Aug 29
An Imperfect Perfection – Follow up
Written by Allen on Friday, August 29th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Filed under:-mini-posts, culture, music, News, politics | Tags:Lin Miaoke, mime, olympics, Opening Ceremony, Yang Peiyi
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Filed under:-mini-posts, culture, music, News, politics | Tags:Lin Miaoke, mime, olympics, Opening Ceremony, Yang Peiyi
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A few weeks ago, accusations and charges of fakery in the Opening Ceremony flew in the Western media like hotcakes when it was discovered that two Chinese girls had participated in performance of the “Hymn to the Motherland” in the Opening Ceremony. We had a discussion here a few weeks ago.
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Well – a few days ago, it was found out that the Australians also faked – not just one signer – but the entire orchestra! I thought this would make for an entertaining read.
We don’t need to get into the politics again… but I just wanted to follow up in case some of you missed the story…
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54 Responses to “An Imperfect Perfection – Follow up”
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August 29th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
The Yahoo report actually omitted some juicy comments:
Mr Green said the MSO had used a backing tape at the opening ceremony of the 2006 Commonwealth Games.
“The miming side of it is perfectly normal,” he said. “There are millions of people watching and if something goes wrong you’d be snookered.”
http://www.smh.com.au/news/music/sydney-olympics-faked-opening-too/2008/08/26/1219516425771.html
August 29th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Hmm – interesting. At least in Beijing – it was done live!
August 29th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
There basically wasn’t a story; talk about making a mountain out of a molehill.
August 30th, 2008 at 12:09 am
Some of the “unreal” effects in the Bejing ceremony was also used in Athens 2004
Memorable moments of Athens Olympics’ opening ceremony
http://www.china.org.cn/video/2008-07/28/content_16084806.htm
August 30th, 2008 at 12:36 am
I am sure that they rounded up all the cowboys (from all the rodeo shows) and their pickups for the Atlantic Olympics. Even better in 2002 in Salt Lake they found all the skating cowboys.
August 30th, 2008 at 12:50 am
Every country tries to pull some amount of wool over the eyes of the world, doesn’t it?
The East Germans had the strongest “women’s” wrestling team.
Australia fakes an entire symphony.
The Americans have questionable citizen athletes.
China has the wizard singing behind the curtain.
China has underage athletes.
The list goes on…
Why don’t we try to guess what kind of wool the Brits will attempt to pull over our eyes in 2012.
A populace with bright, white teeth?
August 30th, 2008 at 8:32 am
Too bad this came to light now. If this was known the day after the Opening Ceremonies in 2000, I’m sure it would’ve been a much bigger story, and that response would even have served as a comparison to the most recent imperfection.
August 30th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
s.k.c,
even after the facts about the 2000 sydney ceremony was revealed, some australian commetators said that the sydney incident was forgiveable and that of beijing is not. why, i wonder?
August 30th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
“Too bad this came to light now. If this was known the day after the Opening Ceremonies in 2000, I’m sure it would’ve been a much bigger story, and that response would even have served as a comparison to the most recent imperfection.”
I highly doubt it would attract the same media frenzy if it were revealed then. What’s in Beijing Olympics case is that the so-called journalists came to Beijing to nit-pick and find faults, and not particularly interested in anything else. That’s why the music directory said not a single western media company was interested in interviewing the director team after the show, but suddenly chasing him once the lip-synching story broke and thought he might be a dissident/revealing more “dirts”.
I think it’s the Wall Street Journal that really put this enormous (and getting old too) negativity into perspectives: the reason, it says, is that this Olympics is only the second time since WWII that the hosting nation is not pro-western or at least neutral. The first time was Soviet Union and the Americans boycotted the game by not going.
I therefore conclude the biggest unspoken broken promise by the Beijing Olympics was not what you read in the papers. The (implicit) promise of having some “big” stories was never delivered – the 24-hour monitoring stations at the protest site did get any incidents, no masked athletes in competition, no food safety issue, no terrorist attacks, no surprise scene-making protests of any sorts in important places. The “journalists” all went home empty-handed. They’ve probably milked as much as they can out of any bit of tiny sensation stories they could find – lip synching, granny sentenced to re-edu camps etc.
http://www.thestar.com/2008/BeijingLife/article/487458
My observation in the past several months leading up to the Olympics led to a surprise finding. I personally think Wall Street Journal upholds its journalism standard the most, perhaps even more so than NY Times (think of the Grace Wang story it broke!).
You ask why ? I suspect it’s the firewall between news reporting and op-ed is proven working. At the beginning of every year, its editor in chief would write a letter to its readers reiterates WSJ’s policy of strictly separating news reporting from the op-ed. They are handled separately and published in different sections. The goal is the reader will know if he is reading opinions or real factual news. So while WSJ is extremely right wing and conservatives in its editorials, that views do not show in their news reporting articles. How brilliant ? I’ve read WSJ for 8 years this was the first time I truly appreciated it.
On the other hand, NY Times (and many others) mixes news reporting with reporters’ opinions. Their articles tend to start with anecdotal stories as introductions, sprinkled with innuendos and hidden opinions. They maybe more personal and interesting to read, but all facts are now shaded by the reporters.
God knows if Murdoch will turn WSJ into Fox News II.
===
BTW, I came across this post and I believe it captures what the overseas Chinese think. How this group of economic immigrants, who normally are not interested in politics, get so whipped up by the events leading up to the Olympics to become so disenchanted with the western media, lost faith in them, and start reading Chinese news.
From this URL: http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/08/20/your-comments-on-chinas-rise/
Mainstream Western media stages “Blemishing China Marathon”
If you google “China” or “Olympics” on any given day in recent months, with the exception of the few weeks China was stricken by deadly earthquakes, you will be overwhelmed by the shower of negative coverage from the mainstream Western media against China and its hosting of 2008 Beijing Olympics.
For months leading up to the Beijing Games, China has been put under the Western microscope with accusations and complaints against the country and its government sweeping across all terrains, from big political issues such as Tibet, human rights, protest rights, press and religious freedom; to social problems including air pollution, government relocation of Beijing residents; to conspiracy stories about special visual effects of the opening ceremony and ultra performance of Chinese athletes; and to more trivial displeasures about losing a pair of expensive sunglasses, difficulties to access Olympic Green, English standard of volunteers, and over-eagerness of residents to help the foreigner visitors. The list goes on and on.
As if that is not enough, an NBC correspondent went on a live TV hunt for Chinese foods in Beijing. Let’s take a look at what she found: giant scorpions, lizards, silk worms, seahorses, iguana tails and dung beetles. Other Western reporters also cited rabbit head, pig brain and animal penis. Being a native of Beijing with 20 plus years of living there and a food lover myself, I have little knowledge where to look for these exotic things, not to mention ever eating them. Come on, China has a civilization of 5,000 years – Western reporters can’t be seriously thinking about portraying the Chinese as barbaric aboriginals or man-eating cannibals, right?
In fact, Dave Barry of Miami Herald admitted to a blog “beijingboyce.com” that “The Chinese people I saw all seemed to be buying things like lamb kebabs and fruit. On the other hand, the people gathered around the centipedes and scorpions on a stick were, in almost every case, tourists or American TV reporters doing fun features on weird Chinese food…. The Chinese don’t eat scorpions. They feed their scorpions to TV reporters. I would not be surprised to learn that the Chinese word for scorpion is “TV reporter food.”
Granted, China is not completely innocent from many of the aforementioned allegations and criticisms, but it is neither an evil host which deserves no credit at all. As the world’s fastest growing economy and one of the world’s most ancient civilizations, there has got to be something positive to report on.
You can be easily frustrated, however, if you are looking to read something more positive or, at the least, constructive about the country and its hospitable people. Sure, there is always the official Xinhua News or China Daily one can read for a change, but any praise from self-proclaimed independent and objective mainstream Western media is surprisingly hard to come by.
Meanwhile, for average Westerners, it is hard not to be misled by the drowning negative coverage on China. A homemaker in the US told reporters that she does not want to “legitimize the Chinese government” by supporting the Beijing Olympics.” Didn’t President Bush just open a bigger US Embassy there? What are we talking about here exactly? I am as puzzled as an Atlanta man who demanded an online answer for not seeing Russian tanks there.
As much as I disagree with President George W. Bush on many things, I have to applaud his recent TV interview in Beijing with NBC in which he stressed that the US and China as two very different countries and cultures are bound to have agreements and disagreements on a range of things, but it is important to have a constructive relationship which will help each other communicate disagreements.
Wow, how I wish that he had possessed this wisdom before starting the Iraq war – lives of estimated 1.2 million Iraqis and 5,000 US soldiers could have been saved.
Should the 2008 Olympics be awarded to Beijing in the first place?
Although the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games is coming up in a matter of few days, the arguments surrounding if IOC had made a mistake in letting China host the 2008 Olympics and if China had fulfilled its relevant promises seem to have just started.
Why pick a heavily-polluted country that is dictated by “free market Stalinists” which suppresses human rights, religion and press? China broke its promises to IOC for all of these areas, charges the mainstream Western media.
However, according to the IOC, its mission is “to build a peaceful and better world in the Olympic Spirit which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play – Olympic Spirit strives to inspire and motivate the youth of the world to be the best they can be through educational and entertaining interactive challenges. Olympic Spirit seeks to instill and develop the values and ideals of Olympism in those who visit and to promote tolerance and understanding in these increasingly troubled time in which we live, to make our world a more peaceful place.”
Does China deserve to be awarded the hosting right of Olympics? Apparently, the Chinese people said a loud “yes”. The whole world witnessed how much grass-root support China got from its people when it applied for and won the hosting right of the event.
As a country with more than one fifth of the world’s population – should it not be given a chance to host one of the many games? With 1.3 billion people not represented, can any Olympic Games truly promote its mission of “building a peaceful and better world with mutual understanding”? That is why the IOC made its decision and it is undoubtedly a correct one.
By comparison, I have serious doubts if the mainstream Western media truly understands and honors the spirit of Olympics – questioning China’s legitimacy to host such an international event only gives away its arrogance, self-righteousness, entitlement and cultural supremacy in international affairs.
If the mainstream Western media is still the true believer of human rights and continues to uphold the universal belief that “all men are created equal”, it should acknowledge the birthright of any country including China, for hosting the Olympic Games.
While China needs improvements in many areas as every other country on this earth does, the changes and progresses made by the country in the past 30 years are unmatched in the its own history, which can not be hidden from view by the mainstream Western media.
China should not be forced to make any concessions or promises to any interest groups in order to be “bestowed” the hosting right of Olympics, thanks to the downfall of colonialism and imperialism! The country’s pursuit of reform in all domestic political and social-economic fronts, including but not limited to human rights and freedoms of its people, can and should only be driven by desires of its own people, rather than being imposed on by external forces.
In addition to disputing China’s hosting rights, the mainstream Western media also has aired many conspiracies about China’s intention for hosting the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Show of power? Self-interiority? Promoting China’s development path to replace the US model? Bla, bla, bla….
We all are humans and predictably we all want similar things in life at the end of the day. Splendid displays, inflated egos or decorated ideologies can not replace people’s basic needs for food, clothing, shelter and healthcare.
For hundreds of years, the Chinese people have craved for a peaceful environment where they can focus on making a better living for themselves rather than laboring for self-serving emperors or greedy foreign opium traders. They have been quite successful in the past three decades and now they simply wanted to party and celebrate with the world through Beijing Olympics. Is that so hard to understand?
Why is the mainstream Western media so angry with China?
In his recent article “Are the Media Being too Mean to China?” published on slate.com, Prof. Tim Wu of Columbia University wrote that “China’s idea of what makes for a better Olympics for foreign consumption—tightened security and cleaning up marginal elements—is exactly what makes Western reporters crazy.”
While Prof. Wu’s observation only touched on one of the surface symptoms that irritated the mainstream Western media, it does shed some light on the current tension. What he described is in fact a cultural difference in how the Chinese and the Western people receive and entertain their guests. But the root of problem is the ethnocentric mindset of the Western reporters to the cultural differences and their entitlement that things should only be done in their ways.
Similar examples are abundant, whether it is about different ways under which Chinese and Western athletes are trained or about how they differ in keeping their personal appearance or etiquettes. I am particularly disappointed with Prof. Wu’s comments that “China doesn’t have the manners and grace of the richer countries, even if it has increasing economic and political clout.”
While making noises during eating is a taboo in many Western cultures, being openly confrontational in social interactions is a sin in many Asian cultures. These are simply cultural differences that should not be judged as superior or inferior, or we risk entering the boundaries of cultural supremacy.
Unfortunately, it is this arrogant mindset that has led the mainstream Western media to judge China by its own culturally biased standards and self-centered expectations. It is not a surprise they drew the conclusion that China broke its promises for hosting Olympics, an allegation China has denied.
What followed was an irrational unleash of anger by the mainstream Western media towards China in an attempt to force the country into the direction the Western media desired to see. The collective media assault on China, however, is more based on self-interests and ethnocentrism, rather than fairness, objectivity and independence which the mainstream Western media often preach.
Let he who is without sin cast the first stone!
A recent issue of Newsweek carried an article, “Rise of the Sea Turtles”, that found “Westernized Chinese people” tend to be more resentful to the West. Although I wasn’t particularly impressed with its analysis of the root causes, the article does provide us with a good pointer to an emerging trend.
I can probably qualify as one of the “Westernized Chinese people” the article was referring to, although I prefer to identify myself as a Chinese American after becoming a naturalized US citizen for many years.
I think it is unfair and simplistic to conclude that the “Westernized Chinese people” are more resentful to the West, because the situation is far more complicated than portrayed. The resentments, in fact, are not the towards the West in its entirety but more targeted at the double standard and intolerant attitudes often adopted by the mainstream Western media and Western governments towards China and other non-Western countries. “Westernized Chinese people” tend to be elites who are educated in the West and their advanced training and intellect make them independent thinkers. They are sensitive towards the hypocrisies of the mainstream Western media which scrutinizes China with one set standards while closing its eyes to the same problems at home.
No one person or one country is perfect and the Bible tells us that everyone is a sinner. If we (Americans) can allow ourselves make mistakes and accept skeletons in our own closets, why should we dissect other countries under our tinted lenses and punish them for not satisfying the standards that even ourselves often can not meet?
We should pursue “constructive dialogues” rather than endless “regime changes” by using force – ironically both strategies were supported by President George W. Bush. I salute his newly-found wisdom which helped him reach a peaceful resolution with the North Koreans and hopefully the same can be done with the Iranians.
If we desire international solidarity against terrorism, why is the mainstream Western media always so reluctant to condemn those who terrorize China? Read its coverage of recent terrorist attacks in Xinjiang and you know what I am talking about.
If the mainstream Western media wants to be the role model for its Chinese peers, why does it conveniently distort facts, use phony pictures and brush away people who have different opinions and deny their right to have their voices heard? A Chinese American confronted a CNN journalist a few months ago in LA when she and many other pro-China protestors were denied chances to be interviewed, the journalist responded harshly – “don’t tell me how to do my business!”
We teach every citizen in the West to respect laws and regulations, yet the mainstream Western media participated in cheering the illegal protests and vandalism in Beijing.
Personally I had a painful experience demonstrating on London streets in 1989. It was cold in that morning and I stepped out of the picketing line for a few minutes to get some desperately-needed sunshine. I was subsequently handcuffed by force and arrested by the London police. When my petite wife disputed their action, she was also handcuffed and arrested. We were locked into separate cells for hours with no food and water, not to mention access to a phone and legal advice. We were only released after the demonstration organizer intervened and after being forced to sign the British equivalent of confession statements.
If being out of the picket line for some sun is a crime that deserves to be handcuffed and thrown into jail in London, why should the Chinese be criticized for expelling illegal protestors in Beijing who purposely climb lamp-posts, buildings and advertising billboards to display unauthorized banners?
Why should an American “pastor”, who proudly vandalized the two Beijing hotel rooms and then cowardly sneaked away, be cheered as a “righteous protestor” by the mainstream Western media?
If a Chinese protestor goes to the 2012 London Olympics to protest against the British suppression of Northern Ireland and hang banners on the Big Ben – can he or she count on the mainstream Western media for for the same “heroic” coverage? Should we also question the right of London for hosting Olympics and its commitment for press freedom if its police arrests the protestor?
Food for thought – “Do unto others what you wish to do unto yourself” (Confucius) and “let he who is without sin cast the first stone!” (Jesus)
Is Western-styled press freedom what China needs?
A highly-respected US scholar once told me that the Western media is founded on the spirit of challenging authorities and it is the media’s job to be cynical, vigilant, critical, defiant and negative.
I am a strong believer of the fundamental principles on which the US political system is founded. Besides many merits of the system, media stands out as an indispensable component designed to supervise, on behalf of the public, the three branches of the federal government. This is almost a perfect setup except three potential flaws – firstly, there is no mechanism in place for the supervision of the media itself; secondly, there are serious conflicts of interests between the two contradictory roles of media both as a representative of public interests and, at the same time, as self-serving profit-making enterprises; and thirdly founding media on the basis of cynicism and negativity has its own social costs.
For media to fulfill its role to supervise the government, it needs to serve public interests, rather than its own interests. It needs to be unbiased, objective and independent.
Nonetheless, it is well-known that the mainstream Western media has long blended its role for public welfare with relentless pursuit of ego, power and profits. As the world enters the information age, the mainstream Western media has become a new rising superpower with ever-increasing influence on domestic and international politics, economy, social structure, value systems and people’s everyday life.
Does Americans really have as much freedom as the mainstream media would like us to believe? As the mainstream Western media pursue freedoms in other countries, Americans are losing so many freedoms that once made them so proud.
In the past few decades, America has experienced a string of serious challenges and setbacks including the breakdown of family/social structure and value systems, falling religious influence and freedom, popular abuse and dependence of narcotics and prescription drugs, rising violence across the country, escalating racial tension and police brutality, widening gap between the rich and the poor, dropping standard of literacy and basic education, failing healthcare system that denies coverage of 23 million Americans, and a tendency of resolving international disputes with “regime change” by military force rather than diplomacy, violations of on constitutional civil and human rights under the cover of anti-terrorism, to name just a few.
Our children can no longer walk to the school bus by themselves for fear of drug pushers and child snatchers on the way. By the time they arrive in their schools, metal detectors await for them in some inner city schools. They have to leave their bags in lockers and no colored drinks are allowed for fear of bombs. Their teachers are not allowed to mention any religion or teach morals in schools. Even “Christmas trees” must not be called “Christmas trees” but “family trees”. They have to go through evacuation drills often to remain vigilant because school shootings are spreading. Now people are even more scared because a school district in Texas took the lead to allow teachers carrying guns to the classroom. But can we trust the teachers? Do we have to outsource our teachers from India or China one day?
As an American citizen, nothing is more valuable than my voting right. But even that has depreciated. Why? Because the mainstream media is not doing its job of dissemination of objective information. Instead it confuses me with a constant stream of selectively edited, distorted and manipulated information in order to advance its own preferences, agendas and commercial interests.
Let’s take a look at the tainted media pictures of presidential candidates. John Edwards is a wife cheater, but that has been kept from the public until now; Hilliary is a liar who believes she is entitled to be the President and her husband Bill is hostile to the mainstream press; John McCain is a patriot but a war monger who knows nothing about economy; and finally Obama, alas, is actually a celebrity, radical of racial politics, Muslim (not that there is anything wrong with it) and “Anti-Christ”! For God’s sake, stop harassing me with all this sensational talk designed to boost ratings and I want to vote for Paris Hilton, but unfortunately she is not on the ballot. So my pathetic one vote looks quite useless, well, at least for now.
Moving back to topic of Beijing Olympics. A Western journalist was quick to point out his disagreement with the slogan, “One World One Dream”, which is meant by the host nation to stress the commonalities all peoples share. Nevertheless, this reporter chose to emphasize the different values he has from the Chinese host.
Fine, let’s talk about the differences. If the mainstream Western media can acknowledge that peoples on this earth are different and that there are vast differences between them in the geographic landscapes, population structures, social-economic hierarchy, cultural values, beliefs, religions and ideologies, it should not be difficult to appreciate that their political, legal and media systems also need to differ from each other to accommodate for the specific needs of each country. It is dangerous to assume the systems of the West are somehow superior which can be transplanted to other countries.
Does China need a Western-style media system? I doubt it. While fundamental Western media principles of cynicism, defiance, negativity and confrontation may or may not work well in the Western cultures, they most-definitely will not be successful in the Chinese cultural environment which values hierarchy, harmony, benevolence and tolerance among people.
However, it is the Chinese people who should decide eventually what political, economic and media systems are the ones they need. I have faith that with five thousand years of civilization, China has the wisdom to draw from the strengths of the West, avoid its fundamental flaws and ultimately develop a positive-spirited media system with Chinese characteristics that is built on the basis of upholding public welfare and interests.
Final conclusion
By blemishing a hospitable nation, which worked hard and sacrificed dearly to be a good host, mainstream Western media only exposed the self-interest and ethnocentric facets of itself to the whole world. Such irrational and frantic behaviors will only serve to bolster more media scrutiny by the Chinese government, further alienate the Chinese people and erase any remaining credibility and relevance of the mainstream Western media in the post-Olympic China.
I love the motto of Beijing Olympics – “One World One Dream” – the dream of the Olympic Spirit under which all peoples of the world will be united with mutual understanding, friendship, solidarity, fair play and tolerance to build a peaceful and better world together.
— Posted by James Shen
August 30th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
@admin: Wow. Perhaps there should be a special forum for really long comments that are like posts themselves? Entries prefixed by “Follow-up comment:”?
August 30th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
F Yang, i have to say that the scorpion eating bit is the most neutrally toned part of the whole olympic story. i read it often in the western press, and i love to read it again and again. at least the moment they were eating scorpio, they would allow us to have a break in the human rights lectures.
August 30th, 2008 at 4:19 pm
FY, the “why did we let them host/they don’t deserve to host” bit relies on this unequal and almost racist view that the Olympics belongs to us in the West, and we have to right to REWARD or PUNISH China with it.
August 30th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
@Wukailong,
Yes, we encourage readers who write a very long comment to submit it as a guest post and then a link/short summary can be put in the comment section. Actually, we are in the process of revamping this site and we will make the process of reader participation even smoother. 😉
August 30th, 2008 at 8:46 pm
“i have to say that the scorpion eating bit is the most neutrally toned part of the whole olympic story. i read it often in the western press, and i love to read it again and again. at least the moment they were eating scorpio, they would allow us to have a break in the human rights lectures.”
I’d agree with you on the scorpion issue, when viewed in isolation. I didn’t have any problem either when I watched the NBC reporting on scorpions.
However, when viewed within the context of other China related reporting, it may not be that benign. This is almost like straight from Michael Moore’s “Bowling for Columbine”. When every evening news have sound bites like this, what is the subtle effect on the viewers over time about the world they live in ? Fear – Michael Moore concludes.
“Next coming up after the break, what you don’t know about the food you put on the table may kill you..”
“You ride them every day, but in an instant, an escalator can mangle you
or a loved one.”
We reveal why you may be riding on stairway to danger.
Nation’s top doctor says one in five Americans suffers some form
of mental disorder.
The surgeon general David Satcher pleads with people to seek help now.
The media, the corporations, the politicians, have all done such a good job
of scaring the American public, it’s come to the point where they don’t need to give any reason at all.
===
I myself is well read in financial investing. I am fully aware of the role played by over/underestimating hard-to-quantify events. Nonetheless, even the most rational people would be subtlely persuaded/shaded by negative reporting, despite he may deem a report as overly pessimistic . I think this is what the poster referring to as the social cost.
August 30th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
F Yang wrote:
“the 24-hour monitoring stations at the protest site did get any incidents, no masked athletes in competition, no food safety issue, no terrorist attacks, no surprise scene-making protests of any sorts in important places. The “journalists” all went home empty-handed. They’ve probably milked as much as they can out of any bit of tiny sensation stories they could find – lip synching, granny sentenced to re-edu camps etc. ”
+++++
First off, excellent points, F Yang. Right through the Olympics, when all these rather trivial stories broke left and right, I concluded that, if this is all the dirt they can dig out with a fine comb, then that’s good news for China. I think a lot of people came to the same conclusion.
August 30th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
To Leo:
can’t see why the Sydney stuff, as reported, would be forgivable. As for the reasons for such an assessment, we’ll all be left to wonder.
August 30th, 2008 at 10:52 pm
To F. Yang:
“I highly doubt it would attract the same media frenzy if it were revealed then” – the point is, we’ll never know now, will we? But your POV is as legitimate as any other.
I think when a city is an Olympic host, they should expect an inordinate amount of scrutiny. Turin had it, Beijing’s seen it, and I think Vancouver and London can expect similar treatment. To expect otherwise is pointless.
I think Beijing got some press that was negative. I think she also got some that was positive. So why focus on one extreme to the exclusion of the other. Besides, either of those options is still better than no press…and I’m sure you wouldn’t have been pleased with that either.
August 31st, 2008 at 4:53 pm
SK, “inordinate amount” is a bit subjective. How about we test this by weither a giant flag will be hung in Canada for First Nation independence, or if Vancouver 2010 will be labeled “Native Genocide Olympics” – the way Beijing was “leveraged” by some…
August 31st, 2008 at 9:20 pm
I think we should cut these guys some slack, there are many logistical challenges in this type of planning. The musicians aren’t the main event, and IMO, it was more so the spectacle of the ceremony that people wanted to see. If you want to see the Sydney Orchestra or the little Chinese girl sing for real, go to a concert dedicated to them. I don’t know why some people are so shocked by this, “fake” performances happen more often then you think. And last but not least, if you watched these performances on TV, and the vast majority of you did, how much did it cost you 😛
August 31st, 2008 at 10:38 pm
To Charles Liu:
of course, the amount of scrutiny is purely subjective. I’m not aware of any standardized quantitative measurement of media scrutiny. Suffice it to say, a city will get more scrutiny as an Olympic host than if she were not; and such scrutiny will probably peak during the Games itself.
If someone wants to unfurl a flag, or affix a label, that’s their prerogative. However, that is not a test; there is no test. If people feel like protesting, they will (and guess what, in Canada, they can!) But if they don’t, that’s not a sign that they were particularly picking on Beijing. It’s just that China’s government behaviour may have been felt to be more offensive and worthy of protest to some, compared to past Canadian government missteps. Again, don’t whine about it. Better to look at what government actions unleashed the protest urges to begin with.
August 31st, 2008 at 10:58 pm
Have a browse of this blog: http://blogs.smh.com.au/olympics/stephenhutcheon/2008/08/16/thefakewallo.html. The bog writer assembled all the “fake moments” and implied China’s growing credibility gap. Please see the fiece attacks on China from some Australian commetators, they are not interested in or just shrugg off their side of fake moment when the story is digged out. What is the equivalent idiom of “恬不知耻” in English?
August 31st, 2008 at 11:10 pm
To Xiao:
the newspaper writer is a goof in this case. Perhaps you should take it up with him. Didn’t have the inclination to read all the comments, but seemed at least half were critical of the initial post. So again, one writer’s opinion should be taken for what it’s worth, and some Aussies shrugging off Sydney orchestral fakery does not mean all aussies are anti-China. If you’re a hammer, everything to you looks like a nail. If you’re always looking for anti-China sentiment, you will undoubtedly see it everywhere…even when it’s not there.
August 31st, 2008 at 11:45 pm
@SKC, smh.com.au is the online edition from Australia’s 2nd newspaper publisher and the author was once the chief editor of smh.com.au. The nails are there no matter if you are a hammer or not.
September 1st, 2008 at 12:06 am
1. so he’s not the chief editor now (not that that makes any difference. Even if he was still chief editor, it’s his opinion in an op-ed piece, to which he’s entitled).
2. to you, they’re nails. To me, they’re not. Yet another example of “to each his own”.
September 1st, 2008 at 1:33 am
He is not the chief editor now but he is still an influential editor. I happened to work with him a few years ago, my impression is that he is a dedicated professional journalist. However he becomes a goof when covering things about China. Why? I think he is not the only journalist behaving this way.
I wish that I could be “Mr. Q” when reading this sort of blogs ignoring the anti-China sentiment.
September 1st, 2008 at 2:54 am
“Why?” – I dunno, but if you actually know the guy, you’d be in a great position to know, or at least find out. To understand why he holds his views would be far more enlightening than to anonymously complain about it.
September 3rd, 2008 at 2:39 pm
S. K. Cheung wrote:
“If people feel like protesting, they will (and guess what, in Canada, they can!) But if they don’t, that’s not a sign that they were particularly picking on Beijing.”
I assume you are in Canada so you must be aware of the several big protests with muted if not non response from the media, that eventually led to a big rally on Canadian parliament hills (4/13), right ?
Our first hand experiences are, if there were only several protesters against china, they would occupy all the front pages here in Canada, but 2000 person rally were conveniently ignored (3/29). On the other hand, when there were thousands of protesters against the frantic media here, like the one in Ottawa in support of Olympic torch relay (4/13), did we see any sizable report anywhere? [All mainstream media outlets were invited. But we only got 1:44 minute sound bite from CTV, with sarcastic opening and closing remarks. And I still clearly remember what that remarks were.].
Some people are incredulous when hearing this. Remember, to some interest groups, they have freedom of speech and no censorship. But to others, they don’t. Both versions of their experiences are valid. This is just like white Americans would never believe or understand the distrust of African Americans towards the law enforcement agencies. They live in two different worlds. You don’t believe we have this problem in Canada ? Think Robert Dziekanski incident, not on whether Tasers are safe or the police used undue force. But on why the police confiscated the amateur video, then lied about the incident to cover up until a lawyer forced them to release the video ? Thank goodness, the tape was not destroyed. God knows how many other lies were perpetrated by the police or public officials, without being caught on tape ?
Being able to protest really means little – a proverbial tree falling in the forest. It’s the amount of exposure (media or physical) that really counts.
It would be incredible if anyone can disagree with this: If you don’t control the media, you don’t control the voices. If you don’t control the voices, you don’t control the minds. That’s why Noam Chomsky said “Propaganda to a democracy is what a bludgeon to a totalitarian state …”.
A silent protest with no media exposure is like a private blogging – sort like graffiti you write. Even the Chinese government is not afraid of that, unless it stirs up more.
In the West, the right to protest is constitutionally guaranteed [with enough admin means to manipulate it though]. But the right to publicity is not. This creates a gray area for the west media to claim moral high ground of freedom of speech, while actively manages and control the public opinions.
BTW, are you aware of Canadian polices went out of the way to use administrative means to minimize/stop pro-China rallys ? I do and many others do. This happened not only in Toronto, but also in Vancouver, and even in the NY City. So much so for free speech.
September 3rd, 2008 at 2:52 pm
“In the West, the right to protest is constitutionally guaranteed [with enough admin means to manipulate it though]. But the right to publicity is not. This creates a gray area for the west media to claim moral high ground of freedom of speech, while actively manages and control the public opinions.”
Bravo!!!!
September 3rd, 2008 at 4:22 pm
F Yang,
I agree that there isn’t such a thing as a right to be heard in any country. I think that was your point anyway. Freedom of speech is often confused with diversity of opinions in a society by the West when it is a patently false notion. No, freedom of speech is just one of those things to manage society and conflicting interests, even though it is cast as a “personal right” for philosophical/legal reasons. In reality, it is never paramount or limitless. In fact, the limits are strict — exercise anything beyond the basics (which you can also enjoy in China, btw), and you’ll bump into those. Some countries have better judicial recourses than others when those limits are touched, but that’s another story.
Your post makes a good point about management of public opinion though. I find it laughable that some people in the West try so hard to over-praise their own system and try to point out China or a similar country’s media as propaganda. Look at the article for CCTV on Wikipedia for instance, and you find the little caveat in the first paragraph…
Its editorial independence is subject to government policy considerations.
…as if it did not apply to state-owned CBC, BBC, NPR, or the more egregious VOA, or Deutsche Welle, which recently suspended reporters for content. But you’ll always find people who defend the real or perceived independence of these state media.
September 4th, 2008 at 5:24 am
To F. Yang:
those are good points. The Dziekanski bit is superfluous, because that relates to RCMP oversight and governance structures. If anything, I’m sure the media would have been happy to report more, not less, of that story.
I’m not sure if the Ottawa rallies were muted. I read about them in the papers and online, and saw it on the tube. So for you, it seems to come down to face-time as a direct comparator, and the ultimate measure of media neutrality.
On one level, I agree that can be one metric. On the other hand, and I’ve made this point before, but not in this thread, media is also a business. So media will report what it thinks are newsworthy for its consumers. And there comes a point where journalistic integrity and editorial judgement might butt heads. That may not be ideal, but that is also the reality. The reality is also that media can’t report everything all the time, so somebody somewhere is bound to feel that their story got short shrift.
I also agree that while we are free to protest, the media are not obligated to be your loudspeaker. They do get to choose for whom they will serve as the loudspeaker. So much like this website aspires to change western opinion of China, I’d suggest that such change might also bring about an evolution in the appetite of the consumer for stories that you feel are important, but currently under-reported.
“Being able to protest really means little – a proverbial tree falling in the forest. It’s the amount of exposure (media or physical) that really counts.” – I agree with this. It is also ironic that you use this to point out the imbalance of coverage; for you can also use this argument to justify why protests were ramped up in anticipation of and during the Olympics. Many Chinese seemed indignant about this; but you can’t have it both ways.
I’m not sure I can agree with your last point. How were Canadian protests minimized administratively? Suddenly, you’re accusing not only the media, but also some level of government. I think there are enough conspiracy theorists around here as it is; hope you’re not going down that road.
September 4th, 2008 at 5:38 am
To Nimrod:
I agree freedom of speech is not the same as right to be heard. The former we have; the latter we don’t, nor should we. You can say what you want…but if what you say is good, then I might listen. Freedom of speech does absolutely guarantee diverse opinions, but not all of those opinions are deserving of our attention. In the end, the user gets to choose what speech they want to consume, or not.
Of course there are limits on freedom of speech, just like there are limits on other freedoms. We pride ourselves on our freedoms, but we don’t claim them to be limitless. But we have a voice in shaping those limits. I don’t think the same can be said for China.
Yes, we have state owned media. But we also have independent media, who are governed by regulations made by the people, but who aren’t subject to having their plugs pulled at the whim of the government.
September 4th, 2008 at 9:59 am
@F Yang#27
Buxi wrote a post about the NY protest and the media reaction before.
http://blog.foolsmountain.com/2008/05/06/two-chinese-protests-two-different-reactions/
Will you be willing to write a post on this topic?
September 4th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
@Nimrod – The editorial content of the BBC is not controlled whatsoever by the government, if the Kelly affair proved anything, it was that!
September 5th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
@S K Cheung
I was only using Dziekanski case not to demonstrate the media reporting issue, but rather police perhaps is not as trustworthy as many people believe, perhaps esp when dealing with some minorities (e.g. African Americans).
Thus the divergent experiences of law enforcement agencies by the African Americans and white Americans explain the vastly divergent perceptions.
Applying the same to the freedom of speech/media neutrality issue – perhaps both views are valid too. In other words, freedom for some people, but not for others.
September 5th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
@FOARP wrote “The editorial content of the BBC is not controlled whatsoever by the government, if the Kelly affair proved anything, it was that!”
Well – the government (or more accurately, the ruling class, the beneficiary – whatever terms you want to use) has a variety of ways to influence the media.
Start with a simple restriction of information access, and the influence can grow vastly beyond that.
What you are saying is like to say the security analysts all publish their reports independently. They are not manipulated by the companies they cover because they are not on the companies’ payrolls. We all know how faulty the logics were – hence the big battle for Regulation Fair Disclose in 2001. Thank goodness Reg FD is now to stay. No more mysterious stock running up and you heard it only three days later that a client meeting by brokerage invited someone from the company.
If you want more concrete examples, read this NY Times article.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/washington/20generals.html?scp=1&sq=Pentagon%20analysts&st=cse
Beyond that, there are so many ways a seemingly neutral entity exerting influences of others. Whenever the number of players are limited, they will likely to collude for better co-existence – it’s as simple as that (being it an agency, the news channels, or the crime organizations).
This frankly not only happens in the West, but also in China too. So let’s not to kid ourselves just because the media is not owned by the government, thus it’s neutral and free of its influence.
September 5th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
@S K Cheung wrote:
“I’m not sure I can agree with your last point. How were Canadian protests minimized administratively? Suddenly, you’re accusing not only the media, but also some level of government. I think there are enough conspiracy theorists around here as it is; hope you’re not going down that road.”
The police has several administrative means to control protest applications (same as what happened in Beijing):
1. real estate allocation, where you can protest
2. time allocation, when you can protest
3. form of the protest, what you can do
Vancouver: Pro-Tibetan protest, despite being very small (a few dozens), were allocated a prime real estate – a central street in Vancouver was blocked for it. The followed pro-China rally, several times larger, was allocated to a side street and on the side walks only.
Toronto: 3/29 rally application was rejected. It went ahead only because a new application was filed under a false pretense of anti-war music concerts (thus you can see the signing photos ). Along with the rally, less than 10 pro-Tibetan protesters showed up (mostly westerners). It was dubbed as a dual-protest, despite the showing on the pro-China side exceeded 2000.
NYC – a protest application has a waiting time of 6 weeks. I think the police figures 6 week is enough time to cool down most heads. And I don’t blame them.
September 5th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
My point is, as the media becomes so concentrated (the new trend of blogging
notwithstanding), they form an oligopoly with the government (or the ruling
class, whatever you’d like to call). The economic interests become aligned
naturally to have better and mutually beneficial co-existence. Under an
oligopoly, the lack of direct vested interests does not automatically indicate
the lack of indirect/implicit interests. Whoever claims just because the West
media is not owned by the government thus is independent is illiterate in
economics 101.
SK Cheung further wrote: “You can say what you want…but if what you say is good,
then I might listen. Freedom of speech does absolutely guarantee diverse
opinions, but not all of those opinions are deserving of our attention. In the
end, the user gets to choose what speech they want to consume, or not.”
My second point is exactly you don’t get to choose what you want to consume, esp
when the competition leads to concentration of players. Your choices are limited
by the menus served at the restaurant. Yes you can switch restaurants – but if
they are colluding, they are not much different. So you end up going home and
cook a meal yourself to your own liking – which is what do here at this forum.
That’s exactly how minorities are marginalized.
I do not believe anyone can dispute the media is still a vastly efficient and
prominent channel for disseminating information. Ultimately, if the channel is
not open to you, even if you lay down all the facts and reasons (i.e. whether
“deserve to be heard”), the media reserves the right to edit them any way they
want, anytime they want, and at any length they want. If you don’t own the
press, you don’t own the voice. If you don’t own the voice, you don’t own the
minds. It’s as simple as that.
I think neither the CCP nor the Pentagon have any illusion that propaganda is
unimportant – or valid opinions will stand on their own. Thus the Pentagon has
very sophiscated Psy-op and the CCP long exulted the value of having the media
to serve the country even during its infancy.
It’s only somehow, the ordinary people (or maybe idealist/purists who have too
much time on their hands), believe in the fairy tale that just because an idea
or a product is valid, it would ultimately prevail and stand on its own in the
market place.
What further can be from the truth – companies routinely spend 1% of the revenue
on marketing alone (not to mention the sales efforts). This amount is comparable
in many cases limited R&D spending. It’s often the young engineers who believe
in the “standing on its own” dream.
This is not to say a media compaign can turn white into black and tout an
invalid idea into a valid one forever. But that’s purist thinking again. Most
social issues are complex and not black-and-white. Therefore you can turn an
issue several shade darker/lighter if you want. For example, no reputable
magazine would turn the OJ Simpson photo into a photo of a chimpanzee. However,
the same O.J. Simpsons photo was shaded much darker on the Times magazine front
page than the Newsweek, implying a guilt to its readers.
With the exception of really simple cases (e.g. 1+1=2), the life of an idea will
always be the inter-play of the validity of the idea and its delivery form.
Anyone who disputes either factor is illusional. You get that all the time in a
company – the marketing manager believes in he can sell the product not as what
it is, while the engineers think the marketing guy is nuts and the product
should stand on its own, regardless how it’s called and how its image/usefulness
is delivered.
BTW, even the simplest case is not always as simple as it seems. Does the Earth
circle around the Sun or the reverse ? Since there is no absolute physical
reference in space, both ideas are valid. So why are we all agreeing the Earth
rotates around the Sun, and many lost their lives for this belief ? Any taker on
this small challenge ?
September 6th, 2008 at 8:04 am
Because you have to find common ground. Any system has to start at “self evidence truth” (yeah right).
But it still depends very much so on context. For you specific problem, it doesn’t really matter in this case. But as soon as something you are trying to answer eliminates one of the possibilities, then you are forced to pick a firm basis. It’s like super-position. Different set of rules under different set of contexts.
I’m slightly stoned, so I don’t really see what you point is with the question.
All together tho I agree with you are saying. Though-out my life, I’ve fazed in and out of this line of thinking, that it don’t really matter cuz the media is all controlled, and we have no voice, whatever. However, lately I realized it don’t really matter. It’s what you think that matters ultimately. Fuck psy-op’s, mainstream media, whatever basically.
Also what matters is we got to unite to the CRAZIES, yes, those guys. Followers of Ku ku luth.!
September 6th, 2008 at 8:15 am
Now I get it… Haha.
Well, still as long as enough people see something as “self evidence truth,” then it is. Like I said, it’s defining common ground. That is not to say “self evidence truth” is the real truth!!! No! Until someone comes along and shatters the so called truth.
Again, it’s different contexts. Now you mentioned media, well, if they can convince enough people then yea, it’s truth!
it’s just a fact of life. Or are you saying you can’t face reality and want to change? Me too man, I love changing reality… Like smoking pot.
September 6th, 2008 at 3:32 pm
To F. Yang #34 and #36:
I don’t dispute that some in our police force are bigots (just like some in our general population probably are), and I’m sure such perception is amplified for African-Americans. Just not sure how closely the magnitude of such perception reflects reality.
Dziekanski wasn’t a minority, unless you consider a non-English-speaking Polish guy in Vancouver airport to be such.
Your protest examples don’t necessarily account for the full picture. Wait time is wait time, you have that with any application. If it’s a standard timeframe, there’s no favouritism. The Vancouver one, you have to account for time of week, other concurrent events, estimated size of protest to explain the different venues, before accusing them of favouritism. And the Toronto one, you got to protest, so what’s the problem. Perhaps the initial application was rejected for some reason other than the fact that it was going to be pro-China. So it’s in the eye of the beholder, and you’ll see what you want to see. BUt perceptions aren’t always a true reflection of reality.
September 6th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
To F.Yang:
To call the media an oligopoly assumes that it is a nearly uniform entity, and that all its components will behave in similar fashion most of the time. There are certainly examples of such, like the run-up to Iraq. Not their best moment. But I disagree with this as a routine characterization. If one outlet had access to a juicy story that others didn’t, they’d probably run with it and break it.
“lack of direct vested interests does not automatically indicate the lack of indirect/implicit interests”; but it also does not automatically indicate the presence of such interest. So whoever taught your Econ 101 class should’ve mentioned that aspect of logic, or perhaps the concept of proof.
“you don’t get to choose what you want to consume” – maybe not always. If some guy is standing on a street corner on a soapbox, there is a good chance I won’t learn about his POV. And that’s a good thing to me. Absolutely, the media have a gatekeeper role to information. As I said before, sometimes their journalistic integrity may be an affront to their corporate interests, and vice versa. And until a better system is devised, we’re left with that imperfection. But I can live with that without invoking some larger conspiracy at play.
BTW, assuming that ideas contrary to your own are illusional (or perhaps your meant delusional) is not always a compelling argument.
As for the Sun and the Earth, you only need consider the relative mass of those 2 objects to know which is revolving around which.
September 6th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
No but I think one of his points is that people in control can manipulate lies to become truth. What does it mean then?
Gatekeeper role to information is all good. But if the gatekeeper is the employee of the man, what then?
September 6th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/editorblog/107
Seymour Hersh found out the option for flase flag to start war Iran was thought up by Cheney. None of the main-stream media reported this. You would think this is a ‘juicy’ story? No. So false flag operations are not newsworthy as long as they didn’t actually carry it out?
September 6th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
To RMBWhat:
Well, ultimately someone has to be in control. The difference is whether it’s one individual who is the boss of all media, or if it’s multiple individuals who each control their own media outlet. If it’s the former, I agree the potential for abuse is greatly increased. But I think that’s part of the role of the FCC in the US and of the CRTC in Canada to prevent consolidation of media control. If it’s the latter, then the potential for collusion among the various bosses still exists, but I think the risk is much smaller. It’s not a perfect system, as evidenced by the run-up to the Iraq invasion among the US media (although the Canadian media did not drink the same Kool-Aid). But I think it works most of the time.
As for the gatekeeper analogy, I think they are employees of multiple men, and not just one guy. I don’t think these multiple men would think in lock-step with each other all of the time.
As for the Seymour Hersh piece, it seems your link was to a rather left-leaning website, whose opinions may need to be taken with some caveats. I say this not because I’m not liberal, but because an anti-Obama slant from a right wing thinktank would similarly have to be taken with a large grain of salt. And let’s face it, dumping on Bush/Cheney these days is like picking low-lying fruit, so if the story had substance, I would think it would’ve made the rounds long ago.
September 6th, 2008 at 10:43 pm
So you don’t think the very idea that the administration of the President of the United States contemplated false flag operations to start a war, and not to mention kill it’s own citizen, is a story of no substance?
Okay, I get it if you think my link is biased. Fine. Also, MSNBC did report this. You know the program that has the “worst person on planet earth” segment, well, Cheney was the worst person on planet earth.
The thing with media oligopoly, that you think there is no “man behind the curtain,” but my rebuttal to that is to ask you what do you think of the events of 9/11?
What do you think about 9/11? What is your take on that? Because for me the question of 9/11 has made me lose faith in the whole shebang. Nothing really mean anything anymore if you take into account of 9/11. And does the people who work in media have to be consciously aware of that they are the agents of spreading dis-info and lies? No. Like everyone else, the media can be asleep. Not to mention the tactics of compartmentalization. You only have to control a few. It’s a pyramid.
This comes back to the question of what is real? What is the truth? If all your life you are taught the “truth,” when faced with questions that go against the “truth,” you mind shutdowns and ignores the real truth.
September 6th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
The media has the power to turn white into black. This is exactly what happened after 9/11.
September 7th, 2008 at 12:20 am
Fine, I’m just going to shut-up. I really can’t say for sure what happened on 911. On one hand I’m really into all the conspiracies about WTC. But there is just this nagging feeling that I’m just going along with whatever my friends think. Since I don’t really know enough of anything to make a proper judgment on the matter. It’s all hearsay.
I need to concentrate more on doing my own job and getting my personal life straight before I go all out into a bunch of crazies stuff that is totally driving me insane.
I need to stop, lol.
September 7th, 2008 at 12:54 am
Hi RMBWhat:
I’m as liberal as the next guy, so I enjoy watching Bush/Cheney crash and burn. The story you mentioned is certainly worth telling, and I hope it does get told. All I was saying was that the apparent bias of the messenger (ie that website) makes me want to look a little harder at the legitimacy of what it claims.
I’m not sure what you’re referring to re 9/11. I’m just guessing, so ignore if I’ve guessed wrong. But I don’t subscribe to the theory that some US entity plotted 9/11 themselves to provide the US with a pretext to start wars.
September 7th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Another thing your cherished “media” and “democracy” don’t give a damn about you. You are a 2nd class citizen to them. A minority. Tell me when is the media on your “side.” Just look at your portrayal in the media. LOL.
It’s all b.s. and lies.
September 8th, 2008 at 8:28 am
Dude, I’m about to pass out, but I will be back tomorrow to explain why I think 9/11 was an inside job. The rabbit hole goes deep, man.
September 15th, 2008 at 8:41 am
I’m not even going to go over the ‘physical’ aspects of the conspiracies theories. But doesn’t it make you at least pause for a moment when former CIA people, Army intelligent chiefs, Regan administration members,scientists, etc, all has come out to question the official theory. Also what about the military people who has since came out and claimed that they taught Atta as a US agent at some military bases in Florida
All the simulations, studies, etc, all failed to, at least for me, failed to adequately explain the collapse of WTC7 after the initiation of global collapse. I guess I just need more explanation, since I’m not very bright. I get the part about steel losing it’s strength, but I don’t understand how it can turn to dust and fall at free-fall speed. I know about the buckling, but then what?
Also about the put options on the airlines on 9-10? Sure, could be a coincindence. But when you add it all together, it drives me insane. So much circumstantial evidences…
On hand having been through 4 years of college, I say to my self that I’m too ignorant to fully understand, so I should just trust the ‘official’ experts and professionals. But the more I get into, the more I fall into this rabbit hole… Everything is crazy!
Everything just connects like whoa.
The debunkers call us ‘truthers’ crazy and nuts. Why would Bush do 9/11 for OIL. Don’t make sense. That’s what sane people thinks, right? But that’s very superficial in the sense that if you step back a little and try to connect the dots…Everything that has been happening all makes perfect sense. Especially with all the precedents of false flag (yes, they are real) operations. The CIA slanging drugs…The Federal reserve… Bohemian grove… The occult… Operation paper-clip…JFK assassination… USS liberty incident…Mossad operations on 9/11. Mossad spying operations…
But that could be the problem. Connecting these phantom dots.
Conspiracies are crazy!
September 15th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
It’s hard to believe me, I know. Most people only heard stuff here and there, ie. they’re feeling around the elephant in the dark. Not to mention there is just tremendous amount of mis-info out there, so everything is a damn straw man argument.
When people liike SKC says “no, I don’t believe they did it to start a war in Iraq.” It’s not about that! Just in in ancient Rome, the elites have machinations to advance their own agenda. They do not care about you. Everything they do does not not have to make sense to you. Because you are in their mind-prison.
The fact stands everything that has been happening has advanced the agendas of the “hidden ones”…