Nightline’s ‘The Fallen’
By Oli
At 7:23 PM · Wednesday, 5 May · 2004
To Life
Recently ABC’s Nightline produced a program devoted to reading the names of all the American soldiers who have died in Iraq during the second Gulf War. Although the presenter Ted Koppel stated The reading of those 721 names was neither intended to provoke opposition to the war nor as an endorsement
, it of course has become political.
The Sinclair Broadcast Group (who have ‘links to the White House’, whatever that means) barred it’s stations from airing the program; Sinclair called it a political statement that failed to give all sides of the story
. I’m wondering what other side of the dead soldiers the story could have covered? One senator also labelled it unpatriotic
, an accusation that always sickens me. I wonder what he would have said if the program had contained an estimate of Iraqi civilian casualties?
Discussion...
- 1. Comment by anon · 15 May, 2004 · 8:04 PM
When someone calls someone else “unpatriotic” what they simply mean is that the person is questioning the government…
Ironically, to question the government is one of the most patriotic things you can do in a democracy.
- 2. Comment by oli · 16 May, 2004 · 3:59 PM
I completely agree with the second part. However I find that the use of ‘unpatriotic’ tends to be very negative. Recently I was reading a Hong Kong newspaper, and China was attacking democratically-minded Hong Kong politicians with the moniker. Their meaning was basically ‘people who don’t agree with us who we’d like to shut up’. The USA also has a proud history of using ‘unpatriotic’ for FUD and worse, for example McCarthyism and the verbal attacks on politicians/countries who didn’t agree with Dubya’s decision to invade Iraq.
It’s all a little 1984-esque in the USA now, huh. When ‘Double-speak’ like “enemy combatants” (POWs denied POW rights), “civilian contractors” (mercenaries), and “armed insurgents” (partisans) are used without question by the media, it’s just scary. Aah the joy of language ;-)
