Most emailed NYT article: Women on women workplace aggression

I tend not to put too much stock in the most emailed articles from most mainstream news sources; typically it's the fluff, the cute animals and oddities (not that I don't enjoy my fair share). Case in point: the BBC's #1 most popular story of the moment: "60-foot penis painted on roof." Awesome.

The New York Times audience seems to tend toward sharing slightly more substantive articles, like the one written by an American expat loving life in the Dutch social welfare state, featuring in last week's Times Magazine (incidentally, worth checking out, if only to swoon at the provisions of the Dutch government's universal health care: ~$400 covers a family of 4, no copays, and dental included, day care is covered to the tune of $14,000/child annually, and legal barriers for midwives are lifted -- home birth is a longstanding tradition).

But getting back to promoted articles: I looked at the most emailed articles on the NYT homepage this morning, hoping readers would be pointing to an equally engrossing read, and here's what I get:

Backlash: Women Bullying Women at Work

Anytime a writer invokes Susan Faludi in the title of an article that points to women as the culprits of our own oppression, you know you're in for a treat. Get this: there's more office bullying during tough times, and some of those bullies are women.

It’s probably no surprise that most of these bullies are men, as a survey by the Workplace Bullying Institute, an advocacy group, makes clear. But a good 40 percent of bullies are women. And at least the male bullies take an egalitarian approach, mowing down men and women pretty much in equal measure. The women appear to prefer their own kind, choosing other women as targets more than 70 percent of the time.

In the name of Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem, what is going on here?

Just the mention of women treating other women badly on the job seemingly shakes the women’s movement to its core.

It is what Peggy Klaus, an executive coach in Berkeley, Calif., has called “the pink elephant” in the room. How can women break through the glass ceiling if they are ducking verbal blows from other women in cubicles, hallways and conference rooms?

Women don’t like to talk about it because it is “so antithetical to the way that we are supposed to behave to other women,” Ms. Klaus said. “We are supposed to be the nurturers and the supporters.”

So let's recap: you've got your essentialist notions of the masculine and feminine (men=aggressive, women=nurturers), and your basic feminist name dropping/attempted movement discrediting. It would be comical if so many people weren't forwarding it, some of whom probably bought into these stereotypes.

Author Mickey Meece fails to consider how stereotypes feed discrimination in the workplace, though for an instant he seems like he's on the right track. He speculates about structural inequities that could be at work and hits upon the lack of women at the top (to say nothing of the pay gap) before one moment of clarity, with the help of Catalyst research:

Leadership specialists wonder, are women being “overly aggressive” because there are too few opportunities for advancement? Or is it stereotyping and women are only perceived as being overly aggressive? Is there a double standard at work?

Research on gender stereotyping from Catalyst suggests that no matter how women choose to lead, they are perceived as “never just right.” What’s more, the group found, women must work twice as hard as men to achieve the same level of recognition and prove they can lead.

The article minimizes the gendered hurdles that women face outside the realm of office politics and instead puts the onus on us to "hug it out," with researchers lamenting the fact that women won't operate purely based on their shared identity as women, rather than as independent, ambitious, people. And since when is it news that women are competitive and strive to excel as individuals?

Now I'm all for solidarity and cooperation among women and underrepresented communities. But the reality is that women are pitted against one another from the womb by powerful media messaging from those who stand to benefit from a divide and conquer strategy. And based on the sources Meece has chosen, he seems pretty transparently bent on disregarding feminist social critiques and instead making the case that nothing stands in women's way but women themselves:

“As we get into the corporate world,” Ms. Cirocco added, “we’re taught or we’re led to believe that we don’t get ahead because of men. But, we really don’t get ahead because of ourselves. Instead of building each other up and showcasing each other, we’re constantly tearing each other down.”

Conclusion: women bear responsibility for our upward mobility, end of story. Easy to point fingers, if you're not owning your responsibility as someone with the privilege and platform to be heard and amplified by readers across the country. The most popular stories do provide some interesting insight into an audience and how narrow viewpoints seep into the discourse on equality.

UPDATE: Cross-posted on feministing!

Champion of consumer rights leaves the Chronicle

"Investigative business columnist" David Lazarus is headed to the LA Times.

Since coming to the Chronicle from Wired News in 1999, David Lazarus has been one of the most prolific, and influential, writers at the paper. His coverage of the energy crisis in 2001 earned him the Journalist of the Year award from the Society of Professional Journalists, Northern California chapter. He continues to butt heads with corporate executives and write stories that unambiguously take the side of consumers.

In his final column, he calls for the reawakening of a dormant consumer movement, with muckraking reporters on the corporate watchdog beat leading the charge alongside advocates.

It's a point he made repeatedly during our conversation - that the biggest difference between now and then is that the media have lost interest in consumer advocacy as both a story and a calling.

This, in turn, leaves the consumer movement to a great extent voiceless.

...Still, I attend a lot of public events and I can say with confidence that most consumers haven't given up when it comes to defending their rights. They're frustrated - that goes without saying. They often feel that companies are dedicated solely to outmaneuvering customers.

But people aren't hopeless. They just want to be treated fairly.

...There was a time when businesses believed the customer is always right. That's an exaggeration, of course, but there's a grain of truth in it. Businesses understood that if you treat customers right, they'll keep coming back.

...These days, the shareholder is always right. Businesses focus almost exclusively on placating investors by delivering steady growth quarter after quarter. And to maintain a consistently robust bottom line, many companies reduce overhead by repeatedly cutting back on service.

Lazarus said he never envisioned himself launching a "one-man consumer crusade against corporate malfeasance."

I don't think there's any mistaking that my work is fairly populist in its sentiment. The rap on what I do is that I'm anti-business -- that's what my critics like to say most often than not. I see myself more as pro-accountability. ... Corporations should be accountable. And if you're going to do something, especially if it affects thousands or millions of customers, you should be able to defend that policy...

I was excited to hear that the organization I work with (the Consumer Federation of California) recognized Lazarus with its Journalist of the Year award in 2004. This year SF Weekly named him the city's best columnist:

With the Chron's business section too often serving as a bulletin board for industry press releases, Lazarus brings a healthy dose of skepticism to the notion that corporate America knows best.

The touching farewell:

Not that long ago, my young son finally got around to asking why Daddy's picture appears in the newspaper.

"Well," I replied, "that's because I try to help people and protect them from bad guys."

My son stewed on that for a moment. His eyes lit up.

"Daddy!" he exclaimed. "You're Batman!"

I'm going to miss Gotham. But Metropolis should be fun, too.

I'll be watching for him in the LAT.

Side note: Lazarus is in very good company as a Crossroads alum.

Propaganda in translation

Currently one of the most dugg political news items on Digg: "Wiped off the Map - The Rumor of the Century." It links to an article on Antiwar.com that details the dangers of heresay in foreign policy.

Somehow our media turned Ahmedinijad's benign statement "As the Soviet Union disappeared, the Zionist regime will also vanish and humanity will be liberated." into the menacing "Israel will be wiped out". Our media also conveniently ignored the statement by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that "We will never start a war."

I first heard this challenge to hawks' manufactured conventional wisdom on Iran last May at a forum organized by a friend in UCSB's Center for Middle East Studies. Panelists said the phrase "wipe off the map" doesn't even exist in Farsi. They cited Professor Juan Cole, who'd previously called attention to how this statement had been seized upon by neocons drumming up support for launching attacks on Iran:

The phrase is almost metaphysical...It is in fact probably a reference to some phrase in a medieval Persian poem. It is not about tanks.

Prof. Cole also debunked the myth of Ahamdinejad's clout:

Of course Ahamdinejad does wish Israel would disappear, but he is not commander of the armed forces and could not attack it even if he wanted to, which he denies.

Guardian columnist Jonathan Steele joined Prof. Cole in disputing the dubious translation:

The fact that he compared his desired option - the elimination of "the regime occupying Jerusalem" - with the fall of the Shah's regime in Iran makes it crystal clear that he is talking about regime change, not the end of Israel. As a schoolboy opponent of the Shah in the 1970's he surely did not favour Iran's removal from the page of time. He just wanted the Shah out.

Good to see the story has regained some traction--too many still take it as a matter of fact. The only reason it remains at all controversial a year later is that intellectually lazy anchors and conservative pundits can't seem to mention Ahmadinejad without this catch phrase in the same breath. In doing so, they persistently reinforce the false notion that the Iranian president is politically powerful and poses a threat, framing talk of preemptive attack.

Alternatives to sensationalism & scapegoating

Some significant dialogues that mainstream outlets have sidestepped in order to deliver their breathless, sensationalist coverage of the tragedy at Virginia Tech:

Let's not make this about race. Already Korean-Americans (or Asians in general since the many races are often lumped into one category), are anticipating the backlash to come. When teenagers shot up Columbine and when Timothy McVeigh bombed babies in Oklahoma City did we blame white males?

Does race play a role in all that goes down in this country? Of course. Discrimination, cultural values and norms, race is one of many things that contributes to who we are, the good and the bad. But there are actual substantive issues to deal with here, issues that don't lead us to easy, bigoted conclusions.

DKos: A Setback for the Blame Islam First Crowd

In the first hours after the Virginia Tech shooting, the internet was rife with frothing speculation about the "Asian connection" with Islamic jihad, as in the following typical instapinion:

First it was Johnny Muhammad, now it was Cho Sueng Hui aka Ismail Ax. Precisely how many mass shooters have to turn out to have adopted Muslim names before we get it? Islam has become the tribe of choice of those who hate American society.

Alas, the "tribe of choice" may have turned out to be ... well, let's just take a look at today's Bloomberg headlines:

Virginia Shooter Compared Himself to Christ in Video
By Nick Allen

April 19 (Bloomberg) -- The Virginia Tech university student who killed 32 people in modern America's worst mass shooting compared his own impending death to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

"I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and defenseless people," Cho Seung Hui, 23, said during a rambling video message that he mailed to NBC News after killing his first two victims.

Somehow I don't think we're going to see a lot of speculation from the same sources in the coming days about whether Jesus Christ is a Rambo role model and Christianity is the "tribe of choice of those who hate American society."

Perhaps the dynamics of a tormented mind are little more complex than being reduced to a simple religious categorization, yes? Perhaps we can hope for a little more restraint – and information – before we leap to sweeping "evil doer" conclusions in the future?
(Note on breath: Don't hold.)

BoingBoing reader comments

I agree with BoingBoing reader Doyle's comments about predicting the religion of the shooter. Speculating him as Muslim, based on the finding of wording "Ismail AX", leans toward the islamophobic thoughts. The character Ismael belongs not only to a single but to various Abrahamic religions i.e. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc, and most of these religions predates Islam. More news is surfacing about the shooter's social interactions, which could lead to the fact that he was a psychotic, and may not have had much religious influence at all. Perhaps he just took the story of Abraham in a mythological way (even if it is remotely related). Has anyone thought or come up with a non religious explanation of 'Ismail AX'? It is amazing to see how people quickly connect anything bad with one religion. It's like they are looking for an excuse, not the answers.

And finally, Juan Cole provides some international perspective:

The profound sorrow and alarm produced in the American public by the horrific shootings at Virginia Tech should give us a baseline for what the Iraqis are actually living through. They have two Virginia Tech-style attacks every single day. Virginia Tech will be gone from the headlines and the air waves by next week this time in the US, though the families of the victims will grieve for a lifetime. But next Tuesday I will come out here and report to you that 64 Iraqis have been killed in political violence. And those will mainly be the ones killed by bombs and mortars. They are only 13% of the total; most Iraqis killed violently, perhaps 500 a day throughout the country if you count criminal and tribal violence, are just shot down. Shot down, like the college students and professors at Blacksburg. We Americans can so easily, with a shudder, imagine the college student trying to barricade himself behind a door against the armed madman without. But can we put ourselves in the place of Iraqi students?

Objective reporting*

Writing on today's town hall meeting in Oakland, the Chronicle toes the Republican party line--"Dems don't have an alternate plan for Iraq":

Neither Penn nor Rep. Barbara Lee, the Oakland Democrat who has opposed the war since before it began four years ago, offered much in the way of specifics for ending the conflict, and they were largely preaching to the choir.

How easily these reporters turn a blind eye on comprehensive legislation provided by Lee, Boxer, and Waters in the Out of Iraq Caucus' Bring Our Troops Home & Sovereignty of Iraq Restoration Act.


*Not applicable to protest coverage

Blogger cred

Traditional journalists seem all too eager to malign blogger credibility. They'll jump at any opportunity, like Politico's mistaken headline this morning about Edwards suspending his campaign. But let's not forget that mainstream news isn't exactly infallible either (::cough:: Judith Miller, Jayson Blair ::cough::) and that their mistakes often have dire consequences.

At least this reporter from the Chronicle makes an important distinction--not all bloggers are created equal when it comes to responsible reporting:

In a blog entry headlined, "Getting it Wrong,'' Smith [of Politico] admitted the error.
"My source, and I, were wrong,'' Smith said.

But he wasn't the only one. The web site for Washington television station WYLT said that "CBS news is reporting . . . '' that Edwards is out and the popular internet site Drudge, made Edwards' suspension of campaigning his lead item.

But at least at first, there was no apology from Drudge for getting it wrong. Apparently, it is fine to grab a story from another source and run with it, as many did with Smith's report, but once it is wrong, he's on his own.

Surprise, surprise. This from the internet gossip made famous for breaking the Lewinsky scandal and for his libelous claim that White House assistant Sideny Blumenthal beat his wife. His latest desperate cry for attention involved claiming to have Gore stumped with global warming questions based on debunked science.

But Politico and Drudge are closer than one might think. Politico Editor-in-Chief John F. Harris paid homage to him in his book cowritten by ABC News political director Mark Halperin--a man who called Drudge the "Walter Cronkite of his era." The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008 includes a chapter entitled "How Matt Drudge Rules Our World." Let's hope they're wrong on that one.

Selling Israel

MoJo Blog looks at marketing Israel, in particular BlueStarPR's $17,000 ad campaign in the Bay Area.

I spotted their handywork on BART a couple weeks ago. My first thought--what about Al-Jazeera?

meloukhia also commented on this poster, noting that Israel was ranked 135 on the Freedom of Press Index 2006 by Reporters Sans Frontieres. Israel's extra-territorial behavior earned it such a dismal score.

Lebanon has fallen from 56th to 107th place in five years, as the country’s media continues to suffer from the region’s poisonous political atmosphere, with a series of bomb attacks in 2005 and Israeli military attacks this year. The Lebanese media - some of the freest and most experienced in the Arab world - desperately need peace and guarantees of security. The inability of the Palestinian Authority (134th) to maintain stability in its territories and the behaviour of Israel (135th) outside its borders seriously threaten freedom of expression in the Middle East.

According to its 2007 Annual Press Freedom Survey

Palestinian journalists faced many restrictions by the Israeli authorities, who considered them primarily as Palestinian citizens, and they were banned from travelling between Gaza and the West Bank for supposed security reasons. Israeli soldiers freely entered media offices and the homes of journalists in the Palestinian Territories looking for weapons and “illegal material.” Journalists of the pan-Arab satellite TV station Al-Jazeera were prevented several times from reporting on the war in Lebanon in mid-2006. Walid al-Omari, the station’s Jerusalem bureau chief, was arrested on 17 and 18 July while reporting in the north of the country. An Israeli military vehicle opened fire on another Al-Jazeera crew, led by journalist Jevara al-Budeiri, during live coverage of an Israeli incursion into Nablus and a technician,Wael Tantous, was hit on the foot by rubber bullets.

Israeli forces bombed Lebanese media installations during the fighting with the Hezbollah militia. Israeli warplanes destroyed a transmission mast at Fatka, east of Beirut, on 22 July, temporarily putting the privately-owned Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation (LBC) TV station off the air. A station technician, Sleiman Chidiac, was killed during the attack and two other employees injured. Israeli planes bombed an LBC installation in the northern town of Terbol the same day, cutting off broadcasts to some regions by LBC and privately-owned TV stations Future TV and Al-Manar.

Given these actions, it's no wonder Israel would feel the need to improve its image with a PR campaign.

Anti-war strategies from NPR

From All Things Considered--"Anti-War Groups Seek Breakthrough Moment"

Peter Overby's advice to peace activists:

"So if activists want to woo lawmakers, maybe occupying their offices isn’t the best way to do it. Maybe they should work inside the system and, say, offer to hold a fundraiser." --Peter Overby

Please tell me this is tongue in cheek.

Today the Senate rejected a timetable for withdrawal--after weeks of debating whether to have a debate--and the House is moving to pass its own bill (after striking a provision that would have given Congress more veto power in the event of an attack on Iran). I see little opportunity to work within that framework. The political will to goad lawmakers into action must come from outside the cautious Beltway.

For an NPR story that does less to marginalize anti-war activists, see Allison Keyes' "An Anti-War Movement in Search of Crowds." At least she incorporated more voices than just MoveOn.

Cingular--formerly AT&T, now the new AT&T

I've been doing research on 18 telecom carriers for a consumer privacy report card, and I thought AT&T's purchase of Bell South and its rebranding of Cingular would consolidate a few of the policies I'm evaluating and simplify my job. But I'm finding that explaining the convoluted history of mergers and acquisitions predating this latest chapter in the annals of media ownership concentration is making the task much more complex. The story is so absurd that (not surprisingly) parodies manage to present a more accurate representation of the monopolistic history than any official press release explanation. Here's Colbert's take:



Engadget tried to make sense of it all in 2005, before AT&T's purchase was approved and the Cingular shenanigans:

1984 - For years there was one phone company: AT&T. Then in 1984 the Justice Department forces AT&T to split up into a bunch of different companies. Seven of those become the regional Baby Bells (the regional Bell operating companies, or RBOCs), while what was left of AT&T handles long-distance.

The late 1990s - One of those regional local phone companies, Texas-based Southwestern Bell Corp, spends the late Nineties scooping up its fellow local phone companies, buying Pacific Telesis Group (PacBell) in 1997, Southern New England Telecommunications in 1998, and Ameritech in 1999. In 2002, SBC Communications, as it is now known, decides to ditch all the regional brand names and call the entire company simply "SBC" in order to "unify its image." SBC combines their cellphone operation with that of BellSouth in a joint venture known as Cingular Wireless. SBC owns 60% of Cingular. BellSouth owns the other 40%.

2001 - As part of a restructuring plan, AT&T decides to spin off their wireless division, known as AT&T Wireless, as a separate company.
at&T wireless logo

2004 - Cingular decides to acquire AT&T Wireless. Cost: $41 billion. AT&T, AT&T Wireless's former parent, retains rights to the AT&T Wireless brand name as part of 2001's spin-off agreement. They announce plans to launch a new wireless service under the AT&T Wireless brand name after Cingular completes its acquisition.

2005 - SBC, which you'll recall is an amalgam of regional Baby Bells spun off from AT&T, reaches an agreement to buy its former parent for $16 billion, $25 billion less than Cingular pays for AT&T Wireless. So SBC owns 60% of Cingular, which bought AT&T Wireless; assuming the Feds okay the deal, SBC will eventually own AT&T, too. Make sense?

Update: merger is approved in November, and SBC once again rebrands to AT&T. AT&T, which still has the rights to the AT&T Wireless name will begin using it in select markets, perhaps as a Cingular-based MVNO.

2006 - AT&T (formerly SBC) announces purchase of BellSouth for 67 billion dollars. Probably just to annoy us. We'll have to wait and see if the SEC approves.

Walking in Memphis

foto by Tizzie P

I spent last weekend at the National Conference on Media Reform in Tennessee. My friend Tanya and I submerged ourselves in media culture, ate pork for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and we even experienced some honest southern hospitality (unlike the disingenous debutante kind I'd recalled) from Alcenia's on Main. Having not set foot in the south for years, everything felt as it had, like it'd been in stasis--complete with top 40 radio hits circa 1998. Natalie Imbruglia can’t still be getting royalties for that gem (though yea, I’ll admit, my middle school self couldn’t get enough). Homogeneity, pop music be thy name. Perfect case in point for why media consolidation is such a threat to freedom of expression.

The most memorable part of the conference for me wasn't so much the panel discussions themselves. I was familiar with much of what was said, as a media junkie and having been fortunate enough to see Bill Moyers, Bob McChesney, Helen Thomas, and Amy Goodman in the past. I took it as a good sign of streamlined messaging. But what I took away from Memphis had to do more with the more practical application of the strategies for dealing with issues the panels addressed. I'll remember us engaging a perfect stranger about how progressives fare in Texas, asking the Holiday Inn operator who listened to Christian radio on why she didn't trust the media, and debating with other activists on the most effective means of forwarding the goals of the media and democracy movement--especially after realizing how absurd it was to be locked in an academic echo chamber that would do nothing to help us talk to the table next to us. I'll also think of the Sunday headline in the local paper--"With surge, Memphis families feel helpless--though proud, patriotic." That qualification-- that obedient flag-waving expression of steely resolve, lest anyone doubt their stripes--was the perfect example of the fear that's paralyzed the media, proof of why they are such an important check on power. That anecdotal evidence of the urgent need for media reform manifested at the local level-- that's what will stick with me.

That being said, I did want to note a few observations I made on the conference itself, for what they're worth.

With the recent FCC ruling on AT&T's purchase of BellSouth still in headlines, net neutrality was a major focus throughout the conference, touted at times in a fairly self-congratulatory tone. With so few big victories in the fight against media consolidation, it's understandable that activists would want to take this opportunity to pat ourselves on the back. But some have cautioned against declaring this a win for media reform. Dan Gillmore of the Center for Citizen Media called the ruling into question, one of the only speakers I saw to point out that even though they vowed not to obstruct equal access to the internet, AT&T pulled a fast one on us, consolidating their ownership power and agreeing to abide by a provision they would've been forced to adhere to anyway.

Jeff Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy, predicted that attendees would come away from the conference "feeling that fighting for [net neutrality] should be the progressive media movement's top priority." Chester thinks otherwise:

Our most urgent task is to proactively intervene to shape -- on behalf of progressive values -- the emerging commercial digital communications system. This will require a strategic intervention to create sustainable "new media" services that help harness the power of digital media to better promote social justice. Our digital media system will have the capability to help "define" political and social "reality" for the majority of Americans. Unless progressives can seriously "program" the new media -- in every community and across the nation -- we will face even greater obstacles promoting our agendas.

Don Hazen, executive editor of AlterNet, concurs with Chester and Gillmore:

It is becoming increasingly clear that we need to focus more attention on the content and tools of the powerful new interactive digital landscape…and less attention on the delivery pipes. Here, huge media companies like Yahoo and Google are fighting that battle with us.

While net neutrality has an important goal of trying to protect us from future damage, it lacks the capability of fixing the myriad problems that already exist. And the company buyout that was approved in partial trade for net neutrality is an abomination, allowing AT&T, one of only three remaining regional phone companies from the original break up of AT&T back in 1984, to dominate 22 states, 67.5 million phone lines, 11.5 million broadband users.

I was happy to hear Bill Moyers reference this fact in his plenary address.

***

A number of presenters challenged the notion of objectivity as an incontrovertible journalistic standard. Columnist Laura Washington of the Chicago Sun-Time and In These Times declared there's "no such thing" as objectivity in reporting while speaking on the panel "Inside Corporate Media: Can It Tell the Truth?" with Jeff Cohen, founder of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, TV host Phil Donahue, and Flavia Colgan of MSNBC. During the "Quality Journalists=Quality Journalism" discussion, a panelist described so-called objective journalism as the type of he-said/she-said reporting in which "both guys spin their lies, and no one can call them on it." She declared that balance does not equal truth. Tanya was reminded of a quote—“objectivity turns journalists into stenographers.” Demanding this warped version of objectivity silences critical voices, and has a chilling effect on dissenting opinions, allowing establishment points of view to get the last word.

***

Media critics span the political spectrum, though as Eric Boehlert from Media Matters for America pointed out, the nature of the critique differs depending on whether it's coming from the left or right. He argued that liberals believe it's important not to slander the press, but instead to create a factual, responsible critique of media misrepresentations and underreported stories. Conservatives, on the other hand, criticize press because their goal is to dismantle it,
Boehlert says. He quoted former Wall Street Journal columnist Ron Suskind—

"For them, essentially the way to handle the press is the same as how to handle the federal government; you starve the beast. When it's in a weakened and undernourished condition, then you're able to effect a variety of subtle partisan and political attacks."

***

Tanya had her reporter hat on for the conference, and recorded an interview McJoan from DailyKos. Her excellent summary of how the conference addressed issues surrounding citizen journalism, media access, and net neutrality is posted here on New Assignment. I submitted my observations as well, but since they dealt more with media reform as a progressive political priority, they weren't posted for the most part. I found it a little ironic that a site promoting citizen journalism--one that is testing grounds for an open source project--would wield such editorial privilege, though I understand it's a work in progress, and have respect for the editor--a friend of a friend. I do feel that divorcing the conference from the political discussion surrounding it robs it of much of its significance. But I suppose there are those sites that are just not the place for advocacy journalism. If the situation were any different--say a mainstream outlet--the rejection of progressive commentary would've done more to demonstrate the fear reporters have of the liberal label than anything the observations themselves could’ve said.

***

I want to wrap up with the poem by Marge Piercy that Bill Moyers read at the end of his address. When he spoke at UCSB a few years ago, he read another.

What can they do
to you? Whatever they want.
They can set you up, they can
bust you, they can break
your fingers, they can
burn your brain with electricity,
blur you with drugs till you
can t walk, can’t remember, they can
take your child, wall up
your lover. They can do anything
you can’t blame them
from doing. How can you stop
them? Alone, you can fight,
you can refuse, you can
take what revenge you can
but they roll over you.

But two people fighting
back to back can cut through
a mob, a snake-dancing file
can break a cordon, an army
can meet an army.

Two people can keep each other
sane, can give support, conviction,
love, massage, hope, sex.
Three people are a delegation,
a committee, a wedge. With four
you can play bridge and start
an organization. With six
you can rent a whole house,
eat pie for dinner with no
seconds, and hold a fundraising party.
A dozen make a demonstration.
A hundred fill a hall.
A thousand have solidarity and your own newsletter;
ten thousand, power and your own paper;
a hundred thousand, your own media;
ten million, your own country.

It goes on one at a time,
it starts when you care
to act, it starts when you do
it again after they said no,
it starts when you say We
and know who you mean, and each
day you mean one more.

Associated Repress

An AP wire story on protests in Oaxaca marginalizes those calling for Gov. Ulises Ruiz' ouster. Shocking. They're "anarchists" (in the derrogatory sense) desecrating private property, while blameless law enforcement keep the peace:

"Thank you, sirs, and may God bless you," Maria Elena Zarate said to the officers. "We are going to support these people who risk their lives to protect us," she added, weeping as protesters threw rocks at officials.

But what of those officials responsible for the death of an American journalist, a local teacher, and three non-violent demonstrators? They're not even being held in custody on murder charges.

Here's what the AP story doesn't tell you:

Throughout the last five months [The Popular Assembly of the Pueblos of Oaxaca (Asamblea Popular de los Pueblos de Oaxaca - APPO)] have maintained their demands in Oaxaca through a peaceful, popular, democratic uprising of the people, remaining firmly within the bounds of the law. In response they have been brutally attacked most recently by plain clothes police and city officials resulting in over twelve deaths, and hundreds injured, to date. The people of Oaxaca are unarmed and continue to respond to the situation with non-violentprotest, yet in response to attacks upon them, President Vicente Fox has responded by sending in nearly 10,000 federal police further aggravating the situation and resulting in more violence against the communities of Oaxaca.
(from a UCSB press release on the movement in Oaxaca)

Their demands are not radical--Mexico's Congress has joined the call for Ruiz' resignation.

U.S. media doing what it does best--ironing out dissent.

Same old story.

Between this and an overdose of Lou Dobbs in the airport, I've had about all I can take. Here's my response to a video on the doctored Reuters photos that my friend forwarded me from Aish, a conservative Jewish org:

This makes my blood boil. There's nothing I detest more than misinformation in mainstream news media. But I'm afraid press misinformation is a much broader pandemic, and not in the way one might believe after seeing that video (which was not surprisingly produced by a right-wing religious organization). The video deliberately avoids a much more significant point to push its own agenda.

The truth is, mainstream media in the US is in no hurry to rush to Hezbollah's defense (or the defense of the Lebanese, Palestinian, or Iraqi people, for that matter). What most Americans see and read and hear is utterly uncritical of Israel, just as it is uncritical of the conservative DC establishment--which along with even the most "left-leaning" democrats voted by a huge margin last month to unconditionally endorsed Israel's attacks (that means you, Babs). Israel's role in the instigation of conflict is often neglected by allegedly "liberal" papers like the Times and the Post, and network television leaves considerably more out of its coverage. That's what happens when you've got NBC's parent company building the bombs Israel imports from the U.S.

The organization that created this video is using a time-honored conservative technique--maintaining power by propagating their image as a weak and embattled minority. Think of Christians--"the war on Christmas," or even our friends at The Fund for American Studies--because everyone knows there are too damn many liberals in econ and polisci departments out there, and not enough money in conservative think tanks to raise a whole new generation of conservative leaders!

Regardless of whether those pictures were doctored, the fact is that Israel was responsible for that destruction, teddybear in the foreground or not. Nearly a million have been displaced and over a thousand innocent lives have been taken (many many more on the Lebanese side), and the "Paris of the Middle East" has been decimated. The capture of a soldier does not violate international law. The murder of civilians does, and an Israeli life is no more worthy or news coverage than a Palestinian one or a Lebanese one.

You're certainly not getting the whole truth when outlets give no coverage to the disproportionate toll of Israel military actions on the Lebanese people. Or what about when antiwar viewpoints were silenced in the lead up to the invasion of Iraq? How about the recent ruling by a federal judge that deemed Bush's warrantless wiretapping program unconstitutional--it was ignored entirely (or only discussed by conservative legal experts) in favor of coverage of Ramsey developments. Jon Stewart did the math--10 year old murder of rich white beauty queen>Israel breaking the ceasefire>occupation of Iraq lasting longer than the US invovlement in WWII.

I have a million bones to pick with the media. That's why I want to be involved in its reform. But if one is criticizing the media, it should be for a tendency towards infotainment and the shuttering of opposing views that's so symptomatic of concentrated ownership and conservative corporate domination. So before jumping on the "liberal media" bandwagon ("Reuters is helping the terrorists!"), please consider the much more sophisticated smoke and mirrors techniques employed by the media at large.

P.S. Here's a story on the blogger from LittleGreenFootballs that challenges some of his accusations.

She's baaaaaack...

Graduation has yet to hit me like a bus...2 months of travelling this summer will pretty effectively soften the blow and provide for a cooshy landing. But come fall, I'd best have a job--doing some print or broadcast journalism, in theory. Indy stuff- if I'm lucky, at KPFA. In the meantime, thought I'd try to start posting regularly again, get a routine going. Just some pseudo-journalism for now--op-eds from the Daily Nexus.

Hasta la Vista Arnold
Governator’s Surprise Visit Was Simply a Ploy

Published Tuesday May 9, 2006

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger paid UCSB one of his signature stealth visits in the wee hours of Saturday morning. Touting a new bond initiative as part of his reelection campaign, Schwarzenegger and his crew shut down Davidson Library - to the dismay of those hoping to get a jump on midterm studying - for a cozy press conference. What, you weren’t invited? Not even local law enforcement knew about it until Friday night.

Perhaps Arnold thought that by scheduling his appearance on the morning after Cinco de Mayo he could sidestep protests because everyone would be too hung over to bother. But, au contraire - armed with only their phones and e-mails, tenacious UCSB activists were able to mobilize an impressive “welcome” crew late Friday night.

The governor hasn’t had the best reception in Santa Barbara, to say the least - hundreds turned out last October to protest his hush-hush, invitation-only “town hall” meeting for his failed special election. On the morning after Halloween in 2004, he visited the Elephant Bar in Goleta to endorse Bob Pohl, who lost the 35th District Assembly race to Pedro Nava. Students and concerned community members, there to voice opposition to education funding cuts and the Governor’s pro-business agenda, were written off as “special interests.”

Wherever Schwarzenegger makes an appearance, protests follow. Is it any wonder why he would keep a low profile when his approval rating is second only to the president’s dismal numbers?

When you hear Schwarzenegger touting his unwavering support for education and California students, beware. This man is no friend to higher education. In the past three years he has allowed our fees to rise. Have you seen that money come back to our campus in more classrooms, cheaper textbooks or more financial aid? Or did it go straight to the bank accounts of the UC system’s top staffers in the form of bonuses and outrageous salary hikes?

Let’s all sit back and watch as Schwarzenegger claims credit for freezing our fees this year, when the real credit belongs the UC Student Association (UCSA) and their strong lobbying efforts with legislative leaders and the governor. It was not a benevolent leader, but students themselves that saved us each $500 this year.

But lo and behold, it’s an election year again. We are beginning to hear the rhetoric and shameless pandering from our loving governor. But we see through it. This is all too little, too late. I would at least have expected him to have a few token UCSB students standing behind him at the press conference. No doubt our campus still contains a few star-struck shills who still marvel at how it’s “f-ing sweet that the Terminator is our governor!”

We were also disappointed that Chancellor Henry T. Yang, usually a great champion of students, allowed Davidson Library to close for two hours during midterm time for what was nothing more than a cheap photo-op for political gain.

The upcoming primary election June 6 will be the first step toward getting a real champion of students and higher education into office. Providing much more than empty rhetoric, Democratic candidates like Phil Angelides for governor and Jackie Speier for lieutenant governor have fought for California’s students and schools. If elected in November, we can be sure they will use their political office for substantive change, not photo-ops.

---------------

Readers Should Remain Skeptical of the News They Read, Press Makes Mistake

Published Thursday June 1, 2006

I was extremely disappointed after reading Elana Wenocur’s column (“Iran’s Wristbands Are Reminiscent of Nazi Germany,” Daily Nexus, May 24, 2006). Wenocur expressed her horror upon reading an article by Amir Taher printed in the conservative Canadian National Post about legislation that would institute a dress code for religious minorities in Iran. Her dismay would be quite understandable - if the story were true. However, the column she read - and that many others have undoubtedly been misled by - was a hoax pushed by the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the preeminent Israeli lobby AIPAC.

On May 19, the Anti-Defamation League released a statement acknowledging that “while it is factual that the Iranian parliament is considering some kind of dress code, there is no evidence of any discussion or legislation concerning badges or the like for Jews and others.” The following day, both Reuters and the Associated Press corroborated ADL’s report, which refuted the National Post author’s claims by obtaining a copy of the Iranian bill and listening to a broadcast of the parliamentary session where it was given preliminary approval. The false allegations have since been acknowledged by the Jewish Week and other pro-Israel publications.

Wenocur’s op-ed was published on the May 24 - the day the National Post issued an apology and retracted its story, and five days after it had first been called into question. Public opinion is built to a large extent upon stories transmitted by the press. Editors are to be held responsible for validating the factual content of columns before they are published and seen by thousands of readers. The media have a solemn responsibility to ensure they do not propagate an alarmist agenda intended to drum up domestic support for belligerent foreign policy.

I feel strongly that it is a civic duty to stay informed on world events and that inflammatory stories like Taheri’s should be viewed with healthy skepticism. Misconceptions are best challenged through education - the hugely successful panel on Iran a couple weeks ago in I.V. Theater was proof that there are many in our community who would rather get informed and seek the truth than hastily jump to conclusions.

It’s important to avoid provocative statements and casually toss around the notion that Iran, or any other nation for that matter, “is developing nuclear weapons.” Unlike Israel, Iran is a signatory of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. It has not violated International Atomic Energy Agency regulations, and according to U.S. intelligence reports, the country is at least a decade away from producing any weapons.

In an effort to promote peace and stability - which ultimately will serve to protect Israel’s interests, too - I think it’s crucial to highlight efforts made toward brokering a diplomatic solution to recent escalations.

Last week the Washington Post reported that President Ahmadinejad followed up his letter to the White House with yet another overture for diplomatic negotiations. Paul Pillar, a recently retired senior CIA Middle East intelligence analyst said, “There is no question in my mind that there has been for some time a desire on the part of the senior Iranian leadership to engage in a dialogue with the United States.”

At this critical moment, it’s in everyone’s best interest to emphasize diplomacy and constructive discourse, and avoid exaggerated rhetoric.

-----------------

That last one precipitated a giant pissing contest on the Facebook with an Israeli student. Not the first time that's happened. And from what I've seen after 4 years at UCSB, there's a pretty vocal (to say the least) pro-Israel community at UCSB. The Nexus has successfully engaged these folks and maintained a steady tradition of perpetuating the Arab/Israeli conflict on its editorial pages. That is, of course, when they're not busily debating the finer points of masturbation. Not that there's anything wrong with a little intellectual masturbation now and again, am I right folks? Am I right? Oh the irony and the awful jokes. Yep, I'm blogging again. Only hopefully this time, no one's reading.

And for all the shit I talk about the Nexus, all I gotta say is--man...I'll miss having a surefire way to get published.

SB IndyMedia blitz

Darfur Freedom Fest
Howard Zinn at Campbell Hall

SB DisOrientation in the News Press

Lefty guide at UCSB urges return to student radicalism
By MORGAN GREEN

Part liberal manifesto and part how-to manual for radicals, the first UCSB Disorientation Guide appeared on campus last week, signaling that a new season of student activism has begun.

The "Diso" guide exhorts students to become activists and points them toward campus groups on the political left. The first copies were handed out Thursday night outside Campbell Hall to students hoping to attend a packed address by pacifist historian Howard Zinn.

While the guide is clearly aimed at students, it gives Santa Barbara a snapshot of the latest generation of liberal-leaning campus activists here, and the issues they'll be marching, and chanting, and petitioning about. It's an eclectic list, from ending the war in Iraq and opposing globalism and sweatshops, to support for unisex campus restrooms designed for disabled or transgender users.

The guide is not an official UCSB publication. Its creators, eight students and former students, acknowledged that so many students have come and gone since the heyday of counterculture and anti-Vietnam movements at UCSB that many are only dimly aware of even the infamous 1970 torching of the Bank of America in Isla Vista. In an attempt to revive the spirit, but not necessarily the violence, of the "old days," the guide details the history of student activism here. The last mass event noted is a 2003 march by about 1,000 students protesting the Iraq war as part of a nationwide student walkout. Tanya Paperny, a student and guide organizer, said that is why the Diso guide is needed. "A lot of people have passion for certain issues, but never direct it to work on campus because UCSB has this reputation for being apathetic."

The guide drew some criticism before it came off the press. One contributor, a UCSB staff member, objects to some of its raw language. And the leader of College Republicans has questioned the propriety of cash contributions by some professors to help pay for printing costs.

Only 1,300 or so copies of the guide are in print, but its cyber version evidently is getting attention. Since the www.sbdisorientation.org site was completed a few weeks ago, it has received more than 6,000 "hits," said Darwin BondGraham, a graduate student who helped organize the project.

The Diso guide covers aspects of campus life that are not seen in UCSB's official orientation materials, he said.

Similar guides have appeared recently at several universities nationwide, including Columbia, Stanford and the University of Texas at Austin. UC Berkeley has produced an online "Disorientation Zine" for 10 years. Last year, UC Santa Cruz produced a guide that was downloaded by more than 8,500 visitors, according to the UCSC guide Web site.

The self-defined radical publication at UCSB comes at a time the volume of campus discourse is rising over issues such as the war in Iraq, the presence of military recruiters on campus, the ban on affirmative action, and state funding cuts. Although only a few hundred out of 20,000 undergraduates consistently participate in grass-roots political activities, conservative and liberal student groups have been increasingly visible on campus in the past year or so. Both sides spent time this summer gearing up for the start of the fall term.

On the right, the long-established UCSB College Republicans spent part of the summer arranging to bring conservative pundit Ben Stein to UCSB on Thursday. They hope he will sway opinions ahead of an expected faculty vote later this fall on whether to keep military recruiters on campus, said Sally Marois, the UCSB College Republicans president. By the 11th day of classes, campus Republicans also conducted Support Our Troops days, gathering signatures on a banner to send to a UCSB alumnus in Iraq.

Also over the summer, the Disorientation Guide's creators solicited students, staff and others for articles and assembled the publication and Web site. "We want to help build up the antiwar movement, get the word out about different progressive organizations," said Mr. BondGraham.

The Diso guide includes biting profiles of UC regents, and commentaries on topics from feminism and corporate media to proper "queer" terminology and the value of blogs. It has interviews with the campus's "most politically active" professors, and a directory of liberal organizations on campus and in Santa Barbara.

UCSB staff member Barbara Hirsch, who co-authored a guide page listing UCSB's environmental accomplishments, lamented that the publication's raw four-letter-word language might be counterproductive. There could be a more positive way of expressing it, she said.

But Will Parrish, a former UC Santa Cruz student who brought the guide idea to Santa Barbara, defends the language. "One of the things we were trying to do is appeal to students in a way that they don't think we're part of the establishment, or what we're doing is watered down in any way."

Some UCSB professors who donated up to $100 for the guide's printing costs stepped over the line, said Ms. Marois. "I think it would be inappropriate for (the College Republicans) to have professors listed under our magazine, The Gaucho Free Press, or to give us money."

One of the donors, Dick Flacks, a sociology professor and outspoken liberal, said he has not read the guide yet. "In fact, I will probably disagree with a lot in it."

In any case, he said that he can contribute to it what he wants when he wants. He also said that he believes it is only inappropriate for professors to sponsor something "that would cause injury to the institution or individuals. I thought (the guide) was a nice project for the students to have worked on."

LA Times raises eyebrows (and eyelids)

On A14 of the LA Times, the headline reads:

DeLay Is Indicted Again' Charges Are Graver

At the bottom corner of the page below the fold, the ad reads:

For more beautiful eyes, go to an Eyelid Specialist
...This means tha tif you have droopy upper lids, baggy lower lids and fine lines and wrinkles, Dr. Fett's advanced knowledge of eyelid structure combined with years of experience as a laser eyelid specialist, can give your eyes a more natural, balanced and beautiful look.

I kid you not. Coincidence? Maybe...but a ridiculously funny one, nonetheless. DeLay--doctors may have been able to make you look a little less like Droopy, but my guess is they probably won't be able to save you from jail.

Norman Solomon at UCSB

Audio at SBIndyMedia.

Katrina--Bush's Monica

The Daily Show's back in full swing--"Bush will build a billion dollar damn in Arkansas...we're fighting the water over there, so we don't have to fight it at home, in New Orleans."

[M]ost chillingly of all, this is the Law and Order and Terror government. It promised protection — or at least amelioration — against all threats: conventional, radiological, or biological. It has just proved that it cannot save its citizens from a biological weapon called standing water.

You'd only hear a line like that on alternative news outlets, right? That was Keith Olbermann on MSNBC. Hot damn, we have ourselves a critical, aggressive media.

The noise machine and its soldering engine

I was talking politics (surprise surprise) over a bottle of wine last night with some friends in the city, when a girl I’d just met said something that gave some real insight into the despair plaguing the left. She told us she was too overwhelmed and too disgusted by conservative tactics to even join the conversation. “You can’t win,” she said.

It was just so indicative of what’s been going on with the broader movement—we’ve been attacked on all fronts by a pervasive messaging machine, and all we’ve resorted to is (at least what comes off as) reactionary bitching. I think everyone knows what the right is all about--though having lived at their policy nerve center, it could just be that I’ve been conditioned to pick up on their arguments. Still, it's never ceased to amaze me how consistent and easily recognizable right-wing, particularly free market messaging is. And the fact that I unwittingly ended up at Heritage alone proves how effective they are at drawing people in—even though their hosting me had the unintended effect of pushing me further in the opposite direction.

Ironically, the people with the most regressive politics have maintained this facade that they've got the most coherent and visionary ideas--proof that the left’s lagging on positive messaging (hopelessly abstract as that is) that all we've done is either rail against them or throw up our hands in disgust after seeing how far we've gone in the wrong direction. The fringe has had absolute control, and solid Frankian backlash rhetoric to convince everyone they’re the ones who are marginalized. With strategies that rival the Chewbacca defense, and it’s enough to make any lefty's head explode.

But all this is changing—in spite of themselves, in spite of democrat’s shortcomings as an opposition party, and even with all the republican’s catch phrases and law-bending strategery and corporate funding, they’re losing it:

The approval rate for Mr. Bush's handling of Iraq plunged to 34 percent in last weekend's Newsweek poll - a match for the 32 percent that approved L.B.J.'s handling of Vietnam in early March 1968...

Paul Hackett, a Democrat who called the president a "chicken hawk," received 48 percent of the vote in exactly the kind of bedrock conservative Ohio district that decided the 2004 election for Mr. Bush...

Only someone as adrift from reality as Mr. Bush would need to be told that a vacationing president can't win a standoff with a grief-stricken parent commandeering TV cameras and the blogosphere 24/7.

And polls show some serious disapproval across party lines. Now isn’t the time for silence or infighting. There needs to be focus on helping their self-destruction along.

Durbin almost redeems himself

Though Senator Dick Durbin may have come off as an unprincipled pissant cry baby when he apologized to republicans for his comments on Gitmo, he was definitely on his game while grilling Kenneth "advocacy is a big word" Tomlinson, Chair of the CPB. Now if only he'd stood up to the big guns.

SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: What was Mr. Mann's expertise? Why did you happen to hire him? According to Senator Dorgan who’s seen the raw date, he was paid thousands of dollars, his data riddled with spelling errors was faxed to you from a Hallmark store in downtown Indianapolis. What is this Mann's background for judging a program like Moyers’s program and whether it’s liberal or not?
KENNETH TOMLINSON: Well, he worked for twenty years for the National Journalism Center, which is a 401(c)(3) organization.
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: National Journalism Center?
KENNETH TOMLINSON: National Journalism Center.
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: What is that? I don’t --
KENNETH TOMLINSON: But the point of watching it –
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: Excuse me, what is the National Journalism Center?
KENNETH TOMLINSON: It’s a center here in Washington that found internships for --
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: And they're straight down the middle of the road, moderate centrist group, right and left?
...
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: Well, I got to get to the basic question here. I won't go through the list of some of Mr. Moyers's more liberal guests -- Frank Gaffney, Grover Norquist, Richard Viguerie, Paul Gigot – on his liberal program --
KENNETH TOMLINSON: It is our experience --
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: But let me ask you this if I can: Did you feel that it was your responsibility or authority to go out and put together the “Wall Street Editorial Page” show and to find subsidy for that? Did you feel that that was your responsibility to do?
KENNETH TOMLINSON: I felt that the law required us to reflect balance in our current affairs programming. I was not the only one involved in encouraging a program that represented a diverse point of view from the Moyers show.
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: So following Mr. Moyers’s comments in St. Louis, can we expect you to do the same for The Nation magazine? Are you going to raise $5 million to make sure they have a show?
KENNETH TOMLINSON: I don't see -- I don't see today we have a balance problem. We have a 30-minute show, “Now,” and we have a 30-minute show, The Wall Street Journal. That's balanced. Let the people decide. Balance is common sense.
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN: But, Mr. Tomlinson, the people, I said at the outset, already decided. They thought that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was presenting balance. And they thought that, you know, they gave it high approval rating. You have perceived a problem here which the American people obviously don't perceive.