Media outlets airbrushing Islam from Paris shooting story
While all forms of media are dutifully reporting on the Paris massacre by Muslims against the editors and cartoonists of satirical French magazine Charlie Hebdo, many of them, such as CNN, the NY Daily News, NY Times, AP, and others, are carefully not mentioning Islam or Muslims in relation to the horror and/or are not showing the cartoons mocking Mohammed (Mahomet in French), according to BuzzFeed.and Hadas Gold of Politico.
Some papers blurred the cartoons; others cropped pictures of the now deceased editors proudly showing off their creations. In one blatantly biased example, the New York Daily News had no trouble displaying part of a cover with a distorted, ugly, hook-nosed Jewish man dressed in a black suit and hat but blurred the Muslim man in a wheelchair next to him.
But the New York Times explained their decision not to show the images in an email from a spokesperson: “Under Times standards, we do not normally publish images or other material deliberately intended to offend religious sensibilities. After careful consideration, Times editors decided that describing the cartoons in question would give readers sufficient information to understand today’s story.”
And here we've always been told that a picture is worth a thousand words. But the brilliant New York Times editors arrogantly decide they can describe a cartoon better than our eyes can see it.
AP spokesman Paul Colford told BuzzFeed News, “You’re correct: None of the images distributed by AP showed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. It’s been our policy for years that we refrain from moving deliberately provocative images.”
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Shown the four images in the tweet linked above, which has now been deleted but included three photos that showed the cover, Colford said that those three photos were taken by non-AP staff photographers and were removed from the AP’s commercial photo system later Wednesday. “The top right image in that tweet you sent – very much cropped by us to exclude the illustration – is the only AP staff-taken photo among the four. The other three are SIPA photos, automatically fed to AP’s commercial photo division and now being removed from our system,” he said.
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A CNN memo obtained by Politico showed the network would not show images of the cartoons.
“Although we are not at this time showing the Charlie Hebdo cartoons of the Prophet considered offensive by many Muslims, platforms are encouraged to verbally describe the cartoons in detail,” the memo says. It states that photos of the cartoons held by demonstrators during protesters are “OK, if shot wide.”
CNN is not the only network not showing the cartoons — in fact, all the major networks and cable channels are declining to show them. Asked whether NBC News would show images of the Muhammad cartoons in the course of its reporting on the story, a NBC News spokesperson said, “Our NBC News Group Standards team has sent guidance to NBC News, MSNBC, and CNBC not to show headlines or cartoons that could be viewed as insensitive or offensive.”
But not all are terrified. Vox published some of the magazine's Muslim covers and Zombie has offered http://pjmedia.com/zombie/2015/01/07/do-not-submit-republish-the-mohammed-cartoons-everywhere/ his extensive Muhammed Image Archive to anyone who wants to publish them.
The Mohammed Image Archive, which I have hosted at zombietime since the day of the original “Mohammed cartoon crisis” back in May of 2006, has not only a full collection of the original cartoons, but more importantly the largest collection of Mohammed imagery ever assembled in the history of the world.
I hereby grant permission to, and even encourage, anyone reading this to repost any images found anywhere on the Mohammed Image Archive. No limits. Repost them all, if you want to.
Go to any of these pages, download whatever images you choose, repost, and help to win the most important cultural war humanity has faced in a long time.
This is the Danish cartoon, first published five years ago, that infuriated Muslims. The cartoonist is constantly threatened with death, has been attacked several times, subsequently has reinforced his home, and has permanent police guards.
BuzzFeed has also reproduced some powerful image responses to today's horror.
Hmmm. What would happen if Jews, Christians, Amish, Buddhists, or Hindus politely – or even angrily – asked the news media to be sensitive to their feelings and to stop publishing material they deem offensive? Exactly!