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Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

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Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#121

Post by gaius »

varjag wrote: post #115
gaius wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

while they worked for BBC, they were unbiased; but the moment they started working for AJ The BBC is generally regarded as being anti-Israel: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/bbc-fights-to-sup... When people say a news source is "unbiased" they really mean "agrees with me".

But you see, everyone has problems with BBC. Israeli think it's anti-Israel, Putin says it's anti-Russian. In reality though it's simply not pro-Israel or pro-Russian. Just telling the truth infuriates lots of people.

It is possible to be both anti-Israel and anti-Russian, y'know. The idea that the BBC is any more "truthy" than any other news source is laughable; they're all run by humans after all. And the BBC recruits most of its staff through one route, the media section in the Guardian, which no-one would claim is anything other than a left-wing paper. It could, for example, balance it out by recruiting 50% via the Graun's big rival, the Daily Mail, but it doesn't.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#122

Post by snotrockets »

jacobmg wrote: post #78
rdtsc wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "They do seem" as a claim on it's own has no persuasive power. Sorry. I meant they seem to _me_ I wasn't asserting a general truth. I am just one of the HNers here. So it is more of a personal observation. > Look, it even comes with allusions to the comparison of Israel and the Nazis! ---- excerpt from first article ------ In mid-January, dozens of young Jews attacked Muslims at a mosque in Yafo or Jaffa, the histo…

It is easy to draw intuitive statistical conclusions in a small town ; you bet if there weren't usually race based violence in a small town, that if you saw 4-5 incidents in a short period of time, there would be very few non-racism based explanations that were plausible. Israel is 7.5 million people with 75% Jews. That provides a large enough pool of incidents of Jews attacking Muslims to draw from just because ther…

But there is a noticeable rise in hostility against activities against the Israeli-Palestinian population in Israel.

Just open an Israeli paper (most maintain an edition of their website in English: try http://www.haaretz.com/ or http://www.ynetnews.com/)

And as an Israeli, I see it everyday on the street, in public opinion, in the papers...

Some friends are maintaining a detailed list in http://www.hahem.co.il/slipperyslope/en/ -- It's quite a saddening read.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#123

Post by ern »

endtime wrote: post #113
srean wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I criticize the Indian government all the time. But I find it strange that for my criticisms to be taken seriously I also have to criticize all other countries equally. I may be the most anti Indian person in the world, but should that discredit my criticism if its valid ? I got thrown off by the terminology "anti-Semitic criticism". From the context it seems to mean: criticism by an "anti Semitic" person, you probab…

Well, are you Indian or Pakistani? The unspoken condition of that test (which I already stated is imperfect) is that the person not have a direct personal connection to that country. I wouldn't necessarily call a Palestinian preoccupied with criticizing Israel anti-Semitic; I'd be a little more inclined to wonder about the motives of, say, a Belgian.

George Clooney is an American of Irish descent. Does his interest in Sudan (to which he seems to have little "personal connection") make you wonder about his motives?

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#124

Post by dasil003 »

gaius wrote: post #121
varjag wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you see, everyone has problems with BBC. Israeli think it's anti-Israel, Putin says it's anti-Russian. In reality though it's simply not pro-Israel or pro-Russian. Just telling the truth infuriates lots of people.

It is possible to be both anti-Israel and anti-Russian, y'know. The idea that the BBC is any more "truthy" than any other news source is laughable; they're all run by humans after all. And the BBC recruits most of its staff through one route, the media section in the Guardian, which no-one would claim is anything other than a left-wing paper. It could, for example, balance it out by recruiting 50% via the Graun's big…

So all news sources are equally truthy? There's no such thing as perfect objectivity, but there are shades of gray.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#125

Post by ars »

davidchua wrote: post #84
borism wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just pulled rtmpdump from macports (I already have mplayer, of course) and I can confirm it works on mac too... except their rtmp provider seems to be getting killed right now. I would recommend switching to Livestation, quality isn't as good, but at least it works (on Linux too).

It works fine on my linux box. Is there anyway to adjust the screensize to full-screen?

Look in /etc/mplayer/input.conf for the keybindings.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#126

Post by rplacd »

gaius wrote: post #121
varjag wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you see, everyone has problems with BBC. Israeli think it's anti-Israel, Putin says it's anti-Russian. In reality though it's simply not pro-Israel or pro-Russian. Just telling the truth infuriates lots of people.

It is possible to be both anti-Israel and anti-Russian, y'know. The idea that the BBC is any more "truthy" than any other news source is laughable; they're all run by humans after all. And the BBC recruits most of its staff through one route, the media section in the Guardian, which no-one would claim is anything other than a left-wing paper. It could, for example, balance it out by recruiting 50% via the Graun's big…

Standard procedure in the industry - the Times have the Educational supplement, the Graun have the MediaGraun (Sky, for example, also pushes the majority of recruitment requests through it. I'd also argue that the T is the more direct competitor.). Much is also put in trade papers like Broadcast.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#127

Post by gaius »

dasil003 wrote: post #124
gaius wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is possible to be both anti-Israel and anti-Russian, y'know. The idea that the BBC is any more "truthy" than any other news source is laughable; they're all run by humans after all. And the BBC recruits most of its staff through one route, the media section in the Guardian, which no-one would claim is anything other than a left-wing paper. It could, for example, balance it out by recruiting 50% via the Graun's big…

So all news sources are equally truthy? There's no such thing as perfect objectivity, but there are shades of gray.

You need to look for a news source that is financially incentivized to do "just the facts". Organization such as Reuters, AP, AFP etc sell "raw news" to TV stations and newspapers, which then put their own editorial on it. The same Reuters feed goes into the BBC as goes into Sky News. So if you really care, just read Reuters and make up your own mind.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#128

Post by tkahn6 »

btilly wrote: post #114
jacobmg wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, everything claimed is easy to verify. Races aren't segregated, racism isn't taught (as in, it's not part of the curriculum.) All races are equal under Israeli law. Your education on this subject had to have been seriously skewed to think otherwise.

All races are equal under Israeli law. From that I can conclude that you are either ignorant or a liar. Because races are NOT equal in Israeli law. Either in theory OR practice. Let me give some examples. The Law of Return only applies to Jews. The military draft does not apply to certain ethnic groups, because Israel doesn't want most of them in its military forces. And that's in theory. In practice it is much worse…

> The military draft does not apply to certain ethnic groups, because Israel doesn't want most of them in its military forces.

Absolutely fascinating. Where did you hear this?

The draft doesn't apply to non-Jews because Israel doesn't want to force its Arab citizens to fight other Arabs. However, Arabs, Muslims, and Christians are encouraged to join the military or civil service and they serve alongside Israeli Jews or in their own units. In fact Druze men have mandatory conscription.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Defense_Forces#Minoritie...

> The Law of Return only applies to Jews.

Many, many countries have a Right or Law of Return. I always find it interesting that it is particularly bad when Jews do it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_of_return

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#129

Post by getsat »

jacobmg wrote: post #70
getsat wrote: post #19

There is a large subset of the US population that would distrust any information from an Arabic source. BBC, Reuters, and Al Jazeera are amazing compared to CNN/MSNBC/FOX.

PBS is a better fit to be compared to BBC. You can find low-brow entertainment based news in the UK and every other country with a free media. It's not like you can't access quality news in the US and Al Jazeera has to swoop in and save the day.

True, what I've seen of PBS I've liked as well.

Re: Why can't people in US watch Al Jazeera?

#130

Post by getsat »

borism wrote: post #24
getsat wrote: post #19

There is a large subset of the US population that would distrust any information from an Arabic source. BBC, Reuters, and Al Jazeera are amazing compared to CNN/MSNBC/FOX.

does Reuters have their own TV channel?

Not that I'm aware of, but their research/stories are cited as sources by a large number of news outlets and their video footage is seen constantly.
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