Media Bias Outrage of the Week - Playing in Traffic

banner: fairpress.org, Citizens Coalition for Responsible Media, fighting media bias


Home Media Bias Outrage/Week Outrage of the Month Outrage Archive On The Offensive On The Offensive Archive Hot Topic Links Special Features Activism Press Releases Rolodex Activist Handbook Thread Archive Identify Media Bias Mission Statement Guestbook Contact Us	Playing in Traffic: ABC Presents a Sympathetic Look at Voluntary Human Shields 03/03/2003 Certainly we have all wondered what could be going through the minds of anyone who would volunteer as a human shield. Dan Harris' report on ABC World News Tonight February 26 tried to answer these questions by portraying one of these walking targets in a sympathetic light. His subject is Ryan Clancy a substitute English teacher from Milwaukee who sold his share in a record store to go to Baghdad and live in a food storage facility in hopes of preventing an unwise, unjust war. Clancy: "This seemed like a very direct and a very meaningful way to take action and to dissent." Harris: "So are you saying that you're prepared to die?" Clancy: "Um, nobody here has a death wish, I mean, I don't think any of us want to die." Harris continues: "He says the goal of the human shields is to stop the war, or at the very least, to stop the U.S. from bombing sites vital to Iraqi civilians…The Pentagon has always said the Iraqis hide military equipment in civilian settings. Washington says using human shields, even if they're volunteers, is a war crime." Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld at a Pentagon briefing: "Deploying human shields is not a military strategy, it's murder." Harris: "But human rights lawyers say if the Pentagon bombs places inhabited by human shields that too would be war crime. The human shields themselves are facing a problem as well, how to avoid being tools of the Iraqi government, which is paying for their transportation and their housing, including stocked refrigerators." (Video of a man and woman rejoicing over a well-stocked refrigerator) Clancy: "It's a valid concern. I think that I individually and most human shields are very aware of the politics at stake here and if I feel as though I'm being used inappropriately I will leave." Harris: "He says he's not here to protect Saddam Hussein, just the Iraqi people. Dan Harris, ABC News, Baghdad." So many red flags! Where to begin? Don't you find yourself wanting to shout, "Son, have you thought this through?" As for the goal of stopping the war, do these folk really think they can accomplish this by sitting around in grain warehouses? And how about the way Harris suggests that by their very presence, they could turn the leaders at the Pentagon into war criminals? Sounds like these 'human rights lawyers' are passing along some bad advise. Consider, too, young Clancy's concern that he will be used inappropriately toward the wrong political end. I would like to assure him that if Saddam Hussein doesn't misuse him, certainly ABC News will. Please join me in reminding ABC News that trying to make human shields look sympathetic makes them look silly. The contact information is below: ABC World News Tonight 77 West 66th Street New York, New York 10023 Phone (212) 456-4040 Fax (212) 456-2795 Email Contact Page Read more here: ABCNews.com: In Harm's Way FoxNews.com: Some British 'Human Shields' Flee Iraq MRC CyberAlert, 02/27/2003: ABC Offers Sympathetic Look at 'Human Shields" in Iraq When you feel your personal media bias tolerance gauge rising into the red zone, don't throw stuff at the TV screen! Send your suggestion to outrage@fairpress.org! Each week, one hideous example of media bias will be selected for closer examination. Hmmmmmm . . . Click below for more: