After obsessively reading articles about yesterday's March on DC, I'm getting pretty fed up. Here is a list of the things that are ticking me off:
Why is it that any group of conservatives are always either: a) Mean, rich people, or b) white trash, racist rednecks who just believe whatever FoxNews tells them? I mean, you could hardly be both at the same time, could you? And I certainly don't feel that I fall into either one of those categories. I'm certainly not rich; I can be mean at times, but so are most of the liberals who are writing about conservatives, so I'm not sure I can learn any lessons on being nice from them. I'm not racist. I'm not a redneck. I'm actually very well educated, very good at thinking for myself, and pretty good at trying to understand what the different sides to an argument are. I don't watch FoxNews or any other news, but I read from a lot of different sources on the internet and not JUST Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter (although I will admit that they're my favorites). I don't try to make claims about "all liberals," so could these people PLEASE stop acting like all conservatives fit into one of these two categories?
Next problem: Why is it that no one can figure out how many people were at the rally yesterday??? The numbers I've seen range from 60,000 to 2 million. People, that is a HUGE discrepancy! That would be like me not knowing if I invited three people to my child's birthday party, or 100! Really? NO ONE could get a decent count?!?!?!?! Apparently the DC police don't do crowd estimates, so yes, someone would have to actually look at the people and do some calculating. Didn't anyone do this? Was that really too much work to bother with?
Having been there myself and having attended sporting events with large crowds, I'm guessing that there had to be have been at least half a million people there. We estimated that there were 1,000 protesters on our metro train alone. When you add up all the other metros, people bussed in, and driven in, I think we can safely assume more than just 60,000. Anyway, here's a time lapse video of it where you can see the crowds marching by. Judge for yourself (and feel free to disregard the music. I like this music, but in this context, even I can admit that it's pretty cheesy).
While we're on the subject, though, the New York Times made it seem-- to people who were just skimming headlines-- as though there were more people at Obama's healthcare rally in Minnesota than there were in DC and that is nowhere near the truth. I realize that no one in their right mind (ha, ha) takes the New York Times very seriously any more, but I'm not used to seeing such blatant distortion of facts with which I am personally involved. It makes me really angry.
Finally, a bunch of the articles made it seem as though the people at the rally were being so terrible and unruly because they carried posters depicting Obama as Hitler or the Joker. FIRST of all, that was pretty much all the rage for the media to portray George W. Bush as Hitler, the Joker, a vampire, and even Satan himself. But when conservatives do it, suddenly it's mean and nasty and not showing respect for the Office of the President? I really can't handle the hypocrisy. Second of all, the mainstream media seems to have forgotten that the Nazi party was in fact a socialist party! If what people are protesting is their leader's move towards socialism, then using Hitler is actually a fairly accurate-- albeit scary-- way to draw attention to that.
I myself wouldn't carry a sign like that because it's a bit meaner than I'd like to be. But if you were okay with previous presidents being likened to evil dictators, I'm not sure you can get too huffy when the same thing happens to the guy you like. (And I also think that with the way Clinton used Monica Lewinsky, he pretty much destroyed any hope of the president ever being respected. But that's a different rant...)
For the record, the thing that amazed me about the march yesterday was how good and kind the people at this rally were. This was very accurately described in this blog; if you didn't read any of the other links I included, please read this one. Everyone picked up their trash, everyone was friendly, everyone was happy. That was part of what I enjoyed about being there so much-- these people, to me, are who really make up America. These are the people you'd want as your next-door neighbors. And these are also a heck of a lot of voters.
Not many of the newspapers seemed to be mentioning this fact.
*For my liberal friends out there-- I'm sorry if I'm just making you mad with this post. I realize that you and I actually manage to have meaningful discussions about these things and am very thankful for that fact. Please don't think I include you in this rant-- I'm angry about the very biased media and the (way too) many ridiculous comments people have left on these articles. I still consider you my friends, though. Just for the record.
6 comments:
Obviously many of the commenters on the various news sites seem to not be aware of Godwins' Law.
As long as you're not under the impression that Limbaugh and Coulter are good, reliable sources of news, then I suppose you can get away with liking them. :) (Unfortunately there seem to be some around me out here that, from what I can tell, rely on Beck/Limbaugh/Coulter as their primary or only news source. That's frightening.)
I had never heard of Godwin's Law before! That is hilarious!
And I have to say-- I've really never paid much attention to Beck, but recently Craig and I watched a DVD about his joining the Church. Well, that was all fine and good, and since then I've watched a little bit about him, and I have to say that I'm not really a big fan. I like Ann Coulter because she manages to be in your face in a way that few conservatives ever are, and I like to just read the highlights of Rush's show to see what he's been talking about. But the Glenn Beck stuff seemed a little too sappy (trying to be emotional but failing, is what I'm saying) for me to take seriously. I also try to read New York Times headlines and will do searches on what interests me.
But I'm curious, now, Erin (and anybody else): What would you deem a reliable news source?
Good question, Alanna. Like you, I read a lot on the internet. I like BBC and enjoy the NY Times as well. But I also read articles from all the other major news services and many smaller ones, depending on what I can find easily. (Sometimes it seems the smaller, more local papers do a better job of simply reporting the facts than the large companies do.) I try to be aware of the bias of the source and temper my thoughts from any articles I read based on that.
If I find a particular news story interesting I will try to find multiple reports of it, just to get as many viewpoints and facts as possible. I think anymore reading the news from any service is an exercise in gleaning the hard facts from the reporter's opinion. But as long as an article contains a greater percentage of fact than opinion (unless it's meant as an opinion piece of course) I will consider it at least a decent source of news.
Beck/Limbaugh (I'm sure the liberals have people who play the same role on their side; I just don't know who they are), from what I know of them, take one small fact and exaggerate and distort it until they can act alarmed about what's supposedly happening.
My problem then comes when people I know come up to me and say that they "heard on the news that Obama is writing a book containing his ideals and is going to require it be taught to all K-6th graders in schools" (yes, this actually happened). This is when I suspect said person is confusing Beck or someone similar for a source of news rather than a source of opinion. And that's disturbing.
I just got back from looking at the blog you linked to. While it may have an accurate description of the rally, the other posts on the blog are incredibly discouraging in the hate and fear they encourage. (Particularly the one about Islam clouding the horizon.)
One of the most frustrating thing about the most vocal conservatives is that they can't seem to get their ideas across without spewing hate and fear-mongering. The most vocal liberals often have the same problem. I just have to keep reminding myself that there are more level-headed people such as yourself out there.
Yeah, it's true. I just cringe when I read stuff like that and want to add my comment that would say something like, "Ha ha, just because you're obviously crazy, doesn't mean that the rest of us conservatives are racist/sexist/afraid of Muslims/etc."
I've also noticed recently that different journals get very different types of responses. I think my favorite, so far is the Wall Street Journal. Most of the comments there are usually thought-out, lacking in obvious typos, etc. I've actually started judging some sources based on the responses from the readers, with the mindset of, "Well, if jerks like that read this, I probably won't bother!" It might not always be a fair test, but I think there's something to it!
I definitely think that test is worthwhile. And I'd wager it's pretty fair as well. At least in a lot of instances. The type of people commenting are often the type of people the site is aimed at.
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