Freepers Got Peter Arnett Sacked.

[reprehensor]

Just watched the excellent documentary/media criticism DVD, Weapons of Mass Deception, by longtime media critic Danny Schecter.

This is probably not news to longtime DUers, but it was to me, and it will be news to rookie DUers.

Schecter says an official at National Geographic told him that they were Freeped into firing Arnett. Here is a transcript of the salient points from the film (transcription errors are my fault). FOX also bears some responsibility for this feeding frenzy.

What was called the 'FOX Effect' drove all the TV coverage to the right. No network wanted to be accused of being unpatriotic.

...

Veteran correspondent Peter Arnett was targeted by FOX news for his decision to say on Iraqi TV, what he was already saying on MSNBC.

Schecter: ...you didn't go on Iraqi TV to say, "I support Saddam Hussein" did you? Uh, you didn't endorse one side or the other...

Arnett: I didn't endorse one side or the other, it was part of the hysteria that was part of this war, there's a degree of hysteria about every war that America participates in... and this was part of the hyterical reaction and I was basically swept up in that incredible explosion of anger, I think there were 157 cartoons of me in the newspapers the next day. Some of them with me in bed with Saddam Hussein, management called up and said, "Look the pressure is too great, we've had thousands of emails and calls, and it's time, we have to drop you."

...

What I've learned that has gone unreported until now is that those emails were not from the public at large, but part of an orchestrated campaign by Free republic, a right wing online network.

"We were Freeped." an official at National Geographic told me. Explaining that 20,000 emails calling Arnett a traitor, bombarded their executives, who then panicked, and discharged him. The Freepers boasted of their success.

Just thought you should know.

[EVDebs]

1. Operation Mockingbird wants total media compliance n/t

[Southsideirish]

2. They excel at hatred. Its what they do.

[Nite Owl]

3. Hear nothing about him anymore

He just disappeared.
Why is it that now that they know what happened, that this was indeed a right wing organized attack, as have been many others, they can't, won't, seem to ignor it and let the truth be reported. We write until the keyboards wear out and they don't listen much to us. Do these right wing attacks just give them the excuse for doing what they want to do anyway?

[glitch]

4. At what point do these people wise up? I am talking about the media that

believes the freepage and then acts on it. At some point shouldn't they start discounting it for what it is, a small group of nasty people whose message has been artificially amplified?

[Just Me]

5. He "got in the way" of the powers that be. Compare Baghdad then,...

,...to what it is today.

For what? To do what?

Why would anyone destroy an otherwise stable, secular, contained nation to such rubble?

Why would anyone PRETEND their actions have made things better,...for anyone,...considering REALITY?

What the fuck is wrong with people thinking this leadership's actions has somehow improved the world?

:shrug:

WTF is wrong with people?

:cry:

[KoKo]

6. Freeps even drove him off his job with National Geographic Mag...

and I wrote them about it. They never answered me. Fuck them!