the fact is, almost all reporting is like this.
Reporters are inaccurate; they put their own spin on stories, they make
it come out in a nice neat package to sell the theme of the story.
Stossel of course got in trouble last year for misreporting the results
of some tests in a report in organic produce, and was forced to deliver
an on-air apology.
http://more.abcnews.go.com/onair/2020/2020_000811_stossel_apology_feature.html.
The lesson is, if you're going to be a contrarian, you need to be
very careful. You're going to be held to the highest standard and your
critics will look for any flaws they can find. Typical sloppy journalism
won't do.
So long as Stossel keeps getting shown up as being manipulative, he hurts
the very cause he is supposed to be helping. If he doesn't shape up he
would do better to get out of the business.
Hal
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